Day 6 (Finally) and more

Sorry for my absence.

Day 6 of the 2009 Laser Masters Worlds in Halifax was totally frustrating, especially for Kim Couranz, Ted Morgan's wife. They both sailed in the same radial division and Kim couldn't seem to get her nose in front of Ted the entire regatta. Now she was not only ahead of Ted, but ahead of everybody! On the last leg of a very shifty, up and down race which found our division (and the other 3 that started ahead of us) turned inside out several times and we weren't even close to finishing.

The RC abandoned all 4 races, much to our glee and Kim's disappointment.

Bottom line for me was that my first Laser Masters Worlds exceeded my expectations. Beautiful venue, great sailing for the most part, and a lot of very fit old guys and gals which inspires me to keep going. I finished better than I thought I would, with a couple of top 10s.

The 2010 season has not been much to write about. A painful abcess on my back kept me off the water for a while, then the dreaded back spasms cost me another month. But things are looking up.

The Crab Claw Regatta a couple of weeks ago at SSA was a lot of fun. Due to great RC work, we got in 7 races, with Brady White dominating the fleet. He said he was constantly changing gears, sailing with his cunningham control in his hand. How many hands does he have? I finished barely in the top half, but had pretty good speed most of the time.

Looking back, I made at least 4 major mistakes that kept me in my usual spot in the standings:

1. With an ebb tide pushing us up the weather leg, I sailed out to the right too far and badly overstood. We were moving up the leg a lot faster that I thought, and it is getting harder and harder to look over my shoulder at the mark, so I didn't until it was too late.


2. I again misjudged the tide at a leeward mark and got spept into it among a large bunch of boats. The turn was very costly, as I lost at least 10 boats.


3. After finally getting my nose in front of Roger Link, I tried to lee bow him as he approached the weather mark on starboard. I blew the tack, he rolled me, then we both had to tack to make the mark anyway, losing several more boats. Moral, never trust that your competitor on starboard is on the layline. Figure it out for yourself. A simple duck, and I would have beaten Roger and several others to the mark easily.


4. So I thought I could cross Mike Heffernan on port approaching the starboard tack layline. Misjudged it badly, and had to do my turns. Lost gobs of boats. I had a good finish going, too. I guess Stuart Walker is right. We always find ways to finish where we think we deserve to finish.

Now we're off to the Chesapeake Bay Masters Championship in Fishing Bay, VA. My goal is to avoid major mistakes and to sail more like a "true competitor" and not so much like a "code competitor" as Stuart Walker defines the terms in his recent book "The Code of Competition". I recommend this book highly if you want to learn why you do many of the things you do on the race course.