A beautiful sunny, mild evening with a strong southerly sea breeze awaited us for the second of our adventures into Twilight racing as an all girls team. There were 15 yachts in the event. We had a good start with Anne managing to get us over the line well in contention. It all went down hill from there. We had spent quite a bit of time out on the water just before the race and had furled the jib because of the gusty wind condition, however we raced on a full jib and managed the yacht quite well. The first leg, tacking into the wind was not a good leg and we were slipping behind. The main issue seems that when the yacht is on the Port tack she cannot point into the wind well at all. We were not too far behind the Couta boat Pelican at the first mark and were surprised to see that she hit the buoy and just kept on racing. She should have taken a penalty 360 degree sail around the buoy but didn't. After a chat about the issue we decided there was little point in protesting. We decided to save it for later! The reach across to the second mark was less eventful than in the first race. The wind however was much stronger and more consistent. The run back to the starting buoy was great with the yacht reaching 6 knots at times and we were gaining on the guys, but were still second last! Unfortunately we had to tack up again to the last turn before the run home and we again lost ground. Port tack is very difficult in Pathfinder and most disappointing. We had a good run home and were gaining on the Pelican. After crossing the finish line we went to deeply into the bay in which the boats were moored and became stuck on the mud! Seeking help from other finished yachts proved unproductive as no one really was watching. What could we do? I knew that it was possible to refloat a yacht by making it heel over and with Anne's encouragement, we did just that! The three of us shifted our weight to one side of the yacht and she came free! The decision was made to say nothing unless we were asked! Only one person thought we might have been stuck and that was Janet's partner and we admitted to nothing.
Racing is an adventure and we must all admit to learning a lot. Some of our tacks were poor, some were great! As a team we work well and we will improve. We need to get coach Harry to have another think about the Port tack when he gets back to Tasmania from his trip to Sydney.
I just hope I am pulling my weight. Bruises galore again this week. How to prevent them is an issue. We had a good laugh and fortunately no one is too precious about the whole thing. The girls are great to sail with and even now the nerves are diminishing. We did feel that the wind was as fresh as we were prepared to sail in - about 20 knots - and we were really stretching our competence to the limit. Tacking and what each crew member does what is an area we still need t work on. By the way we were 14th out of 15. But for fun and pleasure - 10 out of 10. 'Til next time...
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