There might not have been many participants, but we still deserve our victory! Especially after those hard docking moves around… It was a good 15-20kt from the NE all day, good thing we were not enough boats to run a spinnaker class, with only 5 on board, it would have been “sportif”.
The race committee ran 3 races, once around windward leeward. We won the first 2 by 18 seconds with two nice port starts, but lost the last one to Benedek, who well deserved it!
Here are some photos from the crew and the race committee:
This is the 3rd of 4 races of the 2009 women’s series. We were 4 onboard for that race: Nicole, Andrea, Helen and me. Out of 8 boats, only 3 were all women crew in non-spin category. Which is better than the last 2 races where I had 1 or 0 competition… This was a late start planned because of the light breeze forcasted to be coming from the West. On our way to the marina, the west wind was pretty decent, but as soon as the start line was put in place, the wind died and shifted 180 degrees… creating a downwind start! Well…
Most of us opted for a port tack start, but Kara Vela, a nice huge Freedom 40 came across on a starboard tack and screwed everybody by almost blocking the entire line! Good job guys! We were not too disoriented by their move since we were a little late on the line, so we managed to cut between them and the comitee boat and slip away slowly on a straight downwind to mark “E”, side by side with Liberty Call (our friendly competition!). All of a suddent, out of nowhere, Kara Vela comes back behind us: hauling ass! What??? How can she do that? She’s got her 2 mainsails wing on wing and her prettiness is trucking! She joined us on the “windward side” and the three of us, Liberty Call being sandwiched in the middle, worked our way towards the mark, chatting with each other to make sure they were leaving me enough room to go around (nice people ). As soon as I rounded, Liberty Call followed and took the inside position. We were now upwind and she was the windward boat, so I happily played the “up up up” game with her… hahaha! (my turn!) In such light winds, Salsa Verde seems to do better than Liberty Call, which is surprising knowing their slick (not to say perfect) bottom and new keel. So even from the downwind side, we inched our way away and soon after, we were both on the same point of sail, but going 2 different directions! Weird very light weather…
For the rest of the race, we were pretty lonely. Liberty Call was still a threath from behind because we owe her time, and in those conditions, you never know what can happen! Luckily we managed to keep our concentration and the little bit of wind we could find was just enough to keep us going for the most part. After 2 hours on a 4.9 nm course, Salsa Verde crossed the finish line in first place, and 45 minutes ahead of her friendly competition.
We were welcomed by our favorite “chear leaders”: Roger, Carolee, Matt and Eric! Who were anchored near the finish line. We came to their shoulder for the festivities and planned a cordial full team moon for Liberty Call as they approached the finish line. But to excuse ourselves, we gave them a few beers! Thanks to Eric for the nice pictures taken from Sea Mistress’s mast.
This second win does not garantee anything for the series… Liberty Call could still tie us with the last race next month… That will be exciting!!!
Well, he wanted wind for his birthday, he got more than what he asked for!
An image is worth 1000 words, so what about another video?
If you wondered why we were so far behind, it’s because both our spinnaker and spare halyards snap-shackles blew open when we hoisted the spinnaker… So after fishing the sail out of the water twice, we had a hard time re-hoisting the jib, but finally made it… And everybody else was broaching, but well ahead of us…
This season has been filled with new ways to loose a race, but since we always learned something, we are winners
This was the Women’s #2 race of the year. Nicole, Andrea, Helen, Joan and I left Julington Creek around noon to have time to scrub the hull on the way there. Well… The storms just came out as we did, so we thought: ” it might not last, let’s just do it at Epping later”. Conditions for the motor-sail were a little rough for even thinking about getting in the water. We were completely wet anyway, but in our foul weather gear!
We docked at Epping, registered and looked around to see when Liberty Call would show up… Hum… Unfortunately, no Liberty Call this time around. We were the only all female crew to race, therefore the only ones in our class. 4 other cruiser showed up: Kara Vela, Lothlorien, Incommunicado and Bernoulli. The rain and strong winds continued to beat through the marina as we were ”supposed to clean the hull” while waiting for the skipper’s meeting. Having no competition made us feel good about our lazyness.
The dock felt just like “home” since I was next to Lothlorien, Diana’s Baba 30 who is my neighbor at Mandarin Holiday. The difference is, because of the outgoing tide flowing through our slips and her full keel, she had the hardest time to get out of there and get to the race course. So we were stuck behind until the dock master came with a power boat to turn her boat around and free her from this docking nightmare. Fiew, nobody touched anything!
Good thing we had no competition, because we did not make it to the start line until 1 minute from the start! Oups… Oh well! Even with the barnacles still well attached we passed Kara Vela early on and led the race regardless of our bad tactical moves (ok Dave, we got it!). Rain, wind, more rain and more gusty winds made us take a reef. We were hauling ass upwind at above 8 kt and the main kept dumping more and more water on our faces in the cockpit. We could have shook the reef out on the last leg, but why the struggle when you just want to finish and get dry. Still, Salsa Verde got her first first place overall !!!
Epping forest dock master was kind enough to allow me to leave her there for the week, since the weather was horrible and we were racing out of FYC the following week. Thank you so much!!!!!
PS: no photos of this race… the camera would not have survived!
It was a cold morning in Jacksonville, 33F at 7am. I slept on board the night before, but couldn’t fall asleep more than 1h at a time, not because of my heater struggling to keep the temperature above 60 during the night, just because I was too excited. I couldn’t wait for that day to come! For the first time in my life, not only was I going to single hand Salsa Verde, but I was going to do it in a race! No wonder I could not sleep!
The tide was so low that morning that the bottom of the river was uncovered near the marina. The mud was trying to dry in the early sun. The dock was empty. I knew a few people who were going to do this race, I guess it was too early. I dressed up as if I was going skiing, and started preparing the boat. Installed my proudly home made lazy jacks and started to unroll the main sail into them. Wow, I was sweating after 2 minutes… So I removed some layers, I was not really going to ski anyway! This main is heavy, let me tell you that. Then I removed the intruments cover, the tiller cover and started the engine, with my other hands’ fingers crossed! It worked!!! Yoohoo!!!
At 8am, I was leaving the dock. Stuck in the mud because of the particularly low tide, it was not as pretty as usual. I managed to back up the wrong way (that prop pitch just wins over the rudder when mud is involved…) and u-turn around. That was the start of the adventure.
Winds were 10 to 15 kt out of the north turning to north east during the day. I thought hard about raising the sails to get some practice on the way to the rudder club. But motoring out there in an icesicle position, I had to remove my sailing gloves because the tip of my index and my thumb were frozen. When I put on the big mittains, the sailing option had frozen too. I kept looking back to see if anyone was following… no. The only other boat I saw was Ted, coming from the Navy Jax marina. We arrived at the rudder club at the same time. We were the first ones. Docking by myself at the rudder club was worrying me a little bit, but it went fine. As long as you line up that board against the mean pilling, nothing gets a scratch. Fiew!
Bill, who was in charge of the race, eventually arrived. The other boats too. We were 14 people registered. 3 of which were flying scotts and 1 lazer. At the skipper’s meeting, Bill announced that this was only the second time that a woman participated in the 18 years that this race has happened. The course was announced to be Start (E) – G5 – G7 – G9 – finish (E), all to starboard (approx. 8 miles). So everyone hurried to their boats, and here we went.
I motored off and raised my mainsail. Without a mast person, it takes some time and effort! I was able to raise it by hand until the last 2-3 feet, I had to winch the rest. Then the #3 jib, this one was much easier. I was so happy that the winds were strong enough for me to justify using the #3 that day! The #1 is so much harder to tack…
I made a few tacks around the start line area to get comfortable. I was surprised how easy it was to tack that jib. I had learned a trick at the Christmas party the night before the race. Dave Whites told me an easy way to figure out which end of the starting line is favored. You sail on the line and trim your main perfectly, then you turn around and sail on the line the other way around without adjusting your mainsail. If it is undertrimmed (luffing), the end in front of you is favored, if it is overtrimmed (too full), the end behind you is favored. Magic trick, I quickly figured out that the port end (the pin) was favored. Dave had also told me how the port starts are sometimes beneficial. I told him that I was not going to do it on that race because I did not think I would be quick enough at tacking in front of the crowd. Well, I did it anyway, just because there was too much traffic on the other end of the line. And it worked!!! I was the first boat on the line (almost over early, I had to fall off for a few seconds!) and I blew by everybody. I was ahead of the fleet for the first ¼ of the race. Then Whisper caught up with me because I went too close to the middle of the river where stronger currents were against me. I realized it while looking at a crabtrap… I hate them usually, but that day it was helpful! While we were heading towards G5, I was happy that Whisper was ahead, because I was not sure where the mark was. I had a GPS, but it was a little too far inside the boat. Whisper is faster than me on a closehaul. He was going away slowly, but he had his #1 genoa up. So when a good gust came along, he did not reach the main sheet quick enough, he rounded completely! His genoa popped the wrong way around, he was not able to come back. He had to let it go, tack and bring it back around. I’m sure he was not happy, this sail takes a long time to winch! I know because by the time he did all that, I had gotten closer and closer to him! I could almost see him sweat!!! Ok, not that much… but was I happy with my #3? Oh yeah!!! We tacked around G5 and headed to G7, then G9. This leg was a beam – broad reach. Sometimes I think I was gaining on him, sometimes not… It was tight. But the last leg, from G9 to the finish, was a running leg. That’s where he was happy with his #1… And I was not too fast with my #3… So I he gained enough on me to win… by 2 minutes 44 seconds. Not bad for my first single hand race! (Whisper is a C&C 38, with a handicap of 114, Salsa Verde’s handicap is 135. So he owed me 21 seconds per mile…) clic to see results.
Whisper and I sailed back to Julington Creek together on a broad reach under the nice warmer afternoon sun. It would have been fun to wait for the results at the Rudder Club, but the rest of the fleet was so far behind I would probably have had to come back after sunset! And I don’t mind docking by myself, but it’s safer in daylight Plus, why put the sails down, and up, and down again… too much work…
This day was a memorable one for me and for all the little muscles that I feel now and did not even know existed! Thanks mother nature for such perfect sailing conditions. The cold morning just made it a better adventure!
Watch for me next year… I’ll be prepared!
Nate has been sketching a lot of different logos for our future shirts… We brainstormed about it last Friday and he did some modifications while he was trying to teach me all I have to know about photoshop! Well, the first thing I learned is that this is a complicated software… Anyway, I’m really thankful for his great work and time. So here’s the latest logo drawing that he did. We are planning on redoing the wave pattern, to make it a little more splashing, but we want to keep it simple. Please let us know what you think!
So I just received my PHRF certificate in the mail yesterday… To my surprise, I got a rating of 135!!! I was expecting 141, like any other J/30 around here. But no… -3 for a SPL of 12.5 and -3 for a 163% genoa. It’s class legal, but it cost a lot in PHRF apparently!
So guys, we’ll just have to work harder!!!
Bring it on
Steam or boil the potatoes until tender. While the potatoes are cooking, place the mustard, lemon juice, parsley, dill, oil, salt and pepper in a food processor and process until finely chopped. Toss the hot potatoes in the salsa verde and serve with roasted garlic baked chicken. Serves 4.
Plus, why put the sails down, and up, and down again… too much work…
