Well, no, not THAT Admiral's Cup. I refer to the "slow boat division" of the annual PICYA Lipton Challenge match, in which Bay Area yacht clubs send their champions/whoever they can rope in to compete in four divisions on the Cityfront. For many years it has been scheduled the same weekend as the Plastic Classic, which is why you never see Carlos or Bonito at the PC - we are the "fastest slow boats of record" at our respective clubs. Here's how this year's races went.
For Carlos, a lot happened before the start. First we had to raise the mast because we had prepared the boat for trailering to Lake Tahoe for vacation, only to be thwarted by the S Tahoe fire (we brought our El Toro and tents instead, and camped at Stampede reservoir). Then halfway to GGYC we went through a ferry wake and the motor almost died, then refused to go over about quarter speed. After much cursing and fiddling we decided that some gunk must have been stirred up by the wave action and there was nothing more we could do to the motor. So we quickly raised sails and motor-sailed as fast as possible. The GPS said we would be 10 minutes late for the start, so I radioed the committee to tell them we "may or may not make the start". They sweetly said they would look out for us.
If you are ever cought in a similar situation, the best thing to do is to pinch like mad (i.e. luff the sails a bit), since the motor is giving you extra forward speed independent of the wind and therefore you err on the side of pointing. Eventually the ebb got stronger, the wind filled in more, and the GPS started sounding more optimistic so we called back to say we'd make it after all. But when we got there, two of our most fearsome competitors were nowhere to be found. Bonito and the daughty Rhodes 19 crew, who out-hiked the entire fleet a couple of years ago, were MIA. We did find Elaine, and at first it looked like we'd have a match race, but then an Islander 28 lumbered across the line with us and the race was on.
Since we had to keep what sails we had on deck to make the start, we sailed the first race with the genoa. We had a sub-optimal start (i.e. Elaine was sitting on us firmly while we both headed for the ebb outside), but as they had their jib up I decided to try going through their lee, which normally would be considered suicidal. In this case it sort of worked, we fell back into their wind shadow but then crept up until we were pretty even, though we never did get into a good leebow. About this time we heard some radio traffic from Bonito, who had apparantly just arrived at the starting line. It was a bit confusing because the PRO sounded exactly like Michael Andrews on the radio, so it could have been Michael talking to himself for all I knew, but at least we knew they were accounted for. The Islander had disappeared behind us, they finished about 45 minutes later than the rest of us with a very sorry looking genoa.
I think we tacked first into Blackhaller and just crossed Elaine, after all the usual flukiness around the mark we were in the lead, which we promptly squandered on an interminable spinnaker set. Elaine went inside to escape the ebb, we went outside for more wind and because that's where the pole was set.
On the run we first watched Elaine pull even and then a bit ahead of us, then the wind started improving and we had a better jybe, came into the bottom mark with a decent lead. Somehow we kept the genoa going well and stayed clear of the gaggles of other boats on the way to the finish, got the gun. Bonito had meanwhile clawed their way past the Islander and even passed Elaine near the end, to get second. We went back to the club to change down to class jib and visit the facilities. Only half a dozen people asked us whether we were planning on sailing the second race (mostly concerned RYC folks). Hey, we won a race, leave us pee in peace, eh?
If race 1 was a battle of the engines/alarm clocks and headsail choice, race 2 was about avoiding other boats (OK, and the building flood). First, there were about 8 other classes competing on Cityfront that day - an international collection of Etchells, more J-boats than I could count, and an occasional Melges skimming along. Some of them even tried to go through our start line just as we were starting - I saw a bunch of J105s bearing down on Pat at our start, mercifully he was on starboard. We started a bit off the pace again, but made up for it with some nice close tacks to the shore. Gotta love those lifts inside in a flood.
Somehow we ended up ahead of Bonito again at the top mark, they pulled even after the rounding, and we both headed off for Alcatraz on our way to YRA 21. Here is where the plot thickens. Taking a break from trying to out-psyche Michael under spinnaker (a hard task, I assure you), I look behind me and what do I see? A big container ship bearing down on me! Still a couple miles off, but those things can move, and if they give you 5 horns you are out of the race, so we had to do some quick figuring. They looked like they were heading right of Alcatraz (probably wanted to take photos of the J105s and Etchells from close up), and were just starting to change from apparently heading left of us to right at our stern, when I noticed Bonito diverging a bit to our right. Then lo and behold, they jybed and headed off to the Cityfront! From discussion afterward, they didn't think we could make it across the inbound ship. First we checked that we could make it past the container ship, then we checked the course sheet, then the GPS, then the chart... by that time Bonito was way off to the right and we were left of Alcatraz, and the container ship was headed for Oakland, missing us by a good quarter mile.
So we got to YRA 21 after a slight right turn at Alcatraz, and Bonito had got pinned by the container ship and ANOTHER big vessel that was following it. They came in on a fast spinny reach, but we had sailed a much shorter course and were around and heading up to Fort Mason, when - the jib tensioner broke. Put as much as we could on the regular halyard with a winch, then worked out a jury-rig as we stayed in the cone of Alcatraz and counted our blessings. The rest of the race was about staying out of the flood without running out of wind along Fort Mason, and of course staying clear of all those other boats. We managed to stay between Bonito and the finish, got our second gun of the day, while Elaine beat the Islander by half an hour again. You could hear our whoops of joy on the container ship!
Day 2 was a bit anti-climactic. With two firsts, all we had to do was come in third (we'd then win on the tie-breaker), and this time Elaine didn't show, having clinched third place unless the Islander magically beat a Tuna in a breeze. So all we had to do was sail around the course without hitting anything or going too close to Anita Rock like we did last year. But we tried to give Michael a decent run for his money, without risking much. This, as you probably know already, is a recipe for being soundly defeated, and so we were. We were actually only a couple of boatlengths back at the top mark, but after that the fire wasn't in us and somehow the lifts didn't materialize, the jib tensioner broke for good, and the spinny sets got worse if anything. But we had some great jybes!
We finished a couple of minutes behind Bonito, still miles ahead of the hapless Islander, and celebrated our series win with some draft British ale that threatened to froth all over the boat, and then clubhouse before we got the technique down. The best part of Sunday was the ride back, a glorious spinnaker broad reach on port along the "great circle" to Richmond with the wind in the high 20s and the waves at our back. We hit 13.5 on the GPS one time, OK so there was a mild flood, but we must have been going 12 or so through the water. With the backstay out all the way she tracked like a dream, a lot of long happy rides down waves. May you all be so blessed.
Jan Grygier
Carlos
hydrophilos at earthlink.net
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