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Last week our tune up race was cancelled. Not sure what the reason was, other than it was cold and raining earlier. Five boats still went out to play.
This Saturday we managed to have a race. There were only 3 boats in the red fleet. Keeldragger was up against an S2 7.9 and a 6.9. The odds weren't very good. Winds were 5-10 from 160 degrees and generally pretty light. Tomasz, wife (and future Keeldragger) crewed. The weather was quite different than what we had a couple of days ago--i.e. 25kts. Today was calm, clear, and generally beautiful except for the light winds.
We flew the new 155% kevlar genoa today. This is the third time we've bent on the sail and the first chance to race with it. Overall, it's a huge improvement over the last dacron 155% cruising sail I had been racing with. One issue... It's a little broad at the head and it's getting caught at the masthead when we tack.
We had the best start out of the 3 boats. The S2 6.9 was nowhere near the line... still motoring towards the course at the time of the start. We found out later that she was stuck in the mud in the South part of the lake. We appreciated the head start.
I decided to stay on starboard tack and run to the East side. I know that I know better than to go to the wrong side, but I did it anyways. We were second to the first mark (thanks to the head start), but decided to go wing-and-wing instead of trying to fly the spinnaker short handed. The S2 6.9 that gave us a head start had caught up with us by the end of leg 2.
We fought to maintain a reasonably close third place position hoping that our handicap would push us up a point. Amazingly Tomasz agreed to fly the spinnaker for the second run. In spite of being short-handed, we managed to fly the chute with no major c-f's. In fact, not even one STFU from the crew.
On the last leg, we drive right past the S2 7.9. How did this happen? Well, they spent five minutes sitting on top of a berm next to the channel. We'll take all the help we can get.
We finished 3rd across the line.... close enough to move up to second with the handicap? We thought it would be close. After the race, we learned that we corrected over both boats. First place today. Not bad for race #1.
Boy, was this a long weekend. This is my second consecutive weekend regatta. In order to preserve my marriage, I decided to take the Admiral out for a nice steak dinner at Alexander's (that gets me out of trouble for at least this weekend). I'm organizing the annual J. Holt Thomas Regatta for the second year in a row. In addition to sailing all day Sat and Sun, I have to organize the awards, dinner, cocktail party, lunch, kegs, t-shirts, and perform quality assurance for the late night entertainment. Next weekend will be yet another regatta.
It's kind of a bittersweet moment... late September thru early October is my favorite time of the year to go sailing. The summer heat has started to fade and the fall winds are kicking in. The ducks, geese, and white pelicans have begun their migration. The J. Holt Thomas Regatta is the last Star sailing event of the year (at least in Peoria) and soon it will be time to break down old 6001 and put her into storage until next Spring.
Friday evening we had the standard rigging party and regatta registration, which basically means sitting around a keg of Bud Light and shooting the breeze. Since we wound up hosting the 4th District Finale last weekend (no water in Springfield), there were only one or two new boats travelling to the regatta. Several participants already had their boats at the club and were planning to arrive Saturday morning.
I woke up about 5am Saturday morning. It was raining outside and there was a bit of lightening and thunder. I logged onto the computer and looked at the weather radar... looked like most of the crud would pass over by 8 or 9 o'clock. I arrived at the club around 7:30 am. It will still raining outside, with occasional thunder. I was worried that we would wind up cancelling the race. After about 8am, the sky started to clear up a bit. There was a bit of a sprinkle outside but the low clouds had moved out and there was no more thunder.
Race #1: We had a postponement for race #1. Shortly after the postponement, the sky cleared up even more--we launched all of the boats and headed for the course. Unlike the previous week, I actually managed to get a nice start--closing the door on a couple of other boats near the committee boat. 7087 was late to the course due to a malfunctioning jib zipper or perhaps Irish whiskey. We took a hitch to the West side along with most of the other boats. 7814 went way to far to the right and wound up getting stuck. In fact, they were parked there so long I almost thought Blair Gambill was at the helm. During the course of the race, we crossed paths with a few boats that we normally don't see at the back of the course. In fact, we saw an awful lot of 8111. Every time we crossed paths, we'd yell the standard insult , "Gold Star, b*tch!". It was sort of a tribute to Star sailing champion Bill Buchan. 6001 is a Buchan "Gold Star" model and it seems appropriate that we represent. The challenge with this race is that we were sailing in the rain. The yarn telltales were stuck against the sails so it was difficult to drive the boat for optimum speed. I'm pretty sure my crew didn't notice that the telltales weren't moving since he usually is too busy singing to notice such details. We finished 10th.
Following race #1, lunch was delivered by way of a Boston Whaler.
Race #2: We had another good start. Three boats were OCS. 7602 sailing for some distance before turning back to clear the line. The wind died on the last leg. We passed 7566 and were threatening 8111 at the finish. The slow drift to the finish line was agonizing. The Polish crew started to go into condition 90 mode and would not stop complaining and whining. Finally, I told him to shut the "F" up. He threatened to throw me into the water. Then, I asked him to "Pretty please with sugar on top, shut the 'F' up." His response, "No problem. All you had to do is ask nicely." I savored the next 180 seconds of peace and quiet. 8111 finally crossed the line and the rest of the boats started to cheer. We crossed a bit later. Well behind us was 7602. They slugged it out to the finish line only to discover that they would receive a DNF since they didn't make the time limit. Ouch.
Immediately after our finish, we headed for the club. I figured the odds of a third race as slim to none. This worked in our favor--not because we were early to the hoist, but a spectator pontoon boat delivered emergency rations of beer. Thanks for the rescue Norm!
After hauling the boat, I went home and helped the admiral make appetizers (sorry, don't know how to spell whore derves) for the cocktail party. The cocktail party was hosted by the Sanders. We had a great time at their place--put a good dent in the new Illinois River Star Fleet travelling bar and killed a large bottle of Captain Morgan. After the cocktail party, we went down to the Ivy Club for a nice dinner. We had dinner in the Commodore's room, which is adjacent to the main dining room. A private party was booked in the main dining room. It was a funeral party or celebration for a man who had died about a year ago. They had a GREAT jazz band. The Polish crew crashed the funeral party and jumped in the dance line when they started playing "When the Saints Go Marching In". An elderly lady called him on it and told him that he had to dance with her (and her poodle) if he was going to crash the party.
Following dinner, it was time to put the "black credit cards" to use. We have an annual tradition of going to "Big Al's" for entertainment during the regatta weekend. Our fleet has it's own "Big Al", who hooked us up with the lifetime passes for World Famous entertainment. The admirial accompanied me to see the entertainment.... I lost a couple of dollar bills but mostly stayed out of trouble since I was under close supervision. The Polish Fo did a table dance for a few gals sitting at another table. They seemed pretty entertained by his hootenanny.
I received a call from the Polish crew early on Sunday morning. At first I thought Nick Nolte was on the line. I heard this gruff, "I have been drinking whiskey all night" voice and was informed that I needed to provide transportation for my crew since he did not drive himself home (thank God) after closing the bars downtown--at 4AM.
After picking up my crew, we head down to the club. Everyone is launching their boats and getting them into the water early. This is pretty impressive considering the number of gentlement who participated in the late night entertainment. While launching the boats, we smell a little bit of ozone from the hoist. The hoist engine just happens to burn out while the last Star is launched. Everyone is able to get to the race course, however, the problem of getting everyone back out was looming.
Race #3. We had an ok start and managed to yell "Gold Star" a couple more times to 8111 before he pulled away. While going downwind, we sailed next to 8077 for a while. I think the skipper was a little peeved at us and muttered something about running him down. I was careful enough to keep my distance and we wound up passing him. I was headed pretty close to dead-downwind and trying to maintain my course to the gate. Unfortunately, 8077 had to drop out due to an afternoon committment, so we didn't have an opportunity to yell "Gold Star".
Race #4: The wind starts to blow and the skipper of 8111 says "See Ya!". Later in the race, he yells "Gold Star" as he's headed in the opposite direction--about 1/2 leg ahead of us. He goes on to win the race. Meanwhile, we're struggling with all of the wind. Old 6001 just isn't set up for heavier air. We're healing 40 degrees while these new 8xxx series boats are sailing on their feet and hauling ass. During our first run, we briefly get up onto plane. 8036 is way ahead of us and rocking quite a bit. From our perspective, it looks like he dips his whisker pole into the piss two or three times. Usually, this is the kiss of death. Time to put Emmetti Spars on speed dial. At the same time, 7566 performs the most impressive mast inversion technique I have seen. Amazingly, no lost masts--yet. We get to the gate and start to round only to have the main ratchet block lock up while I'm trying to reel in the mainsheet. After we straighten it out, we sail for a few minutes and then get into trouble again. The wind is blowing pretty hard and I oversteer while tacking. We wind up in irons. We sail to the windward mark and are coming in on starboard tack when 7087 pokes his nose inside the mark on port tack. We yell at him and he yells back... then 7087 takes us out for 5 or 6 boatlengths before we can head down for the offset. I'm pretty sure this wasn't intentional. Now we're on a mission to beat 7087. On the last windward leg, 7533 breaks his mast. We finish ahead of 7087 and 7566 finishes ahead of us.
Once back at the club, we are confronted with the hoist issue. We do not have a hot spare hoist. We're rescued by a couple of guys at the club who are able to rig a chainpull on the stiff-leg. This chainpull is about 20:1. It takes about 3.5 hours to get all of the boats out of the water. The chainpull jammed a couple of times, which made some Star sailors very nervous about their boats. It's hard to imagine how these people can obsess about their boats when they don't even own a Buchan Gold Star.
Normally, the 4th District Finale is held on Lake Springfield. This year was different. Due to low water on the lake, the regatta was moved to the Illinois River. I was disappointed about not getting down to Springfield, but not having to break the boat apart and travel made life much easier.
Friday night, I attended the rigging party which mostly consisted of drinking draft beer and eating popcorn out of a cardboard box. I learned that there was some criticism of my c*blocking my standard Polish crew during the Green Star last month. I am fully aware that implementation of a c*block is usually a pretty terrible thing to do but in some cases it is fully justified. In this particular case, it wasn't exactly justified, however, the Polish crew definitely would have c*blocked himself if given the opportunity. There is more than enough empirical evidence to back me up on this. Besides, the entertainment value was well worth having to listen to all of the whining and complaining after the fact. I would also add that the Polish crew was c*blocked again a couple of weeks ago. This time, it was by a co-worker who plays for Jamm Sammich.
Saturday's race was postponed. The fog was thick and there was absolutely no wind. After sitting around for an hour or so drinking coffee, we could see a slight breeze fill in from the South. It was interesting because you could see darker spots on the water where the river current was moving. Everyone finally launched their boats and sailed to the course. Since there was an IORF PHRF race scheduled, we had to share the course. We started 5 minutes ahead of the IORF fleet.
Race #1 was a course 4 in light wind. I had a terrible start for the first race. The wind was very light and I just could not get up to speed. I was about 10-15 boat lengths behind the rest of the fleet when the gun went off. Rick Br. took notice of my wonderful start and gave me a lecture about it later in the day (father and son both lectured me that day--i'm a slow learner). We picked up a bit some a few boats on the next couple of legs. I pulled some kind of donkey move at the first leward gate and fouled another boat (I think it was 7634?). Already in last place, I did a 720... what difference did it make at this point as I was already sucking major ass? I worked some mojo the next couple of legs and wound up beating a couple of boats. I was pretty excited about not being in last place after a few serious screw ups.
The second race was a course 4, still in light wind. My start was better than the previous race, but still sucked. Overall, I sailed much better in this race. This is one race where patience paid off. I think I was in front of only one boat at the last windward mark. All of the rock stars took a hard left and went to the West side. I watched 8036 take a hitch to the right toward the East side. Everyone knows that Tupac is way better than Biggie. I decided to hang with my brothers on the west side, but I wasn't hard core rappin'. I was a little more in the middle. I finished in front of 4 or 5 boats, including 8036. To own a Folli may be to own a masterpiece, but to own a Buchan isn't suck'n... ok well maybe it is. To put it another way, a Folli may be a work of art, but a Buchan is a real piece of work. At the end of day 1, 3 of 4 skippers from the Illinois River Fleet are tied with 20 points each. This sucks, but at least I wasn't in last place! Later, I learned that I have become the standard insult out on the race course. If you want to piss off another sailor who had a bad race or two, ask them where 6001 is---must be right in front of you.
We had a cocktail party later in the evening on the covered barge. I received my first lecture of the evening on how I would do a little better if I showed up at the starting line on time. This was followed by the Lobster Boil where I received my second lecture on why I shouldn't have jibed the previous week. After dinner, a few individuals went downtown for the usual after-dinner "entertainment". I decided not to go in spite of having permission from the admirial. I thought it would be better to collect a few brownie points since I have three consecutive weekend regattas followed by a week hunting trip in North Dakota and another week in Las Vegas for a conference. This next weekend, the admirial is out of town--I'm planning to finance the junior college tuition of a few single mothers and have baby oil rubbed all over my Keeldragger shirt.
On Sunday things looked very different than the previous day. There was no fog on the river. We had a bit of a breeze and the forecast looked great. I had a much better start on Race #3. This time I was one the line as the gun went off--close enough to 8111 to hear him ask if he can tack in front of me. Most of the fleet went to the Tupac side of the course. I quickly learned that I can't point or keep up with boats with sail numbers that have a "7" or "8" as their first digit. I narrowed down my problem to the following: a) the boat, b) the old "North" sails, or c) my stupidity. At the first leward mark, we had a bit of a charlie foxtrot. The little switch on the mainsheet rachet block someone turned and the block was siezed. We lost several boat lengths trying to reel in the mainsheet and I was already at the back of the fleet. We wound up finishing race #3 in dead last position.
The breeze picked up a bit for Race #4. The Slussmaster put the old school hiking vest to good use. Again, we were challenged in keeping up with the newer Stars (anything built after 1976, in our case). On the first downwind leg, we found ourselves rocking a bit. I was a bit uncomfortable until I looked ahead of us--another boat was rocking to the point where it appeared that they dipped their whisker pole into the piss a couple of times. Kids, please do not try this stunt at home unless you have insurance on your mast and a low deductible. The last time I saw a Star dip their whisker pole into the water they lost their mast. Towards the beginning or leg 3, I oversteered during a tack and my crew and I both failed to get to the windward side of the boat. He rounded up and then wound up in irons. The only way I can explain this screw up is that someone must have been taking pictures of us or shooting video at the time. We sailed well the rest of leg 3 and wound up between 7533 "Big Al" and 7078. We blanketed 7533 and let 7078 slip by. Big Al beat us to the gate, but kindly wrapped his jib around his forestay 3 or 4 times. We pulled ahead and went right. 7078 went left. We made big gains by going right--came close to a couple of boats that had been way ahead of us. We finished ahead of two boats at the end, 7078 and 7533. This secured our victory ahead of both boats in the final standings.
This was the last day of racing for the season before the 4th District Finale and the J. Holt Thomas. According to Patrick, all I had to do is beat Big Al in one of two races and I would have beaten him for the season. Needless to say, I sailed bad enough to get a 1/2 hour lecture from Larry on whether I should have or have not jibed at the windward mark.
Today was the day of the mysterious and evil second race. Due to slight mixup, the race committee announced that we would be having two races. This was great because I was sailing single-handed and we had enough wind to wear me out... I had a bit of a cold and was congested. On the first downwind leg of race #1, I made an initial attempt to go wing & wing with the spinnaker pole. As soon as I left the helm, the boat headed up about 90 degrees.... I said the hell with it and tried to steer a course that would put some wind in the headsail without the pole. It didn't work very well. While I was screwing the pooch downwind, my upwind sailing went very well. I wound up beating Fool's Prayer both races.
This was the final Wednesday race of the year. Crew included the Polish Fo, Kim Master B, Kelly Bedi & her beotch Manpreet. Overall the race was uneventful: we didn't T-bone anyone while on port tack, no power boats barged the line, we didn't round up and get three inches of water in the cockpit, we didn't lose the spinnaker turtle, there were no electrical fires, and it wasn't even condition 90. We finished 6 out of 9. After the race, we had our usual pizza and pitchers of beer at the Ivy Club and then retired to the Firehouse for even more beer.
This morning I was worried that my crew wasn't going to show up. I got up before the crack of dawn and came down to the boat. I still had to put the boat back together from the Green Star. Tomasz was supposed to go to early mass and show up around 7:20am to help raise the mast, etc. When he didn't show up, I called him and woke his ass up. Fifteen minutes later, he shows up and we start working on the boat (I had most of the work finished by this point). While we were working on the boat, Tomasz had a hard on about the boom vang. For some reason he kept demanding that I check to make sure it was rigged correctly. I was busy working on other things a deliberately ignored his requests just to piss him off. This was in retaliation for him blairing Polish porno music from his car so early in the morning. Eventually, I looked at the vang--couldn't figure out what the fuss was about since it was set up ok.
The wind was very patch today. The course was windward-leward and the wind was coming out of somewhere between west and north/northwest. There were four boats racing today. During the first race, we were last around the first pin, but managed to sneek in front of Patrick just after rounding the mark. Tomasz starts taunting and talking smack to Patrick and I cannot get him to shut the hell up. I told Tomasz to keep his mouth shut and pay attention to sailing so he doesn't jinx the race. Well, he did. Patrick moved ahead to win the race and we came in last place.
The second race was more of a challenge. We found ourselves at the back of the fleet pretty early. There were a couple of dark spots on the river with some pretty big holes. Patrick and Al went to the right and got left out to dry. We went left and found some wind and managed to truck right on by Patrick and Al. Fred Br. was already well in first place. We went left earlier than we did and made out like a bandit. On the way down to the finish (4 leg finish downwind), we find ourselves in a major hole and cannot figure out where the wind is. At one point I think we were sailing backwards against the river current. Patrick catches a zephyr or something and creeps right past us as we are lying still. Al went to Al'sville so he gains on us but has too much distance to make up. Fred Br. gets mad props--he wound up doing a horizon job on the "hole" fleet.
This was a fun race. We had 12-20mph WNW winds. The race committee set up a triangle course. There were only three of us in the red fleet and for the most part we were just match racing with Fool's Prayer. As usual, I ensured that the boat was overpowered by flying the 155% and an unreefed main. We had a great start on port tack. We were the second boat to the windward mark, but the genoa sheet hung up on the mast during our last tack and we watched Fool's Prayer sail right past us. We followed Fool's Prayer for the next few legs. On the last windward leg, we found ourselves in a tacking duel with Fool's Prayer. We somehow managed to get the upper hand and finished up on a port tack across the line.
I should note that zero beers were consumed and the Polish crew did not even complain about the triangle course. Great success.
This is a late entry... Too much work and not enough time to waste over the last couple of weeks. Here is the brief summary:
Friday:
- We followed Big Al from Peoria to Racine.
- Al likes to drive 85 mph when he tows his boat.
- My Ford Expedition will eat $56 worth of gas between Peoria and Racine when towing a Star at 85 mph.
- The Corner House has great prime rib.
- The Radisson was mediocre at best.
- The bars in Racine were fun.
- The captain c* blocked the crew three times in one evening. Score a hat trick for the captain. Blocks used include "Hey your wife just called and she wants you to call her back", "I can't believe you're hitting on these gals when you are engaged to be married", and "Hey is your wife coming up to watch the races tomorrow."
- Big Al, Chuck, Greg, and Patrick couldn't hang with the skipper and the Polish crew at the bars.
- The skipper called it a night at 2:30AM.
- The Polish crew closed the bars, came back to the hotel, and punched the skipper because of the c*blocks.
Saturday Pre-Race:
- The skipper woke up at sunrise and noticed that there were about 50 red poker chips scattered across the floor.
- The skipper went for a walk around the harbor... when walking back around the hotel he noticed that there was a string of red poker chips heading towards the bar.. about one every thirty feet.
- Unsolved mystery: why the hell did the Polish crew re-enact Hansel & Gretel with red poker chips from the bar?
- Skipper ran into Patrick and drove to the Piggly Wiggly for breakfast stuff.
- Picked up Polish Crew--he managed to get himself out of bed although he was still drunk.
- Arrived at Racine Yacht Club
- Finished Rigging the boat.
Saturday Races:
- Sailed out of the harbor but no wind on the lake.
- Towed out to the race cource by a Boston Whaler
- Polish crew went swimming. He Swam to the race committee boat and physically checked in.
- Wind finally came up from SSE and we had enough to race the first race.
- Three races total: 1) very light wind. 2) medium wind. 3) much more wind and a few waves/chop.
- The skipper did a HUGE favor for Patrick by not pushing him over the line at the start of the first race.
- We ended the day in 2nd to last place ahead of Al and the Sherriff.
- Al lost a whisker pole and picked it back up.
- Patrick lost a crew and picked him back up.
- Patrick would not have picked up said crew if the rules did not require starting and finishing with crew.
- Chuck, who crewed for Patrick, now uses an F-word prefix in front of the word "Star".
- Nielson won all three races--not that I could tell from where I was at.
- There was a power boat, helicopter, and lamborghini poker run which went right thru the regatta course. Well, the lamborghini's were on land. Skipper and Crew flipped the bird to the power boats and helicopters hoping that we could later find and record the footage of our bird flipping on ESPN. Skipper was also mooning the power boats, but this was inadvertent.
Saturday Post-Race
- Made a trip to West Marine.
- Took a power nap.
- Went back to RYC for dinner. This was a brat/polish sausage cookout (no pun on the crew). The homemade potato salad was really good.
- Drank a couple of beers.
- Went out with the Polish crew to the bars in downtown Racine. The Skipper promised to hold off on the c*blocks and allow the Polish crew to c*block himself as he always does.
- Hopped bars until we closed the Ivanhoe. I think they turned on the lights and kicked us out at 2:30AM.
Sunday Race:
- The Skipper was hung over.
- Similar to the day before, there was enough breeze to get us off shore and then the false wind died.
- The race was postponed until the wind came up.
- The skipper had a kick ass start. He was fouled by the Sherriff... Skipper was closing the door and pushing a couple of boats up. The Sherriff didn't clear and his boom hit our rig. Told Sherriff to do a 720 but he did not comply. I didn't protest but was a little pissed to find that we went from being one of the first boats to dead last at the first pin.
- We managed to get back in front of the Sherriff on the second windward leg and stayed in front until the finish.
- Al had a good race--finished in 10th place and beat Patrick.
- Second race was not started due to a discrepancy in race committee vs. regatta sailing instructions on time cutoff for starting second race.
Results: Day 1 finished in 3rd to last ahead of Al and the Sherriff. Day 2 finished 2nd to last in front of Sherriff. Final result: 2nd to last. Neilson won the regatta with an exclamation point---first place for all four races.
Tomasz and the Admiral crewed this evening. We had a great start. We were right on the line at the committee boat (which was heavily favored). We stayed on starboard tack and maintained our position towards the front of the fleet. About two thirds to the windward mark the wind started to weaken. We tacked and stalled the boat in light air. Baby Wojda was driving a Capri 22 and taught us that we could not point worth a darn and our boatspeed sucked. It took us a while to start moving again and several boats were ahead of us by the time we rounded the windward mark. Although we finished a couple of minutes ahead of Boa Vida, we made their day when we posted the corrected results.... they beat us by less than a second.