The Gatekeeper!
At Marcel's suggestion, Greg, Autumn, and I set up a leeward gate to avoid the inevitable "protest alley" at the leeward mark. It seemed about 50/50 on pin choices, thus splitting the fleet and avoiding the Bay Bridge metering light traffic back-up. We think it worked pretty well because the only protest yell we heard was "Starboard!" on boat 1260 after the start on the 4th race.
Marcel promptly did about 3 X 360s to absolve themselves.
We got in five races: course 1, 1X2, 1, 3, 3 in excellent conditions; a 1.5 knot flood with a SW breeze of 7-12 kts. The SW course setup took out the "tacking in shallow water" option, so there was no major favored side of the course. Team Chris/Scott on 1393 took the bullet for the first 4 races, with Moe 1717 grabbing the last bullet to give them 3rd overall. 1260s consistent finishes gave them 2nd for night, while 984 and 941 were neck and neck the whole night for 4th and 5th.
It was good to see Drake Cody, now a buff 7' tall, crewing for Scott O, while Dana and Sadonna were yachting at Tradewinds(: From the committee boat we were very impressed with the quality starts, with race 5 having everyone within inches at the start line! Congratulations to all for a fine night of competition on the water and no protest hearings in the parking lot? !
Cheers, Chris
(Eds. comments (1717): As far as I could tell, there was no contact between boats at any point during the night, not all due to the leeward gate, but aided by it. There was a certain traditional tactical element missing with a choice of marks, but we all survived and will likely see more gates. My takeaway for the night: don't expect the RC (especially Tringali) to stick to the usual course 1 predictability.) |
