| Rites of Spring at Olympic Circle | April 18 |
| Story |
| From Michael Kennedy (Pariah):
The Pariah was out there. We were a little late getting off the dock, and couldn't get the outboard to cooperate in getting out of the harbor (breeze very light-that didn't last long!). Kate and I had been excited for the race and when we were about 10 minutes out at the time of the S22 start, we figured we'd turn upwind, sail with the fleet around the course, but make sure we stayed out of everyone's way so as not to affect the results, and then just not sail through the finish. Well, we started upwind in big breeze and big bumpy ebb, and kept glancing over at the nice warm dry sunny pleasure cruising fleet in the lee of Angel Island. We also had the whisker pole unclip itself and attempt to jump overboard (thwarted by Kate's daring low side rescue). Our discussion went through a sort of risk/benefit analysis and the fact that we weren't going to be scored in the race, already had the T-shirts, didn't want salt water in drinks or sandwiches (or dousing cigars), combined with a nice warm lee of Angel Island in which to picnic if we just cracked off a little and a general ingorance regarding what was about to break (this being the boat's first shakedown of 2009 and recalling that the outboard was not cooperating), all conspired to make the day turn into a pleasure cruise. Discretion being the better part of valor, we had a very nice warm dry afternoon; Kate had a salt-free mimosa, and my cigar suffered nary a drop of water as we listened to people call in DNF's. When we saw Stephen back at the dock and told us that you guys went all the way around Alcatraz, we felt good about our decision. From Leah Pepe(Kelly Shawn): Jennifer and I were definitely surprised with the wind on Saturday! We took turns going below putting on layers - something we really didn't expect of the day. We came over to Berkeley from Richardson Bay Marina, Sausalito, so we had a nice long motor over in the beautiful morning sunshine. We passed the poor dead baby whale that was tied up to some buoys at the mouth of Richardson Bay on the way over, you don't see that everyday. Jen and I don't know the area where the race was held on Saturday very well - I've crewed with Pat Broderick a few times in the area, but never had to be responsible for finding the buoys. So our strategy was to "follow those Tuna's" !! Well, we missed our start..........don't ask..........anyway we started about 3 minutes after everyone else on a port tack and stayed there for quite a while (too long actually) getting used to the building winds and chop. Jennifer was navigator and overall do everything crew on Saturday, she has a fun personality was happy to be aboard Kelly as we brought up the rear of the Santana fleet! Our first challenge of the day, other than keeping the boat flat, was when the whisker pole just about went overboard. The release line on the pole (or whatever you call the line you pull to open the jaws) got wrapped around the cleat on the foredeck bouncing around in the chop opened the jaw that was holding onto the shrouds. She quickly and "elegantly" scooched under the boom backwards and grabbed it just as it was going over....held onto it and managed to release the wrap on the cleat and secure it back onto the shroud....whew! Just wondering, does a wisker pole float?? Our next challenge was on the beat up to Alcatraz.....I didn't realize Alcatraz herself was a mark....the traveler broke. Jennifer again gracefully got down off the rail and went to see what the problem was...then went below to the "extra parts box" to find something that would hold it together...went up to see if those parts would work...went below again to get another part...and back to the transom on the low side as water was pouring in over the rails and down her back in buckets. She fixed it!! We had a traveler for the second half of the race!! Amazing to me how those little rings that are so difficult to put on the pins can come out!! After we rounded Alcatraz......we relaxed for a few minutes surfing the chop and then on to figuring out where we were to go next. Clipper Cove??? Were we reading the chart correctly??? Then when we saw Carlos and then Tchoup as we approached TI...we felt much better about our choice of direction. Anyway, we finished a challenging day for us and after the race - we had another two hour beat back to Sausalito, which included container ships and out of control cruisers..... Things I need to learn now that we are learning how to manage the boat in those winds. How to sail the bay - like reading the water with dying ebbs, building floods....things like that. Playing the traveler in gusts. Also, what does Jan mean when the cabin flexes going through chop....hmmmm........fixing stress cracks??? Yikes....... Sunday, I sailed Kelly to Stinson Beach....what a contrast in weather! No fog. Maybe 10 knots of wind and 80 degress of warmth out there! From Jan Grygier (Carlos): Proof that Tunas were designed for San Francisco Bay After a start marred by an unfortunate single-hander who barged in thinking it was his own, a pair of doughty Santana 22s buckled down in the unexpectedly-hairy Rites of Spring race to show that those old Gary Mull boats can really go in a blow. Jan Grygier and Jerry Thompson in Carlos had the fasted corrected time out of all 23 "short-course" boats, while Steven Buckingham and Chris Giovacchini on Tchoupitoulas was third, with a corrected time only 48 seconds slower than Glenn Isaacson's beautiful custom Schumacher 40 Q. Perhaps even more impressive is that Bill King went around the 10-mile course single handed and brought ATunaMatata in only seven minutes after "Tchoupi". Bill had originally planned to sail single-handed spinnaker, but switched the day before the race to get the Santanas a five-boat division. Given that there were more DNFs than spinnakers flown in this race, it was probably a good call for many reasons. Jan had spent many hours fixing stress cracks in his 1969 Tuna while his boys were taking RYC's Junior program this winter, and it apparently paid off: "For the first time in many years, the cabin didn't flex when we slammed into a wave!" Apart from that pre-race preparation, Jan's strategy consisted of flattening the main and playing the traveller like it was a "real keelboat" to keep the poor thing from sliding sideways in those 30-knot gusts that seemed to funnel around Alcatraz. That and not tacking much - he was gifted with a beautiful lift and some dying ebb that got him just a hundred feet above the dreaded Alcatraz Mark 2 when many others seemed to be overstanding a lot. |
| Result | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| Regatta Message Board |