Not the greatest comeback in sports history, but close enough

August 10, 2018

With Swuzzelbubble having comfy lead over us and the other boats, Thursday was our last day to try and win the IRC 5 series. We would need a bullet and the other main competitors would need a bad day.

Our start was near Mother Bank in the Western Solent. The wind, was very unstable shifting 30 degrees at times and varying between 5 and 14 knots. We watched previous classes and had seen class 3 with a great start on the pin end of the line, where the J-109 class had mores successful starts from all the way across the line.

We decided to, but failed to, start above the pack fighting for the pin. Unfortunately we engaged to early, were locked out by SAM (a Sigma) who refused to go up and ended up not making the pin and therefore we had to port tack (the sterns) of the whole fleet.

As we had the current pushing us to the West, the good thing about starting on port tack, was that we would not have to cross the bramble bank. We managed to claw back from last to 5th place on the water by the time we were at the first mark. By staying on the right Jybe we sailed the shortest course to the downwind mark and were fighting for third place on the water. As the wind was tricky and shifty we had J-ronimo catching us up with the new breeze they brought from behind.

Our final beat towards the finish would be the most tricky one. A beat from Collet -via Norris -to the Breakwater finishing line, with light winds on shore where the current may already be against us. We decided to go out for more breeze before Norris and sail a close to the Island a possible afterwards. It payed of. Although at stages it looked like other would steel our 3rd place on the water. Fortunately we sailed away from Musk Ox and J-ronimo, though not far enough from J-ronimo to take her 3rd place on corrected time; 4th in IRC 5. Not bad in these conditions starting DFL.

We met the nice sailors from Swuzzelbubble at the beer tent and had a nice chat with them. As we cannot take their series anymore, we congratulated them on their class win. And found out that they will not be racing on Friday to keep it all in one piece.

After our nice chat at the beer tent, we had a fabulous diner with YES! and SALVO organised by Peter and Alison Morton! Some Cowes Week traditions must never die. Thank you.

Now our goal is to secure our 2nd place in IRC 5 and keep it all together in a Friday that looks like a windy one.

Cheers,

 

Boj