[Public-List] An unaccustomed responsibility

Thu Jul 3 13:30:52 PDT 2014

Nice....now try it again with a 12 gauge being swung wildly around in the
air as the committee boat pitches or maybe a cannon (loose mind you :-)
bouncing around on the deck....

On Thu, Jul 3, 2014 at 11:08 AM, Gordon Laco via Public-List <
public-list at lists.alberg30.org> wrote:

> Hello gang -
>
> Last night was race night at our club... We have a convention I think other
> clubs use as well as ourselves where participating yachts each take a turn
> doing race committee duty.   Actually I was one of the instigators of this
> programme, which was set up in order to cure a chronic shortage of skilled
> volunteers.  We reckoned (correctly I think) that if racers were taking
> turns running the races, we¹d have informed and motivated people rotating
> through the duty.
>
> Well, somehow, I¹ve managed to go eight years without having to run a race.
> I should be doing it once a season or so but between the RCN, work and
> whatever, I¹ve somehow avoided it.  This summer my turn came up during my
> jaunt to the Syronelle, so I switched nights with one of our rivals.  That
> meant last night was the night.  There was no honourable way out of it so
> SURPRISE¹s crew trooped down to the club early so we could figure out how
> to
> run the race.  Where¹s the keys for the fuel locker?  Where¹s the form for
> recording the results?  What flags go up and down and when?  It was all
> written down but the doing is a little different from the reading about....
>
> Clint, (the Viking for those who met him at the Syronelle) was detained at
> work waiting for a client, so I scooped a fellow nick-named Œthe old man of
> the sea¹ at our club for his long white hair and matching beard.  He¹s not
> all that old but he is a man of the sea and is famous around here for
> rescuing racing dogs and giving them gentle retirement years.  I made him
> Flag Man, I ran the watches and Steve (the tall guy, for those who met him
> during the Syronelle) did everything else.
>
> Out we went  the Man of the Sea calm and content with the well defined job
> I gave him, Steve bounding alongside our committee boat in the orange RHIB
> carrying the windward mark, and me, a bundle of performance anxiety driving
> the committee boat.
>
> The wind was WNW about 15 knots and building.  We went way out into the
> Sound to be clear of the land to windward, and like Conan the Barbarian
> choosing his ground to fight the Picts, declared that we would set up the
> start line HERE.    We heaved the start line buoy over the side then
> motored
> along to anchor the committee boat.  The boat is a pontoon boat with a 40hp
> Merc on it, a crabby jerky slob of a thing.    As things turned out we had
> to re-anchor three times to get a line somewhat square to the wind.  I sent
> Steve off in the RHIB telling him to go dead to windward and give us a long
> windward leg... He went about two miles and dead upwind  good man.  Back
> he
> came and clambered aboard.
>
> A glance at my watched reminded me that we had about twenty minutes before
> the 18:30 start.  Lots of time to forget what to do.  We had a huddle going
> over the flag and horn sequences for the two-fleet start.  I could tell
> that
> I was the weak link, so made sure I didn¹t do what I normally do, which is
> try to control too much myself.  The Man of the Sea stayed on flags, Steve
> added the stop watches to the horn duty I¹d given him... I was the worrier
> and kept the notes on the races.
>
> The clock crept toward 18:30.  During the wait we re-anchored again
> squaring
> the line (once for a wind shift, once when we were dragging).  Finally,
> 18:30 came and we gave the three hoots indicating the start of the start.
> We rattled down the A Fleet start, and what a sight it was when the whole
> herd of them came stampeding up (the wind was now over 20) like buffalo
> approaching the edge of a stream.  They were all a few seconds early so
> laid
> off to run the line jostling and shouting at each other.  The count came to
> zero and we gave our start hoot...and as one, the whole line of boats
> twitched up to windward and started as if they¹d all been connected to our
> horn¹s button.    The stragglers staggered along after them, but we hardly
> noticed being fully engrossed in the five minute count down to the B Fleet
> start.    In due course away they went; and I could relax.  Nobody was over
> early and had to be called back.  My line was square to the wind and the
> windward mark, and best of all our timing was bang on.
>
> The wind continued to build.  The sound got choppy and we had an
> interesting
> time watching our various rivals as they charged around the course.  It was
> very interesting watching the spinnaker dowsing in the heavy air  I was
> surprised how early most skippers pulled the kites in.  I remarked to Steve
> (who is SURPRISE¹s foredeck man) that because of my confidence in
> SURPRISE¹s
> crew, we can usually carry the Œchute much closer to the downwind mark than
> we were seeing on the course.  We speculated continuously about how
> SURPRISE
> would be doing if she were on the course.  I think it would have been a
> good
> night for us.  One A fleet boat came careering downwind and gybed wildly
> just before the leeward mark... She would have to gybe again if she was
> going to get around....but she didn¹t.  She rounded up with sails flogging,
> fell away on the wrong tack, then rounded up again.  We could see a lot of
> activity aboard her and wondered if somebody had been hurt.  We learned
> later that she¹d torn a main sheet boom bail out of her boom and that¹s why
> she retired. Phew.
>
> Finally the leaders were coming down the last run toward their finishes.
> There was a terrific battle between EVERGREEN and LEVITY who galloped
> across
> the line absolutely neck and neck.  Overlapping the trailing A fleet boats
> came the leaders of B Fleet.  WOLFPACK, a pesky Shark being carefully
> steered to stay under her spinnaker, came semi-planing along and sailed
> away
> far past the finish out of shear joy of her speed.  FOOL HARDY, another
> Shark I¹d sailed aboard when I was a boy and she was owned by Mr. Hardy, a
> quiet, competent sailor at RCYC who was elderly back in the Œ70¹s, came
> bounding down gambling that a broad reach might be faster than a dead
> run..it might have been because she was really moving.  With her crew and
> skipper hiking out and shouting to each other, she cut diagonally across
> and
> finished just clipping aft of the committee boat, splashing our stern with
> her bow wave.  Then came MAID MARION and SUNDANCE, our main rivals, both
> plowing hard settled deep between their bow and stern waves and having a
> great battle with each other. (would we have been ahead???)  The rest came
> home in due course.
>
> What a great night  what a relief to have done my duty!    At the club
> after several sailors thanked us for the long course, the square line.  It
> was easy  what was I so worried about?
>
> We¹ll be out there racing next week.
>
> Gord
> #426 Surprise
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