[Public-List] Round the Island Race

[Hugh McCormack]

Why would anyone sail anything other than an Alberg?  Perfection on the water!

Cheers,

Hugh
________________________________
From: Public-List <public-list-bounces at lists.alberg30.org> on behalf of Gordon Laco via Public-List <public-list at lists.alberg30.org>
Sent: July 28, 2022 9:31 AM
To: Alberg 30 Public List -- open to all <public-list at lists.alberg30.org>
Cc: Gordon Laco <mainstay at csolve.net>
Subject: [Public-List] Round the Island Race

Hello shipmates,

So there we were….

Wednesday had come again; race night at Midland Bay Sailing Club.  After some last minute ‘crossing of I’s and dotting of T’s’ in the office, I hustled over to the club grabbing a submarine sandwich on the way.  This night being the annual Round the Island Race, the start was earlier due to the distance to be covered, and as normal per distance races, there was a skippers meeting in the club house before the start.

Thirteen skippers gathered outside the building… the usual jokes being exchanged… ’no need for this meeting, everyone should just follow me after the start’ etc.  The wind looked to go lighter so provisions in the rules for a shortened course were gone over, as was the discarding of the option for an upwind start.

I hustled out to SURPRISE where I found my son Pete already aboard and preparing the boat.  He lives in Ottawa and was home this week for a visit which allowed him to return to our crew.   The rest of our bunch was rounded out by the arrival of Steve, our fore deck man and Robin, who’d returned to SURPRISE following his decision this past winter to swallow the anchor so far as skippering was concerned by selling MAID MARION.  Robin had been one of our arch rivals, a good sailor and we’d had many terrific battles over the years out on the race course.  He’d begun his time at our club many years ago when one Wednesday evening he’d wandered into the club while on a house hunting expedition.  He had retired from a career as a university physics professor and wondered what people in Midland sailed.  We were short handed that night so I snapped him up as crew by calling to him ‘hey, do you want to come sailing?’  Robin did indeed purchase a property outside of town and crewed for several years before purchasing his own boat.  Well the boat is sold so I invited him to return to SURPRISE and he’s back on SURPRISE’s mainsheet where he began.

We cast off and motored out to the start just west of M20, marking Midland Shoal.  Because this race would begin with a downwind start, I elected to prepare the spinnaker and only use the main while the pre-start jostling began… we were more than a little underpowered of course, but I figured it was more important to get the flying sail gear sorted out with the foredeck clear.  It has been two years since we flew the ‘chute.

The committee ran down the flag and horn hoists and beeps and oh boy here comes the last seconds counting down and away we all went in one start.  SURPRISE honoured herself by being first with her spinnaker up and pulling.  That was the good part.  The not-so-good part was that we were imbedded in the pack with a Shark class yacht close port and larger yachts all around us.  The Shark being a shark, and also on starboard tack, began edging over toward us.  Her skipper said ‘Ah, starboard, Gord’, reminding me he had right of way.  We were on port so I nodded and told my guys ‘OK Eugene, I’m moving’ and started to gybe.  Pete and Steve up forward flawlessly gybed the spinnaker and we glided out of trouble.  I think we were all amazed at ourselves… that was the first spinnaker gybe we’d done since before covid and the sail never deflated.  I hope the efficiency of our sail handling dismayed the yachts around us.  Haha, I don’t think anyone noticed.

The fleet began spreading out as we all trudged dead downwind… the knot meter showing 1.7 knots.  More spinnakers bloomed around us.

And then the unexpected happened.  My mobile phone rang.  I’m in the midst of a movie project, one called ‘Washington Black’ which is being shot in Mexico among other locations.  We’d sent nearly 2,000lbs of rope in diameters from 24mm down to 6mm to the riggers building sets in Mexico City and I immediately assumed it was the production’s Art Director calling me about something.  With one hand on the wheel I pulled the phone out with the other and answered the call.

It wasn’t Ricardo, it was a fellow with a different accent offering me duct cleaning services.  I used to be irritated by these silly prospecting calls, but these days I amuse myself by trying to keep them on the phone as long as possible with what I hope for the caller is a bizarre and eventually frustrating experience.  We had yachts in close combat all around us, so I put  the phone on ’speaker’ mode, and began my discussion.

Caller:  We have a duct cleaning service… do you have forced air heat?
Me: Oh great, thanks for calling, yes we do.  Do you have a truck in my neighborhood?
Caller: Yes we have a truck nearby… $99 flat rate!
Me: No flat rate - Full spools only, what diameters of rope do you need? How many spools? No extra discount unless five spools are ordered.
Caller: No spools, duct cleaning! $99 flat rate!
Me: No flat rate… only volume discount.  12mm three strand $485, ready for pick up now.
Caller: What?
Me: All diameters up to 24mm in stock… but I can’t help you unless you can tell me what you want.  Do you have your truck nearby?
Caller: Truck is near, $99 flat rate for duct cleaning.
Me: No ducks, no chickens.  Only rope.  What do you need?
Caller: You don’t understand, flat rate duct cleaning!
Me, Oh, not ducks, ducts.  OK, I guess you need braided polyester rope.  We have that, how much?
Caller: $99 flat rate
Me: NO FLAT RATE… only volume discount after five spools.  FIVE SPOOLS.  Do you need that much?
Caller: What?
Me: Call me back after you get organized and can tell me what you need.

And so on, much to my amusement and that of those crews near enough to overhear both sides of the conversation.

Back to the race.  This telephone exchange changed something… the wind began to increase and with it our speed.  I’d taken advantage of being on starboard tack to edge away to the south of the rhumb line till we reached a point where gybing back onto port let us broad reach instead of run toward Snake Island, which we had to leave to port.  That better point of sail combined with the increasing wind got SURPRISE moving and over the next thirty minutes our speed climbed from under 2knots to 5.9 and 6.  Wahoo.

Of course everyone else was also enjoying the better wind so our position didn’t improve dramatically, but there we were at the halfway point of the Round the Island race, in the middle of the pack with boats who owed us time all around and close.

Besides handling our mainsheet, Robin is our tactician and now he began murmuring to me with his soft British accent, reminding me of the wind shadow to leeward of the island.  Snake is shaped like a grain of rice and angles such that as we passed it sort of end on, there was a lee caused by its trees which over-eager direct steering can catch the unwary.  I resisted the urge to go straight for the mark off the far tip of the island and stayed wide, only gradually bending my course to port.  Most of the fleet around us hugged the island and we were gratified to see them slow down in the wind shadow.  We carried our spinnaker, gradually easing the pole forward and hauling in the main as we went from running to a thrilling spinnaker reach with the pole just off the forestay.

Ah, there’s the mark.  ‘OK guys, let’s douse this ‘chute… pop the pin!’  The shackle pin on the guy was pulled, eager hands back in the cockpit caught the sheet and rickety-split the spinnaker came in under the boom and down the companionway with only a few flogs… dry and tame.  We’d already set the genny so SURPRISE held her speed as we came up and up close hauled now charging for the mark.  We rounded with several larger yachts in close company.  Some tacked immediately but we held on and beat for several hundreds of meters before flipping over onto starboard and starting the long beat back up to Midland and the finish off the club.

Those tacked right away found themselves unable to lay a course clear of the island and one by one the three of them had to tack to take a jog out our way before resuming their course for the finish.  That jog out our way had to be made on port tack… haha… the phrase ’no wound stings like a self inflicted one’ zipped through my head as I saw their frowns as they came up.  But no, none of them were forced to take sterns or tack early, there were enough gaps for them all to claw their way up largely unimpeded and soon the whole mob was back on starboard and sailing home.

The wind got light and headed us for a while… which prompted the committee to move the finish up to the shortened course end position for the finish line.  With nothing else to do Steve began packing the chute down in the cabin.  This seemed to immediately cause a dramatic lift in the wind direction which was accompanied by an increase in its strength.  We were getting back up to speeds over 5 knots.  Pete called down into the cabin ’Steve! Pack that spinnaker faster! It’s making us speed up!’  Laughing, we carried on and got across the line collecting our beep from the committee.  We were fourth across the line, probably second on corrected time.

What a great evening.  Can’t wait for next Wednesday.



Gordon Laco
426 Surprise





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