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I didn’t think we were going to get to race. The wind was blowing dead on our stern as we sat in our slip at a steady 25 kts with gusts into the low 30s. We had a pole dead behind us that we needed to slide sideways around (about 9 feet to starboard to clear it before we could then back out into the channel).
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With only a 4 hp outboard I wasn’t sure it was up to controlling us in a sideways slide and then backing against the wind and fetch that was coming at our stern. With all of us on the boat (Jay and Miriam and Me) we did a couple of test runs while still tied to the dock. Each time I was able to take the slack out of the docklines from where we were being pushed into the slip by the wind and waves. So with just a few minutes before our start in the race I made the decision to give it a try. We used a line from the port stern cleat to the piling behind us on starboard for some extra security, just in case we had a problem. However it all went very smooth.. With the poor engine going full out we slowly moved sideways around the pole behind us and then out into the channel. 🙂 I almost didn’t give it enough room before going into forward. With the wind pushing us back at the docks I thought for a moment that it was going to push us into them before I got turned away. The nice thing about my outboard is that I can turn it as well as the tiller and it gives me an increadably tight turning radius. I used it 🙂
It continually amazes me how maneuverable Sea Puppy is and how little power she needs to move. She realistically weighs in with us on board with fuel, water, batteries, engine etc.. at about 4000lbs. Her dry weight just the boat with no stores, fuel etc.. on her is around 3300 lbs. a whopping 900 more than the factory specks show. Every 235 owner I have heard of that has weighed their boat has reported similar weights. I would like to move up to a 6hp engine though just to have a little more margin in power.
short and sweet for now.. 🙂 3rd place in first race.. 1st place in second race.. it was close in the first race and we were way ahead on second race.. 🙂 everyone did a stellar job of it.
We bent the spinnaker pole around the babystay. I forgot that the babystay was on and the foredeck guy 🙂 didn’t notice either so when we put it on the first time it was on the wrong side.. when we pulled in on the guy to pull the pole back it bent around the baby stay… 🙁 now I need a new section of tubing to put the fittings back on.
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Well we took Sea Puppy out racing today.. I thought I was going to be the race committe today but Chapel and her husband were in town and volunteered to do it. 🙂 so I got to race Sea Puppy.
I was supposed to have lots of crew and most of them ended up not showing up. Miriam was the only one left with me when we left the dock and because of her surgery she couldn’t help sail… It was looking more like a casual solo race for me than anything really competitive. Once we got out there though we took aboard Richard off the committe boat. He had helped Chapel and husband as well as her niece and friend get the committe boat out and the course set prior to the race. Chapels niece and friend were starting to get sea sick on the committe boat which was anchored so I took them onboard also ( the perked up after getting moving again.)
Well we went out and kicked butt on saturday. The boats in my class were a Hunter 23.5 with a phrf of 255, Kathey Lynn with a phrf of 171 and me in Sea Puppy at 191.
The first race we had what I think was a bad start. However everyone else in our class must have made some mistakes during the race also as we ended up with a very solid win. The course was a standard triangle with a 1 mile leg to the windward mark from the start.
We lost the second race due to a not great start and not balancing the weight on the boat correctly.. The wind had shifted about 45 degrees so it was a straight up speed race with us making the windward mark without tacking and then reaching back to the finish line.
Sea Puppy still has her mast down so I went out with Patty on Pirate Girl her Beneteau 323. I was a fairly stiff day with winds between 18 to 22 knots and seas running between 4 and 6 feet. We reefed both the main and the jib to about 1/2 to 2/3 normal sail area and pirate girl just flew. It was just Patty, Mirriam and Me on the boat so we were all kept busy with tacking around the course but it was definately easier than WeBeJamming which is about the same size but lacks the self tailing winches and furling main and jib.
Well I got my mom and sister to come out with me to race. I also had Cary on board as crew… it started out as a great day. We got out on the ocean and the breeze was at about 10 knots. It was decided to do a leeward windward race to the sherman a wreck 6 miles away.. I got a great start and we poled out the 155 and just started shooting for the mark at about 4.5 knots… the only boats ahead of us were an S2 and Tarten 10 everyone else was falling behind 🙂
then disater… my sister started getting queasy….. 🙁 well she said she could tough it out so we kept going.. then my mom went below for a second to use the head… she enver made it that far.. she popped back into the cockpit saying that being below started to imeadiatly make her queasy to… then it went down hill till she was looking really grim…
Sea Puppy is still a mess inside from the work I have been doing to the electrical system so instead of racing her I went out on Webejamming with Jim Pike, Lou, Greg and Cary. It was an interesting day.. Webejammings engine is still not running so Jim got his son to bring a skiff out and tow us from the dock the 5 miles to the inlet 🙂 and back later in the day.. sort of. 🙂
The first race was going good till we got to the first mark.. Jim thought we were doing a windward leeward race instead of a triangle course… everyone else in the fleet must have been wondering what we were doing heading back for the finish line after the first mark 🙂 it took a couple minutes to sort that out and get back on course 🙂 over all I think we did 3rd in that race… but I haven’t seen any of the official times yet.
I went to a friends wedding yesterday and missed the first day of racing… Jim and Patty and John took Sea Puppy out and raced her.. however racing against a J24, Tze Szu, a Beneteau F36.7 and a tartan 10 didn’t do much for our chances.. Sea Puppy finished 6 of 8 if .. today with me on board we finished again 6th of 8… I think we should have been in cruising class not racing class.. we were the highest phrf in racing with Bens Anago being close to us. All the other boats were significantly lower than us.
Day two at the Leukemia Cup was another day of tack tack tack. We again raced inside on the river and with a vicious current running against us on the windward tack we were limited to one side of the river. So it was short quick tacks again and again and again. Probably every 3 or 4 minutes we would tack. For some reason we just couldn’t seem to point as well or go as fast as we thought we should be. It wasn’t a great day for standings in the race but it was some fun if tireing sailing.
I slept on the boat saturday night… I went to sleep about 11pm and was told the next morning that there was a bad thunderstorm and rain about 1:30 in the morning… I wouldn’t know though 🙂 I slept like a baby the whole night.
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Here is a quick link to some pictures I took today on the second day of the race.. I will come back and fill in when I’m rested up a little 🙂
http://scottcarle.com/gallery/v/Sailingandboats/racing/album/
scott
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It was a fun race. We took 2nd place behind Tze Su? sp 2 hours 42 minutes and 40 seconds
We held with tze su upwind runing about a 10th of a knot slower than her the entire leg. Down wind runing the spinnaker though she tacked down wind and we went straight for the mark. With our symetrical spinnaker I thought we had it made about half way to the mark and that we were going to beat her. We were doing a sold 6.5 to 7.2 knots all the way downwind. Tze Su was a dot on the horizon off behind and to starboard of us.. about 2 miles from the mark she started to gain quickly and within the last mile passed us to take the finish line 4 minutes ahead of us. I talked to Patrick later and he said they were doing 9.5 knots reaching with their asymetrical spinnaker. I felt really good about coming in 4 minutes behind Tze Su…. They are based off the 235 hull but he extended the transom 3 ft so that their waterline is 3 ft more than mine. I have a wing keel and draw 2’9″ while he has a fin keel with a bulb and draws 5 ft, my mast is 29 ft tall and his is 33 ft he also has a bow sprit to run an oversized spinnaker on. Also I believe that his boat is lighter by a fair bit than mine. It certainly seems to sit lighter in the water from what I have observed. In any case it is always a boat to be feared in a race. it is fast and well captained
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Sunday morning was beautifull and calm. We were almost wondering if there would be enough wind, but soon the breeze stiffened up and we had 8 to 12 for the rest of the day. After and early start the race committe decided to move fleets C and D from inside on te cape fear river to outside on the ocean to use the same course that the bigger boat fleets were using. We found out that morning that the Ultima one of the boats in our fleet had damaged their keel badly the day before running into something and they were not racing anymore. Of the rest of the boats in our fleet only Sea Puppy and Lokahi were able to traverse the Cape Fear River Inlet and get out to the race course. So even though we sailed even better sunday than saturday 🙂 and the races counted this time 🙂 we got second place by default because no one else got out to race. Lokahi ran a great couple of races and beat us both times. Actualy Lokahi beat a of bigger boats even. They also ran their spinnaker where we decided not to. Me, Patty and Jim had not had enough practice together racing and we had never run th spinnaker together before. Not to mention that Me and Patty had only sailed under spinnaker twice before in our lives. However we ran two great races and did well. Lokahi beat us fair and square.. their new sails a clean bottom and spinnaker did us in. Not to mention they didn’t make any mistakes and kevin ran a great race.
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