At the beginning of August I traveled to the northwest part of Michigan to Crystal Lake. On the way out I stopped by my brother Jay’s house in Canada and visited with him and the girls. Jay was still recovering from a tonsillectomy and so I helped keep the kids occupied for a while he rested on Monday afternoon. Always a problem when Jay and I get together is that we talk a lot, which is not always good for someone who probably should be resting his voice and throat.
I left Tuesday afternoon to finish the trip to Crystal Lake. I arrived just in time to drop the boat off in a monsoon. Brent Penwarden and Family and Bob Meyer and his kids and father were already there. Still join us was Bob Cole and his wife Marie McKee and Steve Andersen. Bob, Marie and Steve arrived on Wednesday. All told there would be 6 MCs being sailed and 2 E-Scows. We had Brent, Bob M, Bob C. Me, Tim Meyer (Bob’s oldest) and Steve (borrowing Jim Meyer’s boat) sailing MCs. Bob and Tim sailed on Steve’s E-Scow (KU-18) and me, Marie and Ann Penwarden sailed on Bob’s boat (KU-9). We were all staying at Jim Meyer’s cottage. The family has had the cottage since the 1920’s.
Crystal Lake is a very pretty area to sail. It rivals Keuka Lake in that manner. The hills are not as high and it is only ½ mile from Lake Michigan. It is also fairly oval in shape without much of any points or bays and is 3 miles wide and 9 miles long.
We went to Crystal to participate in the Western Michigan Yachting Association Championships. This is a multi-boat regatta where there are 5 senior classes and 3 for the juniors with one shared class in the Laser. The regatta is structured to have 4 races in a day such that each class has at least one start and the last two races start the same class. This way each class has 5 starts over a four day period. It is an interesting experience changing classes in the middle of a regatta.
The first day started with E’s. We had a decent start and some good positions for a bit, but ended 14th out of 24. You can lose and gain quickly on the down winds, and boy did we. Following the E’s, we immediately had the first MC race. It is a bit of a mad scramble switching boats, but everyone had the same issue. I had a very good start right to windward of the guy who won the race. I thought I did well with speed at the start and good pointing, but man did he have speed and pointing ability. Pete Comfort led wire to wire. No one really got near him at all. I rounded the first mark in the top 15, stayed the course on the down wind and then went right on the next upwind. I didn’t plan on banging on the right corner, but the wind had shifted to the right and the RC did not change the course even though they had the opportunity. I actually ended up over standing the mark, which many times is bad, but I had excellent speed and was able to pass a bunch of boats and was 5th around the windward mark this time. I held my position downwind, but I was getting nervous. I started singing to myself to try and calm myself down. I went up the left middle the last time up and lost a bunch of boats that went left earlier, but I was able to stay in the top pack and finished 11th out of 62. This was by far one of my best finishes at a regatta with this many boats. I was very happy with the result.
The second day had the E’s go first again, but with the midday start. We again had a decent start and found ourselves up near the top 10. We had two fantastic downwind legs and that helped get us our best finish of 8th. The MC’s had two races this day. My watched died in the middle of the countdown to the first start. I had to guess the time. I positioned myself where I thought would be a good spot, protected it and then watched one of the top guys start to sheet in. I followed his cue and had another good start. I again was in the top 15 at the first mark. I stayed this way for most of the race. In the second leeward rounding I came in fast and took room from a guy who felt I did not have it. He yelled foul, though I never heard him yell protest. I thought I had rights and so did not due any penalty turns. I did not have as good a last leg and fell to 18th in the race. In the second race of the day I had a decent start, but nothing fabulous. I was top 30 for the beginning of this race. In the first downwind I saw a bunch of boats on the leeward side of me slowing down for the left mark rounding. I didn’t want to be in that mess so I went for the right side. There was also some boats there that I would need to give rights to, but they were much slower than me and though I had a wider radius of a rounding, I came out of it much better than the four of them. This helped put me close to 15th at the last windward mark. Unfortunately, in the last downwind I went into the middle and lost a bunch of boats and then did not sail that fast upwind losing more boats on a right shift to finish 24th. Still not bad, but not as good as in the first two races. At this point I did not know if the guy truly had protested me.
The third day had the MCs as the midday start. Unfortunately the wind went flat for a few hours and the MC race was cancelled. During lunch I heard that someone was looking for me for a protest. Oh crap, he did file. So I went and brushed up on the section of the rules pertaining to When Boats Meet and Mark Roundings. I have to say, I never saw this guy until he started yelling. I don’t know where he came from, maybe from behind a bunch of other boats or something. I saw most of the other boats near him. I will admit that I knew he was in front of me at the beginning of the downwind leg, but that is about it. Anyway, I checked the rules and I saw the provision that in summary says “if there is doubt that you had rights or lost rights, then it is presumed you didn’t”. I knew I was right within 2 boat lengths of the mark, but maybe not 3 boat lengths as the rules is now as of the 2008 rules. I figured I was going to be thrown out now, but I had hope that Protest Committee would take into account of the whole he did not say protest thing. Unfortunately, they ignored that remark, and they found me guilty of the infraction, so disqualified me from the race. I found out later that night that they threw me out of the third race and not the second, but I wasn’t going to correct them on it. I was pissed and hurt. I think there was some arrogance on my part for thinking he would not actually go through with the protest. I never had been apart of one in my adult racing and only once in juniors. I also had raced MCs for 10 years and never really felt people protested in the fleet, so I was taking advantage of that fact. I now I suffered from that thought process.
As the wind came up later, I still had 2 E races for the day. I had to channel my negative energy somewhere and I tried to sail hard for Bob. We had a decent start in the first race and had ok speed with the other boats, but Bob went into the middle in one of the downwinds and we got passed on either side. This would be our worst finish of 17th. During the second start one of the boats near the pin was on port tack and came at all of us on starboard. He tacked, but late, and forced/pushed a few of us into the wind. He screwed four boats doing the maneuver. We would have had a decent start if that had not happened. We did our best to get back up to speed, but we could never get into the top group. We ended up 13th in that race.
That night I decided to drink my pain away. It is not something I am proud of, but I am also not ashamed I did it. I don’t think I realized how much getting thrown out of the race affected me. It pretty much took my competitive spirit away. I was definitely drunk, but I would say that I had a great time that night and didn’t think about the result at all.
As morning came, I was sluggish, but surprisingly did not have a hangover. I made the MC race by a minute, but was really not into racing. So I just went for a nice sail that just happened to have a race course in it. I cleated the main after every tack and didn’t bother to play the main downwind. I was singing and just plain having fun. It was very cathartic. Somehow I still beat 14 boats without even trying. We had a long break before the last E race, so we all packed the MCs up for traveling. With the disqualification and the last race, I ended up in 36th. If, and I don’t usually dwell on these things, I had not been dsq’d and finished near were I had previously, I would have been in the top 20. Oh well. I will just have to treat it as a learning experience.
For the last E race the wind started to pickup. The wind seemed to be around 12-18 with some puffs over 20. It was hard work and we sailed the boat real fast. The top 12 boats had a nice gap over everyone else. We were anywhere between 7 and 12 in the race and finished 10th. It was a heck of ride, almost scary at times. Having not sailed on the E at all this year, I admit to being nervous with that wind and not having the floatation at the top of the sail as we usually do at Keuka.
I was a most wonderful week, the disqualification not withstanding. I hung out with good friends, caught up with the western Michigan crowd, who are always a blast, and went biking every day. I would definitely do that type of trip again.
No comments:
Post a Comment