Aussie Nationals Update

Friday, January 8th, 2010

Two more days to go and it’s all over.

So far it has been an interesting regatta. Amac has been dominating with 6 firsts in the first two days. His downwind pace can’t be matched by anybody here and would always gain or extend on these legs. Andrew Stevenson has been fast too but ultimately it has been a one boat race.

I have had a mixed bag of both luck and results. On the first day I broke my belcrank fitting on the centerboard and had no full flap up or down. Just  lot of slop in the system and struggled to stay near the top. I had a 4, 3, 2 scoreline, but fixed the problem for the afternoons dash for cash. With $1200 of prizemoney on offer it was worth trying to win. I won the 3 elimination heats and then disaster. On the way to the start line I managed to hook up a trawling line from a fishing boat 50m away. It wrapped itself around the centerboard and pulled the flap down hard, breaking my linkages. The idiot didn’t even stop  on going until the line broke. Man I could have strangeled that guy….. Andrew Stevo picked up a nice cheque for his efforts.

The next day was good. A bunch of 2nds and 3rds behing Amac and Andrew put me into 2nd overall.

Yesterday was a hard luck story again. I lead the first race from the start and once the breeze dropped to lowriding the starter decided to abandon the race. What the? He claimed a windshift was the reason. Sorry to inform you buddy but the wind shifts. That’s sailing…. Besides I had to gybe down the last square run 3 times so what wind shift was he talking about anyway?

Next race was tough. I think I was still fuming particularly after he told me to go home if I don’t like his calls. I think I should have strangled him as well as that fishing bloke… I was way back after 2 swims and tried to get back into 5th with a port tack run towards the finish. I might have gotten in a way of a starboard tacker, but that’s another story.

Race 2 on the day was great. Neck and neck with Amac around the whole course, he would get me every downwind run but I pulled some nice tacks and fast works to pop in the lead again. I held him off down the last run as he droped back to 3rd after breaking his linkages in a cartwheel.

Amac unable to foil in the last race left it to Andrew and I to fight it out. I had better upwind pace while Andrew was quicker downwind. I was in the lead until the last lap when the camera boat decided to mount themselves right in between the two bottom marks. Realising they would get in the way they bolted our of the way leaving nice 1m waves behind their boat for me to cartwheel over. Andrew poped through and I got 2nd. Not happy Jen.

After the race, I was nformed of a protest over the finish of the race 7 and consequently disqualified for my dodgy manouvre.

Today should be fun. Strongest breeze of the series forecast with decentwaves too. Amac is up and runing again and I am still tied up with Andrew for 2nd after the DSQ drop. What will today bring? More reports tomorrow…

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