Sequoia YC Summer Series Race #3

Saturday was the third Sequoia Yacht Club Summer Series Race of the season. I crewed for Stan on Smokin' J for race #1, missed race #2, and crewed for Stan again on Smokin' J for race #3. We were short-handed. Kerry, Steve Skinner, and I were Skipper Stan's only crew.

We left the dock a little after 11am, as soon as Stan returned from the skipper's meeting, and headed out to the starting line between channel markers 3 and 4. The conditions were pretty perfect... about 70 degrees, a bit cloudy (but the sun came out strong in the middle of the race, and it warmed up a bit), and about 12-15 knots of wind out of the northwest. We did some practice tacks and gybes, and then started timing our start. We started right on time, along with 8 other boats, and went full speed ahead toward our first mark.

We were racing from markers 3 and 4 (the starting line) to 12, back to 3, out to S, back to 12, out to Y, and back to 3 and 4 for the finish line, which meant we had two downwind legs. I was looking forward to flying the spinnaker twice, although being shorthanded didn't help, and both Kerry and Steve had only flown it once or twice each. So Stan assigned me to foredeck. Although I took a spinnaker handling course and have had some practice, it had been a month or so, and I'm still pretty slow. Plus I discovered that Stan and I use different terminology to indicate the side of the boat where we're raising the spinnaker.

Before I got to the docks, Kerry and Steve had rigged the spinnaker sheets and halyard for a port-side set (my terminology). As we started the first leg up to marker 12, I thought Stan told me we'd be doing a starboard set. Later, I realized he said we'd be on a starboard tack, which means we'd be doing a port-side set. My misunderstanding actually made sense to me, because we were on a starboard tack, and I thought we were going to tack around the mark and would be on port tack and do a starboard set.

Because of my misunderstanding, I scurried around the foredeck moving the triple to the starboard side. Ugh... We got close to the mark, and everyone started yelling at me to move the spinnaker halyard to the port side outside the jib. I did it, because they all seemed to agree, but I couldn't understand why. I figured maybe the wind shifted or they changed their tactics or something... I'd find out later. Then they all started yelling to move the sheets and the chute to port for the set. I did, but it took me forever.

When I was ready, we raised the chute. It filled immediately and started increasing our speed right away. It was a beautiful thing. I got ready to lower the jib and yelled back for someone to release the jib halyard. Little did I know that we'd passed marker 12 some time ago, and we were only about 2 minutes from marker 3, where we'd have to douse the chute and head up to S. Double ugh... So we didn't lower the jib at all! I vowed to do better on the second downwind leg.

I started getting ready for the set early. The first thing I had to do was go below and repack the chute, which I did quickly, because it was really hot down there! I came up, clarified the side of the boat where we'd do the set (port again), and set about getting everything ready.

I was ready this time when we reached marker 12 again. We raised the chute and, again, it filled right away. I thought we were golden until the guys started yelling that the pole was stuck. When I looked behind the jib, I realized that the guy was wrapped around the bow pulpit, and I would have to detach it from the spinnaker's clue, untangle it from the bow pulpit, and reattach it to the chute in order to release the pole and properly fly the chute. I offered to do that, as I hung over the bow pulpit, curling my body around the forestay, but Stan said no, it was too dangerous while the chute was loaded. Bummer! So we had to douse the spinnaker again and sail the downwind leg without it.

The rest of the race (out to Y and then back to the imaginary finish line between markers 3 and 4) was uneventful. As it turned out, we came in third out of five boats in the spinnaker class, so that wasn't half bad! I definitely need practice with the spinnaker before I do foredeck in a race again! Thanks to Stan, I seem to get a lot of opportunities to practice. He's one of the most patient, supportive, and encouraging skippers/teachers I've ever had. Thank you, Stan!

By the way, these pictures were all taken on other days. I didn't have a minute to take any pictures during this race!

Free Ride Out of Sausalito

Remember my story about the shroud that broke? Well, it turned out that Modern Sailing did the right thing and comp'd me a free boat for a day. I tried for weeks to gather the original crew from that day, but I just couldn't find a day when everyone could make it. So I put a stake in the ground for May 18, and 4 out of the original 7 of us were able to make it (Jean, Kerry, Norbert, and myself). I invited Sandi and Alice along, too, because we had plenty of space and they're fun to have around.

As we drove up to Sausalito together in Kerry's SUV (thanks, Kerry!), we talked about two possible destinations for the day. Our first choice was out the gate and up the coast. The winds were going to be light and so were the currents, so it would be a good day to venture outside the gate. Our second choice was turning north up past the Richmond-San Raphael Bridge to see what there is to see in the San Pablo Bay.

The Bay to Breakers race was running that morning all across the city, so Kerry decided to drive around—across the San Mateo Bridge, north on 880, across the Richmond-San Raphael Bridge, and south on 101 to Sausalito. It ended up taking us about an hour, which might actually be shorter than the more direct route we usually take straight north on 101 through the city.

As we neared the coast, we could see the thick fog hanging over the coast and decided it was not a good day for coastal cruising. What fun is it if you can't see anything? So we picked up Carita, a 32' C&C, and headed north around Tiburon toward San Pablo Bay in about 8-10 knots of wind. As soon as we turned the corner out of site of the gate, we came to a dead stop. The tide was still flooding technically, but it was pretty much max slack. Clearly, there wasn't enough wind up there for a day of sailing. So now what?

Jean suggested that we head down toward Treasure Island, sail around it and back. So we headed across the slot and certainly found our wind! We reefed the main before we got into serious wind, partially furled the jib after a while, and then reefed the main again. Hardly any of the main was showing, but it was just right for the 25-30 knot winds we were getting crossing the slot.

We rounded the island to starboard, and as soon as we were in the lee of the island, the wind lightened to about 5 knots or less. On the southwest side of the island, it died down to the point where we had to start the engine to keep from drifting south. As soon as we came out of the lee of the city, the wind picked up again, and we were off!

We wanted to get back to Sausalito by about 5-5:30pm for the free BBQ at Modern Sailing. In addition to giving us a free charter for the day, they invited us to their club BBQ. What nice people! The sail back was nice, and we buttoned up the boat and headed for the scent of burning charcoal.

We ran into Curt (who'd sailed with us for KFOG Kaboom!) at the BBQ. He'd been on the club sail and wondered why he wasn't invited to sail with us. I explained how this was a comp'd charter, and we were mostly the same crew that ran into problems with the broken shroud. But he decided that this was my first string crew, and the title kind of stuck.

It was a very relaxing day out on the water, and a lovely time was had by all. Please check out my Picasa web album for more pictures by Alice and me.

South Beach Friday Night Race

The South Beach Yacht Club runs races on Friday nights every couple of weeks. Ron has entered Black Sheep (a 25' Beneteau) for the season, and we've been trying to find a Friday night when I can crew for him. I've never sailed on Black Sheep before (mainly because I'm usually on the competing boat, Smokin' J), but I've wanted to ever since Ron, Sherry, and Rosie bought it. I finally got my wish on June 16.

Ron single-handed Black Sheep up to San Francisco from Redwood City that day, as he always does for the races (and then sails her back the next day), and arrived around the same time I did, 5pm. Tara showed up a little while later. When we discovered that the other two crew were not going to be able to make it, off we went to start the race a little after 6pm.

We were late getting started. Black Sheep is really different than any boat I've sailed in a long time. Ron had told me it's like a big dinghy, but I hadn't realized what that meant until I stepped aboard. (It's been about 10 years since I've sailed dinghies.) It's very sensitive/responsive. Any change in weight, sail trim, or helm makes a big difference. And we sat on the floor of the cockpit the whole time to stay lower than the boom, which almost hits the floor on the aft end while you're sailing. I always get some bumps and bruises when I sail, but I had way more that night than usual.

Black Sheep's rigging is also very different. For example, the main halyard exits the mast on the floor of the cabin, so you have to go below to raise and lower the main. That took us a while. Ron kept handing off the helm to me and going forward to help Tara.

The other rigging difference is the jib sheets. They're cross-rigged, so you can always trim the jib from the high side. I often do trim the jib from the high side, but grabbing the port-side sheet to trim the jib on a port tack (sail on the starboard side) requires a brain shift from me that I couldn't always pull off. Tara was having the same trouble.

Anyway, after much ado, we started the race about 20 minutes late. Oh, and did I mention that we didn't know the course, because we weren't near the race committee boat at the start? So we just followed the other boats we thought were in our race. The breeze was light, but we rounded the first mark without too much trouble. Then the wind died. Seriously, we were going backwards at one point.

After drifting on the flood for half an hour or so, we were a mile or so south of where we should have been and started to consider starting the engine. Most of the boats in our class had been way ahead of us when the wind died, so they were drifting south about a mile east of us. We were actually ahead of the pack at that point, just because we hadn't drifted as far as the others.

But we waited another half hour or so, kept drifting further south, and finally Ron decided to start the engine. We motored back in past McCovey Cove, where the White Sox were playing the Giants and the crowd was roaring, into South Beach Harbor.

The apres sailing food and drinks were good, although many people were done eating by the time we got there. We weren't as late as the rest of the boats in our class, though, who all eventually motored in a while after we did. All in all, it was a fun time! Thanks, Ron, for another new sailing experience!

KFOG Kaboom!

Saturday was KFOG Kaboom!, the annual music festival and fireworks show put on by the San Francisco radio station KFOG (104.5 FM). I thought it would be fun to sail around the bay, listen to the KFOG concert on a boat's stereo, and watch the fireworks from the water. Knowing a lot of people would want to go, I chartered Late Harvest, a 39' J-120, from Modern Sailing Academy in Sausalito for the evening. What a sweet ride!

My crew was supposed to be 9 people (10 including me), but Sandi didn't make it. She ended up sitting on 101 with her engine off for two hours because of a horrible accident just south of San Jose. When the traffic started moving again, the rest of us were already in Sausalito and ready to take off, so she just turned around and went home. Poor Sandi missed a fun evening.

Eight of us converged on MSA around 4pm in various cars, and we were to pick up Ron at Pier 40 around 6pm. We got to Sausalito a little later than I'd planned, but the boat was late getting back from its class, so it all worked out. We got a tour of the boat from Stan, one of the instructors, and Jim, the actual boat owner. Everything looked hunky-dorey, so off we went around 4:30pm.

Leaving the dock was way easier than the usual tight squeeze at MSA. Late Harvest was on the end dock, so I backed out with plenty of space and had a wide open space to turn and head out of the marina.

The wind picked up when we were about 10 minutes out, so up went the sails, off went the motor, and on went the smiles on my crew's faces. It was a beautiful sunny day, warm enough for just a light sweater, and a really nice wind at about 14 knots. Jean took the helm so I could call Ron to let him know our ETA, and she looked so happy that I didn't have the heart to take back the helm.

As we sailed across the bay, Jean shared the helm with Norbert, and he took us under the Bay Bridge and around the corner into South Beach Harbor. We pulled right up to the pump out dock, tied up, called Ron to let him know we were there, picked him up, and off we went.

As soon as we were out of the harbor, we started looking for a place to anchor. The festival was right on the Embarcadero, and several boats were already anchored right outside the South Beach sea wall. It looked like a good place to hang out and wait for the fireworks. But there was still daylight and wind, and our main purpose was to sail, after all, so Florin took the helm and sailed us around for a bit.

As we sailed around, we tried to get KFOG on the stereo. We got the stereo to work, checked all of the settings, increased the volume, but there was nothing coming out of the speakers. Curt attached the extra speakers to the stern, as Jim had shown him, but no sound came out of those either. Bummer! We really wanted to listen to the concert!

Around 7pm, Norbert decided he was hungry and had to eat, so we headed back toward South Beach and anchored without too much ado. The boats were pretty close to each other, so we put out our fendors and watched for a while to make sure we were all swinging together.

Dinner was a feast! We started off with margaritas provided by the skipper, and wine was out for those who preferred it. Gina very quickly whipped up some very garlicky bruschetta and set out her yummy spinach and pasta salad. Jean's home-cooked chicken was tendor and delicious. Mihaela had made two homemade breads, which were incredible. I brought a spinach salad and a mixed green salad with about 20 types of veggies. Alice brought the most perfect strawberries I've ever eaten... red throughout, and every bite was delicious and sweet.

Next came the desserts... Alice's homemade brownies and Ron's scrumptious pastries of various types. Norbert had brought every kind of bar on a stick that Häagen Dazs makes! Seriously, there were about 8 or 9 different kinds! Ahhh... that was good.

At one point during dinner, Norbert look up through the hatch, noticed a very large yacht (80-100') right up close and personal. He shouted "Boat!" and bounded up the companionway stairs to see if we were about to hit it. We had swung around quite a bit, but it didn't look like we were going to hit. Ron pulled up about 10 feet of anchor just to make sure, and we returned to the cabin to finish dinner.

During dinner, there were a few close calls like that. At one point, a stinkpot pulled up our anchor while they were pulling up their own! Not just our rode... the whole anchor! Some guy in shorts and a t-shirt (seriously, the temp had dropped to about 50 degrees by then) was able to untangle it from their rode and release it. Once we thought it hit bottom (which was about 60'), we tugged on our rode a bit, and it seemed to have stuck, so we returned, once again, to our meal.

Just as we were finishing our feast, the music from the land got louder (so we did hear it after all) and the fireworks began. The fireworks were spectacular. Please check my Picasa web album for more pictures.

The fireworks ended around 9:30pm. We pulled up anchor and headed directly into South Beach Harbor to drop off Ron. The pump out dock was full, so we motored around for a few minutes, found an empty slip, and dropped him off. Getting out of that marina was a little hairy... darkness, several kayakers with a death wish crossing right in front of us, boats of all sizes coming in and out. I successfully maneuvered us out and we were on our way.

This was the first time I've ever sailed at night. It was different. I wasn't totally thrown by it, but I admit it was a little disconcerting. At some point, I handed off the helm to Norbert, and he navigated us back to Sausalito using his new GPS. Good thing we had the GPS to guide us, because the fog had rolled in around dusk, and although we weren't actually in the fog, we couldn't see many of the landmarks we would ordinarily use to guide us... like, uh, the Golden Gate Bridge. We couldn't see the top of it at all, and the fog had settled under it, so we couldn't see much of the supporting structure either. It just looked like a road across the water. Eerie...

Back in Sausalito, we overshot the marina because we were in the outer channel and couldn't make out what was what on the land. So we turned back around, headed in closer to the land, and I guided us in. Getting in that wide open slip was pretty easy. I do like that location in the marina for getting in and out!

We had the boat all emptied out, buttoned up, and showered off, and we were on our way home by about 12:30am. What a lovely evening! Thanks to all of my crew for making it possible to charter such a sweet boat, for bringing such a fantastic feast, and for being such great company! We'll do it again soon!

Special thanks to Florin for all the great daytime pictures!

Boat Delivery and Gromeeko Round the Island Race

On Friday, Skipper Stan, John, and I met at Spinnaker Sailing first thing in the morning and sailed Smokin' J up to San Francisco in preparation for the race the next day. We prepped the boat, rigged the head sail, loaded up the porta-potty (which no one ended up using), and got underway around 10:30am.

It was cold (50-ish), cloudy, and the wind was pretty strong, so we never did raise the jib. We sailed on the mainsail the whole way. For the most part, we had NW winds, so we tacked now and then but nothing strenuous. The swells were only a few feet high, but they were pretty close together, so it was a constant struggle to steer against the waves. We took turns at the helm, although my turn ended abruptly, at one point, when I couldn't keep the boat from rounding up.

All in all, it was an uneventful trip, and we arrived at the Golden Gate Yacht Club around 4:30pm... a 6-hour trip. We had arranged for a limo service to pick us up, but since we couldn't really predict our arrival time, I told them we'd call them an hour before we want to get picked up. Unfortunately, that message got confused, and the driver showed up at 4pm and had to wait an hour for us to arrive and then secure the boat and check in at the yacht club. It sure was an easy ride home, though, with someone else driving us through rush hour traffic.

On Saturday, Skipper Stan, John, Larry, Norbert, and I met at Spinnaker Sailing and all drove up to the city in my car. We were headed to the Golden Gate Yacht Club for the Gromeeko Round the Island race. This race is sponsored annually by the Los Gatos Yacht Club in honor of George Gromeeko, who was a charter member and very active in the club. Our Skipper Stan was the defending champion, having won this race on Smokin' J for the past two years, so the pressure was on!

We met the last member of our crew, Marianne (George Gromeeko's daughter), at the Golden Gate Yacht Club and started prepping Smokin' J. It didn't take long, since we pretty much left everything set up the night before.

It was a gorgeous day for sailing... much warmer than the day before - high 60s - and sunny. The wind was blowing NNW at about 12-14 knots with light chop on the water. A perfect racing day!

We were away from the docks by 10:30am. Our start time was an hour away, so we took the extra time to practice tacking and gybing and timing our start. Several of us were sailing together for the first time, and a couple of crew members hadn't sailed for a while, so we needed the practice.

Astrea (a Beneteau 37) started first, at 11:30:00, we started at 11:32:30, and Brainwaves (a J-35) started at 11:35:30.

We rounded the first mark to starboard at Harding Rock and worked our way around the back side of Alcatraz (not slowing down as much as we thought we would). All three boats remained in the starting order.

The wind came up strong on the south side of the island as we headed down to round the second mark to starboard at Blossom Rock. At that point, Astrea was still 3 minutes ahead, but Brainwaves was just one boatlength behind us. As soon as we rounded the second mark, we hardened the sails and headed up toward the cityscape on a close haul while Brainwaves split to the right, away from the city.

Our wonderful tactician, John, had printed out and laminated current charts for every hour of the day. It was clear that the strongest currents were close to the cityscape, so that's where we headed. We seemed to gain a little on the first pair of tacks, which convinced John that he had selected the better side of the course. However, this advantage did not hold up.

Stan says "In retrospect, I think we went too far toward shore on the second tack, into lighter wind and lighter current, possibly even an adverse eddy behind obstructions, as when next we approached Brainwaves, they were ahead."

We crossed the finish line one minute and three seconds after Brainwaves, followed about 10 minutes later by Astrea. What a lovely day it turned out to be for a quick and very close race!

After the race, we all gathered on the docks for a vodka toast to George Gromeeko and the winners of the race. That was followed by a delightful luncheon sponsored by George's wife, Bunny. Thanks to Stan for including me in such a great experience!

 

A description of the trip back to Redwood City from Norbert, since I had to drive my car back and missed the downwind sail home:

It was nice, fast, and overall relaxing. We had too much wind until we reached the San Mateo Bridge, so we had to ease the main regularly (even with the backstay tightened and traveller all the way down to leeward). Looking back, a reef in the main would have been the better option, I think. Anyway, we made it in 4.5 hours, and one GPS recorded a top speed of 10.5 knots (not sure how accurate that is).

Check out my Picasa web album for more pictures.