| The
Hits Just Keep Coming
If
you haven't gone crazy, they've been having a ball up here on the
Olympic Circle A few crashes, a dropped mast and people moving up
and down the standings. The log jam isn't just at the first weather
mark third thru sixth place separated by two points.
Here's the latest.
In this fleet the closest you are ever gonna see to a port tack
start was pulled off by Judd Smith and gang in race one. After two
“shucks can’t get an square line” postponements and
one general recall. The committee finally got the race off. Judd
noticed, “They kept sneaking the pin end up, start after start
and it finally was favored. With that long a line, it was enough
to make across. We were three to four lengths ahead of Healy when
we finally came across. Lucky bow number 13 with sail number 1300
didn't’t have to look back much. Judd’s crew Henry Fraser
–in his best stock car racing North Carolina twang– said
it much more succinctly, “We did hit that line wide open.”
Judd
pussyfooted with Craig Healy for a while forcing Craig into a tangle
with Peter Vessella, which allowed Judd to pull away.
Conner
meanwhile had banged that right corner pretty hard. It was not a
day to bang a corner–as his 12th & 13th place finishes
show. He did have his moments unburying himself. He took a wide
line at the weather mark, saw an opening at the offset, set immediately.
The chute was full as he passed the offset, and immediately cut
inside about 10 boats, popping a fast jibe for clear air down the
left side. All was done quietly and efficiently amid the chaos of
20 other boats.
Local Peter Vessalla has moved into second with his consistent scores
of 10,4,26,2,5. He nipped Healy in today’s first race. Healy
returned the compliment with a little change, too by taking second
in the day’s last race. The Brits have moved back a tad. Moving
up is Tim Wells who placed third in the last race and now sits in
third place. Well sort of... Without the throwout Tim has 31 points,
Vince Brun is at 32 points along with Nils Razmilov whose brother
Ante is a point behind.
All Vince Brun could say was “It’s a long story.”
He was a a ways back in race one. Even had fun trying to do the
port tack jam it in at the weather mark. Nothing worked in the first
race. He finished a probable national championship denying 24th
place. Like a champion he came back and won the second race. He
asked the question, [Do you] “Go for tide or go for pressure?”
and made the right decision. Even taking a page from Lucky 13 and
starting at the pin.
Race
one mark roundings proved highly challenging. 54 boats rounding
in something like 4 minutes ends up leaving someone out. After the
leaders passed by Paul Kent jammed it in close to the mark on port.
A miscalculation in the tack laid him right on the mark. He cleared
himself immediate, but left a stack of slowed up boats, screaming
and hollering in his wake. Down at the leeward rounding, where the
wind picked up. A port tacker coming off the gate managed to cross
1 out of three boats coming down on starboard. The new short rig
was really fast when towed behind RIB.
Quite a few boats came in early. Either with a broken boat or broken
body. “My back.” was enough said from one skipper. The
breeze was a nice sedate 11 knots at the beginning- building to
up near twenty then throttling back. The wash cycle on the chop
was set for heavy duty. No stranger to a good thrash, Jeff Thorpe
tiredly remarked, “If I were racing a marathon, this is how
I would feel.
Plenty
protests today and requests for permission to haul. Yesterday's
internecine war twixt Frers Ante and Nils got chucked improper filing.
Judd Smith “We did hit that line wide open.”
09/24/04
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