|
|
| The
Clean Report Melges 24 US Nationals, Day 1 I hadn't ever sailed on Jacksonville until today. A month ago I was trying to figure out where Jacksonville is and who sails there. I knew we were sailing on some brown river but I didn't know much else, and what I did know didn't make me feel good. Some of the useful facts stored in my head were that the town was originally named Cowford, because it is located near a part of the river where early inhabitants drove cows across the river. Umm…ok, so what else did I know? Ahhh, largest deepwater port in the US - more good news, how about paper mills? Check. Busy Naval Air Station? Got it. I clearly did not expect ideal conditions for a nice getaway weekend sailing with some friends. Meanwhile, after a tough and breezy first day I find myself already saying that I'll be here next year. The Club has been throwing great parties - a full on oyster roast last night with as much beer as we could drink and tonight a huge pasta buffet tonight with beer and booze, all set to the backdrop of some jittery video taken of today's races by Race Organizer Pat Lambert. There were almost a dozen awards given out, of which we got nothing, but overall the administration of the event has been excellent. The club is beautiful and the competitors include lots of friends and a ton of great racers from half a dozen different countries. And of course, most importantly, they've got a buffet breakfast laid out for all of us - and for some reason, a buffet dish full of crispy bacon is one of my all-time favorite things. Despite its brownness, the St. John river has delivered the goods as well, and with a vengeance. A strong cold front came through last night, and the isobars stayed tightly packed up and down the east coast all day today, and the forecast was for anywhere from 15 knots up through about 30. This is one aggressive fleet - 47 boats started the first race, and after 3 general recalls the fleet still had its share of OCS boats. The wind was fluky but not really persistently shifting, so the middle of the course paid for most people, a trend that would continue. It was marginal planing, and a lot better for lake sailors that for ocean racers - no real surprise that Full Throttle cleaned up only a few weeks after kicking ass on Lake Geneva, Wisconsin on Melges Performance Boats front porch. The second start had two general recalls, and one of them certainly saved our ass. We got stuck luffing at the line when another boat came flying in, trying to create some space where none existed. I think they bounced off of boat us and a leeward boat before flopping over. We were stuck in reverse at the line, and fortunately they flew the yellow triangle just moments later. The race itself started to get interesting when one boat hooked another's backstay, bringing down the mast, and some other equipment issues and a man overboard kicked up the entertainment factor. The wind was up to about 20 during the finish, but with flat river water, there just wasn't as much difficult driving the boat as there would be if this was Miami or Key West. The last race was really honking. We had a nice start and good speed. I saw two boats get knocked completely flat while sailing upwind- one of these boats has a top pro driving so it wasn't inexperience - and that just doesn't happen that much in these boats. There was certainly plenty of wiping out downwind - we spent a minute or two on our ears too, after getting a knot in the old spinnaker sheet during a job. By the finish, though, Team Gill was working as a team, sailing like we'd been doing it for a while instead of sailing like we'd just met each other a few hours before. I apologize
that I don't have any pics, but I need to buy a cord for the camera -
I snapped some good shots despite the wind gusting to over 30 and being
a little preoccupied. My pal Katie McCord is here and she'll be on the
water tomorrow, taking pics of us in the light, fluky airs that should
be out there. I'll make sure to get you some good 'uns. 11/17/06 |