Crew

Kathleen, Nansi, Pam - Foredeck

Susan - Main Sheet

Steve, Adam - Jib Sheets

Ron - Steering and occasional motivation

Circe was not supposed to be back from holiday in time for this race so despite only one day's notice, incredibly, almost everyone made it. Unfortunately, Mike was caught in Winnipeg. Nansi was not supposed to make it but has accepted Steve's offer to find her an alternative career, as has Kathleen. Adam joined us because he was available, male, willing to crank winches, a new sailor, and didn't know any better.

Wind

At 5:00 it was howling out of the north west, with gusts to 30 knots and average at 20 knots. It was VERY windy.

But by the time the race started it had reduced and become VERY changeable and patchy varying from zero to 26 knots mainly from the north west but shifty.

Sail Selection

Left the dock with the #3 on deck and a reef in the main. Got out there and as the wind dropped shook out the reef and switched to the #2.

Course

NWE 3X buoys to port - Start was at the east end of the bay with the first mark toward the city and the 2nd mark in the west part of the bay.

Race

Well, to say the least it was interesting. See "Wind" above. The committee boat end was favoured so, of course, Skipper Ron started at the pin end to avoid the crowd. We were on the line at the gun on starboard tack (but got robbed of the jug by Bandoleer). The weather leg was fairly short and heavily starboard tack favoured. Three quarters of the way to the port layline we were actually in pretty good shape tacked over onto port and easily crossed ahead of most of the fleet including Alpha Omega and Dove (who actually did alter course to duck us - a very generous move as he was on starboard)) but hung on to port tack too long to ensure laying the mark on starboard and the boats we crossed managed to actually make the mark (some by head reaching) so that we ended up rounding the mark behind the boats we had crossed ahead of. Only Abracadabra were behind us. We managed to pass Dove on the next reach but Abra got past us and we closed the gap on Alpha for the rest of the race but could not catch her. I learned afterward that Alpha was carrying her #1 (go big or go home, Eric said) which explains why we could not close the gap. We also saw Blue Streak round up in a gust ahead of us at the jibe mark. But it was a great sail with wind speeds from 0 to 26 knots from every direction on the compass. Sail trim was constant with Pam calling the jib "in" then "out" then "in" again on every reach. We hit boat speeds in excess of 8 knots in some of the gusts. It was a fun night. I think a good time was had by all, including Adam. Kathleen seemed a bit bushed at the end though. The only unfortunate occurrence was that skipper Ron got drenched steering to leeward when certain crew members allowed the boat to excessively heel in one of those big gusts.

Results

We ended up third, 33 seconds on corrected time behind Blue Streak who was second behind Alpha Omega. Abra was 4th. Veloce was away cruising.

The good news. We won the second series. Results were

1. Circe - 8

2. Blue Streak - 10

3. Abracadabra - 11

4. Veloche - 12

5. Alpha Omega - 12

6. Kokoro - 21

Well done Circe crew. You loveable motley lot.

Skipper Ron