[Rhodes22-list] Anne's Kentucky Race Season

[Wally Buck]

Anne,

Flying a spinnaker sure makes things intereresting! Thanks for the rest of 
the story.

Wally

>From: "anima13" <anima13 at bellsouth.net>
>Reply-To: The Rhodes 22 mail list <rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org>
>To: "The Rhodes 22 mail list" <rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org>
>Subject: RE: [Rhodes22-list] Anne's Kentucky Race Season Date: Tue, 16 Nov 
>2004 06:29:02 -0600
>
>Ed,
>My race story was to my non-sailing friends and family.
>I will try to piece together something more technical.
>
>
>This weekend we took our first road trip with the old race boat "Dagnabit",
>an S2 6.7.
>Friday at 1700hrs we left Lighthouse Landing in Jimmy's nice new 4 seater
>truck carrying Dagnabit behind. The truck is red and so is the boat's trim.
>We looked quite spiffy, I'd say. We arrived at Harbor Island Yacht club
>at 730pm. We set up the mast in the dark. However, John, my racing partner
>owned this boat for years and I raced on this boat for 4 years so we knew
>the parts and pieces very well. Jimmy bought the boat from John and got
>another mast after the mast broke on us a year ago. He did all the cutouts
>on
>the mast himself and ordered all new line. He is a master in heating and
>air, so
>he had a cool light you wear on your head which freed our hands to place
>screws
>and O rings, etc. Did I mention that it was cold and windy and dark?
>There were two other fellows there. They had tilted their boat hard on its
>side
>by stringing their halyard over to a dock about 35 ft away: a hard tilt.
>They were
>scrubbing the bottom for the race, of course! They had their station 
>wagon's
>lights
>beaming onto the work area and had amazing irish-folk-country-dance type
>music
>blarin'. Made the chore all the more enjoyable. We were about to drop her 
>in
>the water
>when we remembered the wind vane!!! One more time. We finally dropped
>Dagnabit in the water,
>tied her up to the dock and went to a Longhorn where Jimmy treated us to
>steaks
>and red wine. We were crashed in a motel by 1100pm.
>I got up a little early to make sandwiches. I was on orders to wake the
>fellows up.
>So, at 6:15 I took coffee to their room and banged on the door. Turns out
>that my
>room's clocks had not been turned back, so it was really 5:15. Man did I
>take some
>grief, and I know that more will be comin at me for the next year. They 
>will
>not let me
>forget this.
>Nevertheless, we returned to the Yacht club and started rigging the boat.
>Thank goodness
>the sun was out, but it was pretty cold. I had top and bottom runner's
>underwear, cashmere
>sweater (old with holes), super fleece jacket and fleece pants on. Gloves
>and hats were
>also in order. Good thing is, we had wind!
>We know several folks from that club, for they come to KY races quite 
>often.
>They were very
>welcoming and gracious at the skipper's meeting. I got a chance to visit
>briefly with Joy
>Kimbrell with whom I worked at Donelson hospital. She has a masters in
>nursing and teaches
>via the internet. She is a very serious racer and was their race chairman
>for two years.
>Racing at Old Hickory lake in Nashville is tricky. I did it for two years 
>on
>J-24 in the mid 80's,
>so it was cloudy in my memory until we got out there. It all came back in a
>huge flash!
>This is called a lake, but it is really a river. It is narrow, makes many
>turns, and has multiple
>bays with streams flowing into the river which makes for VERY shifty wind
>conditions.
>The starts of races in Nashville are very aggressive. These folks take 
>their
>racing SO
>seriously. Many are the same who raced when I was there and have the same
>boats. Most have
>more of a race style boat, whereas, on KY lake, we are more of a cruising
>community and folks
>have much nicer condo-type boats. So few race on KY lake but when they do
>come out, we are so
>excited to get them to participate that we make it as comfortable as
>possible.
>At this start we had boats coming at us from every angle, Near misses were
>occuring on every
>direction to the boat. NOW I remember this!
>We had a good upwind run to the first mark and set the spinnaker nicely for
>the downwind leg.
>Now we were warm and layers were shed. Man, it was tricky keeping the
>spinnaker filled when
>wind was coming outta those coves! We jibed the pole (my job, I do
>foredeck). At 2/3 of
>this leg, I could see that other boats were having very difficult times 
>with
>the spinnaker up.
>They were having severe knockdowns!  We decided to douse the spinnaker 
>early
>and infact the
>dogleg of the river at this point made the wind more on a beam, anyhow. 
>This
>was a good move.
>We made up to the next mark and continued with hard concentration and lots
>of muscle power
>up wind. We made a great decision to reef the main which enabled us to get
>more power out of
>it rather than dumping it so much due to heavy gusting. Made the next mark
>and set the spinnaker
>once again. This time we were absolutely flying on the thing. Our boat was
>planing! When we later
>checked the GPS, we learned that we had hit over 8mph on that run.
>HOWEVER, we had a sudden windshift at this speed and the wind came from
>across the beam,
>causing the boat to BROACH, severely!! I am on the bow of the boat on the
>low side!! I am holding
>on for dear life (guess that is why they call 'em the lifelines!) Mostly, I
>did not want to go in
>the lake. We rock and roll several times and each time we are perpendicular
>a little longer. The bow
>sinks in the water and my feet are planted firmly on the low side of the 
>bow
>but are covered with 8
>inches of water for over 7 seconds. Such calesthenics! The non-sid is so
>diamond on this boat that
>you cannot get on your knees to wash it and I am COUNTING on that diamond
>right now!
>Meanwhile, they are having a time back in the cockpit. John nearly gets us
>back on
>the run but the wind tips us each time, so he lets the spinnaker halyard
>down. The spinnaker sheet
>is caught and now that huge sail is 20 feet out on the port side of the
>boat. John gets out his little
>swiss army knife finally cuts the thing and I haul in that monster, soaking
>wet sail and pitch it in the
>cabin. Lines are tangled everywhere and we quickly get them untangled so we
>can stay in this race.
>We succeed and make the next mark.
>We point very well and make the finish line with final muscle effort. What 
>a
>glamorous day! The
>sky was that wonderful autumn blue with a few stratta clouds. This lake has
>very lovely homes at
>the shore. The grass is very deep summer green, for Nashville got all that
>hurricane rain and many
>of the hardwood trees are hanging onto their colorful leaves. It was a fine
>sailing day.
>We drink a beer at the dock. The wind was so good that we are done at
>3:30pm. We take the boat
>apart, run it onto the trailer. We get the mast down and everything is
>stowed. We are on the road
>home in dusky daylight at 1715hrs). What an adventure. oh, we were 5th in
>our class of
>8 boats...not bad for a light boat and only 3 crew...we really need 4 on
>that boat.
>I am in bed at 2000 hrs!
>
>Several other boats who came after us to that spot had the same problem and
>took the spinny down
>after 2-4 knock-downs.
>Good friends of mine who have raced everywhere in the world on J boats 
>wrote
>the following to me
>after receiving my story:
>
>
>"I can't count the number of times we've been hammered by the "Drakes Creek
>Blast"!!!  We went out for a while Saturday morning and it was really 
>gusty,
>probably up to 17 or so.  Sounds like you had a great time, we always
>enjoyed sailing at Harbor Island, and belonged to their club for a lot of
>years.  We're leaving Thursday for New Orleans, Chip is sailing a J160 in
>JFest.  It's going to be tough to have to eat oysters, and crab and all 
>that
>stuff, but we'll do our best.  Also, the timing is perfect.  Crais is going
>to start the trip down the river with Carmen and Larry, and we'll pick him
>up on our way home.  See you soon"
>
>Anne
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>-
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