Sat 5 November ā Race day 2, At Home Series. The course was RPNYC ā 10p, 4p, 10p, 4p, RPNYC. The fleetĀ included St Laurence and Tortimony. The ROās nightmare!
Steve and Anne from the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron (who built their 60ā yacht from South Island White Pine some years ago) visited the start box after DO Jim Gordon gently nudged them our way.
We were busily trying to sort the conundrum ā who was going to finish when!
St Laurence had just about reached mark 4 for the first time before we could see any of the monohull fleet through the Freyberg Pool windows which made them about 1/3 of the way up to the mark.
Soā¦ā¦.. after a few calcs as to how long we thought the monos would finish we decided to shorten the course at the next mark (10) after mark 4 was rounded.
Not so good for St Laurence as she completed the course in 1.25 hours while Tortimony took approximately 3 hours. Ohā¦ā¦ the ROās nightmare!
The rest of the fleet enjoyed some reasonable sailing with the wind being NNW and the upwind legs being not quite true. But it was sufficient to force some race strategy upon the participants.
A great tussle for 2nd took place between Whistler 3 and 88% Proof, with 88% Proof beating Whistler by a few minutes.
The race fleet numbered 10 entrants with a query from me āWhy wasnāt anyone doing the Lowry Bay Regatta?ā
Jim, watching the race up on the hill somewhere, rang and made the declaration that there were 10 race entrants. We only had 9 on the sheet. We had forgotten Haumuri!
Ash had put only 9 finish times into the computer and pressed process results; that created havoc. The bloody computer wonāt allow any adjustments The ROās nightmare! Thus we had to generate another race (with the help of Pedro).
After much paper wastage we finally had the results at 1657hrs for a 1700hrs prize giving. The ROās nightmare!
The Caniwi team of Garry Hutchings, Cathie Johnson and Malcolm Baxter worked well without much radio chatter required.
During the race Steve and Anne departed with a promise to come back later. They did so and stayed on in the club for dinner then visited the sheds to chat with the locals and view the fireworks.
After much chatting and fire-working we eventually had to part with them but a wonderfully pleasant evening was had by all.
The result: Getting home at 2345hrs.