The trip to Mexico for the Laser Masters Radial World Championships was a chance to escape from the approaching cool weather in Sydney I still have a warm glow from the experience of the sailing there and the venue would rank as one of the best I have sailed at. The closeness of the accommodation to the boat park, the quality of the food and the excellent sailing conditions all went together to make it a memorable event. It seemed that every day the breeze filled in at 1 pm local daylight saving time and we commented on being able to set the clock by the arrival of the breeze.
On Sydney Harbour today there was a pleasant warmth left over from our long summer but the breeze was anything but predictable. What breeze we had was a a small fraction of the forecast and it came from all directions. We made an excellent start on the boat end on a beam reach and managed to keep reaching up to the leaders every time the breeze faded. So fickle was the breeze in the middle ground that we passed some of the 1s fleet that had found their private zones of no wind.
We were in exceptionally good company at the top of the harbour in front of our regular competitors and alongside clubmate Agrovation but the reach back home proved to be more challenging.
Against the outgoing tide the 1 knot of wind was not helping us make much headway. We tried to pole out the genoa but the wind would not cooperate in strength or direction. We tried to poke it out to leeward but the breeze would have none of that but we found little gusts of South East breeze to keep moving back towards Steel Point. Just beyond the point the breeze switched to South West and came with some force to help us to the Rose Bay rounding mark. In the switch of the breeze Agrovation gained a few metres and went on to beat us over the line. We were left with a beat back to Point Piper to the shortened course finish at the rounding mark to record a third on handicap and a rare finish in front of the more fancied company in the fleet.