Crackerjack likes a bit of breeze and usually does well and today, with wind and handicap in the right area, was no exception. Also Krakatoa returned to the podium with a small handicap advantage over Passion X where we filled the third place. It was very close from third through to 12th place with just two minutes separating the ten yachts.
We started at the start boat behind Crosshaven and were pleased to keep our nose in front of the fleet for most of the run. We overtook Crosshaven when they ran deep due to having the jib poled out but in turn were overrun by the windward fleet as they drove down in the gusts. Crackerjack and Joli were two of the yachts that ran past us to the top mark.
On the way home we had some pretty good angles but were mostly in phase with the fleet who were all picking the shifts well so it was mainly a speed test. Amante, the much modified Sydney 36 Cr won the windward work speed test pulling back Hanni a little but not passing her and leading out from Joli by a couple of minutes with Crosshaven just 4 second behind. We enjoyed a tacking duel with Trim and Allegro who both passed us and we gave away three minutes on the work home to fellow GFS club member Joli and were mid fleet in conditions where we are still trying to find our mojo.
For the day we set our new No1 heavy genoa and a reef in the main. This worked quiet well as we were a little under powered on the run but over powered on the work. We had not expected continuous hard on the wind conditions on the way home and had hoped for tighter conditions on the way out and more free ones coming home. What we did try was OK and worth persevering with particularly if the wind has a bit more north in it however for today the full main and small jib poled out might have been more successful.
Courtesy of generous handicapping we had a first last week and a third this week which gives us the series lead for the time being. We will lose a bit of handicap next week and we might not pick the shifts so well.
Some pretty good tacking angles on the day