To be fair the thirty knots was post race as we were providing a water taxi service for one of the crew and the thirty degrees was on the way from West Pennant Hills to the water but all the same it was a warm and windy session.
For today we had two of my sons crewing and that added firepower for the windy conditions. In deference to the wind we set our new Carbon No 3 and put in one reef in the main. This appeared to be the rig of choice as Odyssey and Avalon seemed to have the same set up.
For some odd reason I clicked on the wrong link to the start times and gave away a minute at the start. We did think Odyssey started early but it was Passion X starting a full minute late. That minute gap to Odyssey varied very little for the work to Goat and the long run back to Spectacle Island but once on the work we slowly pegged them back to about 30 seconds.
Avalon with shiney new antifouling was not so close for the work to Goat and around Balls Head we picked up a strong gust which seemed to keep the distance fairly static. Along the Balmain shore to Cockatoo Island Odyssey managed to pole out their genoa and drew away and it was only a set of strong gusts along the Cockatoo shore that kept us in touch.
Around the eastern end of Cockatoo island Odyssey did some rounding up in the gusts which allowed us to peg back a few more boat lengths and at Spectacle Island we were right on their tail.
It was quiet around Spectacle Island and Avalon with genoa poled out was cutting into our lead at alarming speed.
Not wanting to take any chances in the 24 knot gusts we followed Odyssey around Snapper island and settled in for a drag race to the finish. Today the shifts went our way and we passed on front of Odyssey on the second last leg into the finish. Avalon was now charging up to our position but a header at the finish allowed us to flip to port and clear the line .
Allowing for our starting mistake we finished four and a half minutes slower that Avalon and that is a good result for us.
