CATALINA SAILBOATS RACING MONTEREY BAY ON TUESDAY NIGHT: OCTOBER 28, 2014 THE END OF THE SEASON

THE END OF THE SEASON

October 28, 2014

SKUNKED!  We can’t be skunked with no wind on our last Tuesday night sail.  We have not been skunked on any Tuesday night this season.  We had nine boats out for a float-fest?  But wait, you can feel the whisper of a wind from the East.  Looking to the East there was a band of dark water on the horizon. We picked a short course for the limited wind and  light: Start, Blacks, Finish. As we started the count down, it seemed like the wind was actually blowing from the south.

On Pair A Dice, we were a little early to the line and had to stall.  Homer was right on line right on time and Kicks was also there but a little further down the line.  We threaded our way between Blue Ribbon and Kicks.  On the way to Blacks there were many headers and lifts.  It was a game to see who could take advantage of these shifts in the very light wind.

At Blacks it was Odonata, Kicks and Blue ribbon rounding with a substantial lead over Pair a Dice.  After rounding Blacks, Blue Ribbon and Kicks headed outside looking for more wind as Odonata set their spinnaker in the non existent wind.  We were all bucking the swell in the light wind.  On Pair A Dice, we set the pole on port and took the rhum line toward the mark.  We noticed the poled jib was getting backwinded, just as Blue Ribbon was catching a filling Easterly and sailing very fast toward the South.  We doggedly sailed straight toward the mark, but switched the pole to starboard.  Odonata’s spinnaker filled beautifully as they sailed over the line in first place.  We limped over the line in second, Toad was third, then Kicks, Blue Ribbon, Aeolian, Sea Quake and Free Spirit.

We had a great turnout at the barbecue with lots of food and sailing talk.  You would have never known that there was a World Series game on the TV in the Yacht club.  That’s OK, everyone knows that sailors don’t take the World Seriesly.

This Season:

For 13 years some of us have been enjoying Catalina Tuesday.  The early participants KNEW we had something very special and FUN! We tried many different ways to get the word out, but with little success in increasing the number of boats coming out.

For all of those years we raced with two or three other boats.  After each race, whether it was Tuesday night or a regatta, on Pair a Dice, we always discussed in detail three questions win or lose:  What did we do right?, what did we do wrong? What could we have done better? These discussions often continued in E-mails during the week after each race.  It was these e-mail discussions that lead to the development of sailingpairadice.blogspot.com. 

During the season, I have attempted to share the little things we learn while racing and sailing.  Sailing is unique in that people are always sharing the things they learn.  I encourage everyone to share in these discussions on your boat after each race.  This is the way you can really advance your sailing skills: always keep an open mind and learn more.  You will keep learning more, but you will never know it all.  To me, this is one of the things about sailing that keeps me coming back: always learning and knowing there is even more to learn!

I hope to see you guys out there this winter on the weekend and the mid-winters regatta.

Thanks to all of you for participating this summer and I hope to see you out there next summer.

Barry Keeler

Sailing Pair A Dice