tonyquoll Posted October 25, 2010 Report Share Posted October 25, 2010 10 Paper Tigers! We made up 1/2 the boats there. Already some of the racing is getting muddled in my mind. Apologies for errors, omissions and swell-headed boasting. It went something like; Race 1 steady 5-10 knots. While most PTs sat on the start-line stalled, waiting for the gun, I’ve cut through them with a hull flying to hit the port end at full tilt. Ian Marcovich started badly but sailed through the fleet to the lead, and kept going to overtake most of Division 1 as well. So caught up in that battle, he sailed the extra lap with them, while most of us finished. Ian eventually came in 7th, ahead of Steve Halliday and others who also did the extra lap. Bill Arthur from Wagga won, with Ralph Steadman 2nd, me 3rd. Race 2 the wind died out a bit, and swung to the north-west. As I'd got there early and practiced Friday afternoon, I knew there'd be a channel of wind on the left and kept going there. It paid off; near the windward mark everyone else went right and sat in a hole, while came in with a hull flying from distant 6th place to 3rd and just behind the leaders. Ian commented that seeing me flying the hull while they all drifted was “a Tigerdelic moment”. It was a photo finish between Marco & Ralph, while I held 3rd. A dark cloud approached as we started race 3, and gave about 20 minutes of strong winds. the peak of one gust was recorded at 50 knots, while I thought they were more like 25. Survival conditions in any case. I done another flying port-end start, dropped the traveller a bit to keep speed up and hammered it. Boats to windward held me to that tack, then when I finally had space to tack, it was a 1km broadreach from there to the windward mark. Not great strategy but awesome full-tilt top-speed screaming reach fun! Think it was Marco, Ralph & Bill at the front. The wind put off a few boats, who headed for safety at the clubhouse. At the end of Saturday, it was Ralph in the lead, Ian 2nd. Then Bill, myself and Neil Waterman on equal points for 3rd. Possibly Steve Halliday, or Steve from Concord Ryde? Max Dogger from Merimbula, Steve(?) from Ballarat, on Maximum Warp (sorry mate) and Des from Mannering Park. Sunday morning was crappy drifter conditions. I’m sure Des would agree with that. Race 4 had a very biased line, so I've run down the line on starboard and called most of the fleet who were going for it on port tack. I went to the left side, while they all went to the right, and it looked like a big mistake for me. As I've crossed the lake to their side, a flukey gust hit and had me hull-flying, straight to the mark and into 2nd place! Sweeeet! I passed Bill on the run when the wind changed & he didn't pull his sail in, but Marco and Ralph got past me on the next windward leg. I really have to learn to get the sail flat enough upwind! Race 5 similar drifter, this time I've gone right while everyone else went left, and dropped to near last. Neil Waterman was directly ahead of me, laughing "ha! I'm beating Tony!" Then the wind swung 90degrees to put me to windward of him and going faster, "ha! I'm beating Neil!" I called back. We came 6th & 7th I think. Possibly worse. It was worse for "Maximum Warp", sitting in board to get the hull flying, then performed a slow-motion capsize as the wind picked up & he couldn't respond fast enough. Good fun racing with Yarni Marcovitch on a Maro-designed Glider, who determinedly chased us. She won the last race and finished 2nd in her division overall. Final race after lunch the put us on a triangle course with an island in the middle of the windward leg. Sitting under the vang with my legs on the leeward side, I managed to lift the hull and float up one side of the island, tacked on a couple of windshifts and round the 1st mark in the lead. Somehow matched Marco for pace and the two of us left the rest behind. Of course he overtook on a windward leg, and got away on the reaches. On the last leg, I got a couple of nice gusts and he changed course to cover me, which reduced the gap. He tacked to cover, while I tacked on the shifts and caught up, then lucky timing had me fly to the finish on port and cross ahead as he came in on starboard. Unbfckinglvable! Regatta results, PT Division; 1st Ian Marcovitch, 2nd Ralph Steadman, 3rd Tony Hastings, 4th Bill Arthur, then not sure. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyquoll Posted October 28, 2010 Author Report Share Posted October 28, 2010 Great youtube clip of the racing by Mary Tulip: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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