RACE REPORT Saturday 17 February 2024

Club Championship Series Races 11 & 12
Autumn Point Score Series Races 9 & 10

by PRO, Ashley Deacon

Unlike the sunny hot and very windy days that Rod Barnes described in his summary of the sailing conditions at the Master’s Worlds in Adelaide (well done all DBSC sailors) we were met with a very muggy day (Sydharb water temp was 25°C) and an insipid ENE breeze that drifted soft 10 knots N and ENE wind lanes down the course during the afternoon for Championships 11 & 12, and Point Scores 9 & 10.

A very impressive combined fleet of about 53 boats, plus Brett Beyer’s squad, had to deal with our usual friendly fleet of Echells parked on ‘our’ course, but were also entertained by way too many doof doof party boats.

The on-water race team had some hand wringing late morning as to where best to lay the course – in ‘The Dardanelles’ so the fleet could all enjoy the snakes & ladders of that water – or a standard NE course. Thanks to Michelle Power and John Sweeny for helping lay the proper course; a Nor’easter with the weather mark biased to the east to make life a little more interesting.

Both fleets behaved and got away clean in the first race, which gave Mark Crowhurst a great opportunity to brief me on features of the digital race scoring software. We were soon distracted by the return of the ILCA 6 fleet with some impressive margins and speed shown by the youngins after the 1st lap. However we were again distracted, this time by the pretty rapid formation of some large thunderstorms to the SW of Sydney. The storm’s thunderhead broke down and quickly drifted north over Sydharb, and the storm influenced the wind on the Harbour by sucking up the hot humid air into its vortex. This caused the first race to slow and take over an hour to finish – apologies from the on-water race management.

Brett respected the threat of the storm and concerned for lightning, took his squad home – safety first.

Between races Craig Sheers and John were able to shorten the windward leg and adjust the bottom mark but the ILCA 4 & 6 fleet were clearly keen to get the race done, avoid any lightning, and to get to Shirley and Paul’s BBQ, and almost the whole fleet crossed early so the General Recall flag got a nice airing. The ILCA fleet were well behaved and respectful, as always!

Some observations from a skipper’s viewpoint: “My main impression from a sailor's perspective it was a pseudo NEaster with more east and variability than usual. It was tricky deciding which side of the course to take, with shifts sometimes favouring shoreside and pressure sometimes favouring the channel side, varying between legs.

You could be punished for taking the wrong side which I did regularly. Quite a lot of cross chop despite incoming tide.”

And a few observations from this infrequent PRO:

• The digital scoring system is great until trying to finish boats whose skippers haven’t signed on. Simple solution……. sign on folks.

• Videoing the race finish is a great backup. I used my iPad, but accidentally hit slow-mo, so I had hours of video to enjoy that night!

• Safety is the number one priority for the PRO and on-water race team, and the threat posed by the storm and our concern for lightning on the day did put the second race at risk of being abandoned

• Boat bungs: Installing bungs on the RHIBs is important (ask Pat Levy…..whose naughty book is full), but its equally important on our ILCAs. Please ensure and check that your bung is in when rigging and if you need to borrow a bung ask someone – I’m sure our members will gladly assist. One of the ILCA 7 fleet sailed without a bung – very very slow – and it cruelly impacted his overall club championship results, i.e. podium.

Thanks to Shirley and Paul for a slap-up BBQ and their on-time start to the feast, and to Rod Barnes and Quentin Burns for their help on the ‘Toasties’, and Grant Lovelady for the post BBQ clean-up.