Wednesday, June 25, 2014

2014 Waukegan Race



A couple members of our crew had to drop out to tend to other obligations so we were left with Keith, Mike Brown, Antanas, and Julyte for the race. Fears of incredibly light winds spread through the harbor as we prepared the boat to race. Julyte was hoisted up the mast to attach the wind indicator, we bent on our sails, and off we went. As we drove the the starting area a thick fog surrounded us in all directions. 

We started the race and immediately made a couple tactical gybes to get ourselves into clear air. For the next four hours, nary a boat was seen. We cruised along averaging 7 knots of boat speed, Julyte, Mike, and I alternating turns trimming the spinnaker (even Keith trimmed for a while!). Keith drove and Mike trimmed main when he wasn't taking a shift on the Spinnaker. 

Not seeing any boats had us very cautious that either we were doing phenomenally, or we were in the cheap seats. 

As we approached the finish line we had to throw in a gybe to make the finish. We sailed along at what felt like .5 knots of boat speed for what seemed like a half hour -- finally Mike made the call and we gybed back onto course and crossed the finish line shortly thereafter. 

Not completely certain on how we had done, we buzzed the wall outside of the yacht club and only found big boats and a couple of T 10s tied up. Confident in our victory we made our way to the slip and had a few victory cocktails. Once we docked the sky became angry, like an old man trying to return soup at a deli, and we hustled over to the yacht club to celebrate and collect our brag flag. 

(Not Pictured: Keith and Julyte)

Mirth and merriment commenced, and on Sunday we woke up early and motor sailed the boat back home. It was a fun race and a nice relaxing trip home. We are all looking forward to doing it again next year!

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