Shields 88: A bad day on the water beats a good day on land...

...but a great day on the water is pretty sweet! I had a really lousy week; lots of little disasters, getting sick and tough hours at work, but that all went away when we got sailing!

Day started well when I found a diver who could wash 88's bottom Saturday morning. We've been really lax about it this year, and haven't cleaned it since June. Diving was not something I was looking forward to as I've had a cold all week, but a friend on the dock happened to hire a diver who didn't mind one more boat. Nice!

Crew was tricky as we had a late cancellation putting us at 4, which is certainly sailable but a little light. At dinner the night before we recruited Katie, Niki's sister, and then in the morning Mike Gillam (spelled right?) was looking for a ride as 90 was taking the day off. All of a sudden we're at six! I've wanted to try 6 for a while, as it turns out it's crowded but fast (more later)

The forecast was for 15-20 out of the north, which meant waves, so we were set up the same way we were Monday; straight mast, moderate sag in the headstay. As the day went on, we actually powered the boat up more, and we were probably about 200lbs on the lowers. Seems weird until you remember that we had 6 people, all hiking hard. I'm learning it's really important to keep putting more power in the boat until you can't hike it away anymore. All day sails were set pretty well: jib was a hole foward, but eased to the spreader tip except in the flat. The main was set with a good bit of twist, but was played all day. The breeze was down to 8kts at one point, but the RC was reported 20's at the end of the last race. The waves started at 2-4 but on the last race I really think there were a couple 6 footers. Going upwind meant there were some huge slams, but man was downwind _awesome!_

First race we attempted to start at the boat, but got shut out by 150 and had to gybe around. Woops! 130 led the way, followed by 150 then us at the top mark. We were able to pass them up when they had a certain incident. I won't say what happened, but they were offering to sell people shrimp at the bar later... The next upwind leg we made big gains on 130 by playing the last third of the beat real close. I like doing that as it's hard to call laylines in big waves, and lots of other boats overstand or end up doing extra tacks. Downwind we were pretty close to them, and might have caught them if we had gybed on them towards the end, but another brainfade on my part and they finished just ahead. Good racing with 130 and 150 on that one, and it really looks like people are getting psyched up for Nationals.

There was a goofy aborted start where the wind dropped to like 8kts, went left 40 degrees, and we were all starting on port aimed right at the mark! Glad they stopped that one....

Next start was us at the pin, which had been favored up until the last 2 minutes before a right shift came in. Lucky for us 150 took 196 and 130 over the line, and they all had to restart. We made a mistake by not covering all the way right, and ended up in 2nd to 150. The next run turned into a reach, and we were able to make up ground on them by keeping the boat flatter and using the waves a bit better. With 6 on the boat I had Katie be our wave-tician, and we worked out a great dialouge on when to surf, it was really helpful having someone eyes-back saying "your stern will lift in 3, 2, 1" and then we'd put the bow down and really get some wave help. 150 had a bad rounding and we were able to halve the distance between us, then we got left of them, and when we crossed again upwind we leebowed, sent them right, and the next cross we were about 5 lengths ahead. We were the only boat to fly the kite on the run, and exteneded for a very satisfying win. Again, waves were key on the run.

our big crowd
Sailing with 6: this was a big help, as we were able to get 5 bodies (I can only kind of half hike) hiking hard, and it gave us some crushing upwind speed. Other boats were depowered to deal with the breeze and we could keep the bow down with full sails and were really fast. Oddly, we werent the heaviest crewed boat, at around 910 (other 5 crew boats had more), but having more bodies means the same weight is more effectively hiked. Sailing with 6 is a clear advantage in breeze, but I'd like to try it in the light to see if it hurts. My thoughts on this are that 6 should probably be illegal, as it is so much better in breeze, but it's crowded and I think isn't in keeping with the character of the boat.

Really fun day of sailing, learned a lot and had great racing with good competition. We now have 19pts for the season, and I think second has 47. Next week should be good as we've got Bam coming back to town for some Nationals crew sailing. Looking forward to it!

Mark Passis (63) and Steve Schwartz (90) were out on Marks lovely new powerboat, and they got some great snaps on the Shields fleet on the last run, here they are:

The purple spinnakers have really grown on me...