FINAL RACE. DAY 3 OF ST BARTH’S BUCKET
SUNDAY 29TH MARCH 2009
Not so good today!
The course was about 25 miles, clockwise around the Island. Our rating was, as expected, not very good and although the course was similar to the first day out time was put back an additional 8 minutes.
We started a little late on a close reach to the first mark, a hard beat up to the next lot of rocks, tack onto port and continue around the island. All sounds easy but we did not do too well with our positioning and had boats all around us giving bad air and trouble. We had to pinch hard to lay the next rocks and passed really close – the adrenalin was flowing fast as we scraped past with waves crashing nearby. Boats were criss crossing each other and there were some close encounters as everyone pushed hard for advantage. Once around the Grenadier rocks we could free up a bit and hoist the mizzen staysail with a fleet of boats all around us, mostly in front unfortunately.
We all turned again to starboard around another off lying rock and set a spinnaker but the wind was dead aft so we had a lot of problems. In retrospect we should have stood on to get a better angle after the gybe but now we were committed. This course took us close into the shore on the lee side of the island and we fell into a hole while watching even more boats passing further offshore. Bad move.
We still have not heard the final results but we were well into the back half of the fleet, probably in the higher twenties out of a fleet of 35.
For final results and reports see www.bucketregattas.com
We will now go back to St Maarten and later this month up to Savannah to haul out and do our ABS survey.
All is well on board and we had a most enjoyable regatta.
Phil
