Bill
06-02-2002, 08:38 PM
Thought I would share with you my first sail of the season. It was to be on the Olympic Circle course located in front of Berkeley and directly in line with the opening of the Golden Gate. This area is sometimes know as the ?slot? for its direct sight to the Gate and its tendency to get a lot of wind.
The weather this Saturday was significantly different than earlier in the week. Temps hit the high 70's in Berkeley and San Francisico on Wednesday, and reached the 90's in places like Sacramento. Saturday, however, was one of those ?it?s hot in the valley, so it will be cold and foggy on the bay? days. In fact, because of a low pressure area passing through, it was even colder and windier. The temperature in Berkeley reached only the mid 50's and the winds hit 35 knots that afternoon. (All this learned from the Sunday morning papers.)
We began our sail two crew short ? there were only two of us aboard. No big deal, in most cases. By the time we reached the race area the wind was about 18 knots and the sea, though not very high, was a bit on the lumpy side. Lumpy and windy enough that with only two crew we decided to leave the engine in the well rather than removing it and placing it below. We would be non-competitive due to the drag, but a last is better than a DNF.
By the time of our start (12:25 PM) the wind had picked up a little more and we were beating to weather at a 20 degree heel. The sea was still fairly flat, so we were not getting too wet. Rounding the first mark was easy -- just let out the sails and head East on a broad reach. The next mark, however, was something else. It was one of those nasty jibe marks and by now the wind was blowing over 20 knots. No problem, I'll do a jibe by the book -- take in the main, drop it over the other side and then let it out again. Yeah, right. After getting the mainsheet taken in and starting the jibe, things moved quickly and I failed to release the mainsheet in time. We did a magnificent broach (without the aid of a spinnaker). I was on the low side of the cockpit grabbing at anything I could to get out of the water, which was filling the cockpit like the family bathtub on Saturday night!
Fortunately, the boat sails better than I. It righted itself smartly and proceeded to sail off at 180 degrees to our original course. That was good. All that was needed to get going the intended direction was to release the mainsheet. It was following this episode that I learned that the pants to my foul weather gear had a torn center seam at the seat. I now had a wet . . . you know.
The rest of the race was relatively uneventful as we fell further and further behind the fleet. The final beat to the finish was in 30 knot wind and seemed to take forever as we were regularly drenched by water spraying off the bow.
After getting the "horn" for completing the race, we turned homeward and set a course directly to the Bay Bridge and the Estuary just beyond, only to discover that the abandoned Berkeley Pier was in our way. This meant we had to come about and sail back into the westerly wind and flooding tide. The sea was now three to four feet and coming at several angles to our course, and the wind had increased to about 35 knots. It took half an hour to reach a point were we could tack toward the bridge and still miss the pier.
Back at the slip, it took us over an hour to wash the salt off everything and get the boat put away. As I was loading up my gear, I realized that my lunch was sitting, uneaten in my duffle bag. My crew claimed that this had been the most fun day of sailing he had ever experienced. Great Crew!
The weather this Saturday was significantly different than earlier in the week. Temps hit the high 70's in Berkeley and San Francisico on Wednesday, and reached the 90's in places like Sacramento. Saturday, however, was one of those ?it?s hot in the valley, so it will be cold and foggy on the bay? days. In fact, because of a low pressure area passing through, it was even colder and windier. The temperature in Berkeley reached only the mid 50's and the winds hit 35 knots that afternoon. (All this learned from the Sunday morning papers.)
We began our sail two crew short ? there were only two of us aboard. No big deal, in most cases. By the time we reached the race area the wind was about 18 knots and the sea, though not very high, was a bit on the lumpy side. Lumpy and windy enough that with only two crew we decided to leave the engine in the well rather than removing it and placing it below. We would be non-competitive due to the drag, but a last is better than a DNF.
By the time of our start (12:25 PM) the wind had picked up a little more and we were beating to weather at a 20 degree heel. The sea was still fairly flat, so we were not getting too wet. Rounding the first mark was easy -- just let out the sails and head East on a broad reach. The next mark, however, was something else. It was one of those nasty jibe marks and by now the wind was blowing over 20 knots. No problem, I'll do a jibe by the book -- take in the main, drop it over the other side and then let it out again. Yeah, right. After getting the mainsheet taken in and starting the jibe, things moved quickly and I failed to release the mainsheet in time. We did a magnificent broach (without the aid of a spinnaker). I was on the low side of the cockpit grabbing at anything I could to get out of the water, which was filling the cockpit like the family bathtub on Saturday night!
Fortunately, the boat sails better than I. It righted itself smartly and proceeded to sail off at 180 degrees to our original course. That was good. All that was needed to get going the intended direction was to release the mainsheet. It was following this episode that I learned that the pants to my foul weather gear had a torn center seam at the seat. I now had a wet . . . you know.
The rest of the race was relatively uneventful as we fell further and further behind the fleet. The final beat to the finish was in 30 knot wind and seemed to take forever as we were regularly drenched by water spraying off the bow.
After getting the "horn" for completing the race, we turned homeward and set a course directly to the Bay Bridge and the Estuary just beyond, only to discover that the abandoned Berkeley Pier was in our way. This meant we had to come about and sail back into the westerly wind and flooding tide. The sea was now three to four feet and coming at several angles to our course, and the wind had increased to about 35 knots. It took half an hour to reach a point were we could tack toward the bridge and still miss the pier.
Back at the slip, it took us over an hour to wash the salt off everything and get the boat put away. As I was loading up my gear, I realized that my lunch was sitting, uneaten in my duffle bag. My crew claimed that this had been the most fun day of sailing he had ever experienced. Great Crew!