Well, we motored (yes, the engine is working again) out to the starting line for lack of wind. We get out to the start, and the race committee has the indefinite postponement flag up. They are waiting to see if the wind picks up. Yeah right. . .. Then the weather changes, it starts raining. . . hard. What a start to the second half of the Wednesday night series.

    The rain lasts for about 15 minutes, and at the end of it, the wind picks up. The committee takes down the postponement flag and starts the sequence. The wind picks up even more. Everyone gets course AB, which is a fairly short course, but the late start necessitates it.

    The start is a spinnaker start. At first we contemplate a starboard start, but we realize that the wind is shifting and it will be impossible to start on starboard. We line up on port tack at the committee boat end of the line. Everyone else, including the other classes, fights for the pin end. We contemplated it, but the wind was not far enough ahead. We ended up starting in the lower third of the line, with Argo at the committee boat end, and eveyone else bunched up at the pin. Phantom had started with the class in front, and ended up late to the start because of that mistake. They circled around the committee boat, and were moving on Argo's line.

    So, we had a good start, but immediately fell into a hole. Everyone above us had wind, and Argo had wind. We watched as Argo walked away from us and the two boats we had with us, and opened a big lead. Those above us were so bunched up they couldn't really take advantage of the breeze. We could have used the wind, we just didn't have any. Phantom, on Argo's line, had wind, and so made up most of what she had lost.

    We finally got wind, but Argo had an incredible lead. Phantom decided to come up to our line to challenge us. Ron and I realized that we needed to stay low. Those above us were fighting, and kept pushing eachother higher.

    Phantom, with her higher line, moved up to us and started to challenge us about midway to the first mark. I tried to ignore her and kept working down. When we were getting in to her wind shadow, I would work out of it, but I didn't try to fight her. She kept pressing the entire line, and toward the turning mark, I popped up and made her dive below me. I wanted to keep her to my starboard so that she would be outside at the mark.

    Approaching the mark, we determined that we wanted to just turn, and go to the other side of the river. It seemed that the wind was better over there, and in the other classes, the boats that went over there made out.

    As we rounded the mark, we misjudged, and rounded a little wide. This let Phantom sneek in the inside and above us. However, she was having to hold a higher line. I came up to close to head to wind, and forced Phantom to tack away. This was the last we saw of her.

    The upwind leg saw very little change in the order. LinGin moved up along with Second-2-Nun. We didn't go far enough on a couple of tacks, and it allowed us to be caught by these two. At the next mark, we were expecting to put up our spinnaker, but we only had three people aboard, and the wind had picked up to approximately 18 knots, and it was a beam reach. With the wind directly off our side, we thought it would be the better part of valor to hold the set until the next mark. A look back made us feel better. Second-2-Nun and LinGin were both having problems with their spinnakers. Both were rounding up and being beaten by their spinnakers. They were both faster than we were, but at a cost that we couldn't match. They halved the distance between us and them on the short leg to the next mark.

    At the next mark, we popped the chute, and immediately held our own. We skimmed the windward side of the leg. About fifty feet from the line, the wind died for us. Second-2-Nun and LinGin brought the win with them. Realizing what was happening, about twenty feet from the line we headed up and forced Second-2-Nun to dive below us, just as we got the wind back. We finished second, with Second-2-Nun half overlapped with us, and LinGin just behind them. It was a wild finish, but we pulled it out.