Good Friday

Sunshine and wind this morning! Talk of 25 knots but I don't want to believe it. I'm rigged and ready to go at 9:35. The others are not. The 9 am briefing was at 10am. Then on the water by 10:15. We're not to come in for lunch until 1:30. The wind is stronger than yesterday but from the same direction with similar shifts and gusts.

Peter focussed on tacking at the briefing. Back foot over hiking strap. Take the mainsheet to the chest. Turn the rudder slowly. Face forward. Duck. Bring the mainsheet to the block (easing it). Tiller hand to the gunwale. Get across and level the boat. Switch hands on the main and tiller. Sheet in. I worked on this.

The first drill was windward/ leeward tacking and gybing. Must remember to loosen cunningham on the downwind legs. Remember position in boat. Outside foot at the front of the cockpit, knee bent. Inside foot tucked back under the hiking strap. Kinda like being in the blocks on a track. Ready to move forward, backwards, side to side. Shoulders square with the boom.

Then we did this crazy drill with 3 marks. It's like windward/ leeward except that you have to 360 every mark. Deadlier than death circles. Especially at the middle mark - boats entering from two directions.

Today I was hit a lot. Bang! Wham! Bump! The coaches saw enough hits that they were asking if there was anyone who hadn't hit me. Brady, Scott, Geoff, and a few others. The coaches also said the hits they saw were not my fault. True as it is, it reveals a few things. Some of the worst hits I didn't see coming. Like when Scott rammed me port side aft. It's not much consolation that it was his fault. His mainsheet got caught on my boat, turned his boat, and then mine capsized. I climbed over the top, but not quick enough. Fionnlagh turtled. I got wet righting him. The moral of the story is: keep my head out of the boat. If I'd seen him coming I could have yelled "Starboard" and hopefully avoided the whole situation. I didn't see Brady coming either but there were a lot of boats going into a mark rounding and I'd just come out of a tack to starboard. On a happier note, the hits also reveal that I'm not straggling behind the group anymore, that I'm stepping into the fray.