Crew: Geoff, Grant, Anastasia, Murray.
Forecast: On Friday the Metservice was forecasting Southerly 20 knots gusting 30 knots but on Saturday morning thankfully they downgraded it to Southerly 15 kts so the race was on!
We all met at Chaffers and after showing off to the crew Halo’s new engine exhaust pipe and diesel heater we rigged up and cast off at 1113 hrs. With Anastasia on helm we sailed over to Pt Halswell and into to Kau Bay check out the wind. With the southerly averaging a nice 13 kts we decided to sail with the No. 2 Jib and full main.
The course was announced on the ‘Virtual Course Board’ as Start – Mark 10 Falcon Shoal – Mark 10 Ward – Finish, with Start/Finish at the club start box. Excellent! We sailed down Evans Bay and as it would be a downwind start we timed our approach to the line as 1′ 35″ from a line opposite the boat ramp.
Our start worked out almost perfectly with Grant on helm, Murray on mainsheet, Anastasia and Geoff handling sail trim and foredeck. We quickly had the medium spinnaker hoisted. Slingshot shot off ahead with their monster blue and white spinnaker and Usurper, who started behind us, sailed past with their big red kite flying.
As we neared Pt Halswell we were still ahead of Incantare and Tamerlane as we hoisted the jib and did a smooth drop of the kite. We opted to sail wide across Kau Bay to avoid the worst of the wind shadow. However Tamerlane cut in tighter and and gained on us. We then sailed close-hauled towards Falcon Shoal. Nearer the mark Tamerlane appeared to get into some trouble with their sheets and did a 360 degree turn as they resolved the issue.
We passed Falcon Shoals mark at 1341 hrs and then commenced a broad reach up towards Ward Island. Decided against deploying the spinnaker this time.
I have the No. 12 mark set as a waypoint on the chartplotter and as we neared it we realised the mark wasn’t there! The two leading boats had sailed further on to round one or other of the Muritai club dinghy racing marks in Days Bay. I called race control on Ch. 77 to advise the mark had disappeared and they confirmed we could treat it as a virtual mark and turn back. However in the interest of good sportsmanship we decided to follow the leader boats around the Days Bay mark.
Then it was a drag race on a close reach back to Pt Halswell. The Young 88 Incantare was able to pass us but we kept ahead of Bill on Tamerlane.
As we rounded Kau Bay Tamerlane once again cut in closer than us to Pt Halswell without any discernible loss in speed. As we tacked our way down Evans Bay the wind was getting up to 20 kts so we put a reef in the mainsail. Tamerlane were still able to point higher than us and they just pipped us at the end to cross the finish line three boat lengths ahead of us.
As we sailed back to Chaffers the southerly continued to increase with gusts over 30 kts at times. We were glad to have the reef in. Anastasia made cups of tea for all and we docked Halo back at Chaffers at 1540 hrs. A most enjoyable day’s sailing!
The race results were published on Monday. We gained a decent third place on handicap.
RaceQs Replay: http://raceQs.com/event/1521310
Halo Log Book 