Wet the appetite
Today was the first time on the helm of an 18 footer for
me…
So why not - for your first attempt - step aboard Club Marine with
the 2005 JJ Giltinan Champions (and 2006 3rd place getters). Seve
and Tim were great on the boat, putting in a good show despite my
gumby steering as I felt my way around the track.
The weather cooperated, with a nice and easy 10 knot Easterly. No
boathandling issues there, just a tricky 3-stringing day.
With the JJ finishing only last weekend, most crews were still
pretty burnt out. A few boats didn’t make the day and a few more
had crew changes.
I was a bit hesitant starting on Euan’s 3 minute handicap (the same
handicap as Cocko), but thankfully the handicap start made it
pretty simple to get off the line well. As the race developed we
started to pull back ground on Yandoo and Fisher & Paykel. We
pulled through Belle, AppliancesOnline and a few others. Rag &
Famish closed up our 1 minute headstart but didn’t pull past. Asko
(on scratch) pulled back lots of time too…
But as things went on there ended up being more boats behind then
ahead. We crossed the line 6th, over a minute ahead of Rag &
Famish. Asko pulled only about 50 seconds out of us around the
course.
So I was pretty happy to finish 2nd on scratch for my first time at
the helm…. very happy maybe.
…
Maybe I need to work on stealing the boat and Seve and Tim from
Euan permanently…
