Racing September 5 by Bill Perley

This past Sunday was a day with a number of disconcerting conditions that, all put together made the racing a little challenging.

After a couple of days of northerly wind, the water is usually warm. I got what I thought was a rude shock when we launched -- froze my piggies. The wind was SW, pretty much as had been forecast, but there were a number of large wind shifts that we had to contend with.  210 to 240 & back again.  If we did not pick up on them and tack with them, we were lost.

Two days of strong Northerlies left a swell that was counter to the wind direction.  It was interesting, to say the least, trying to maueuver through these waves.  More than once, they were distracting my attention from the wind.  We did get a few good, but short-lived rides.

Wind shifts to the left often came in the last minute before the start. One start, Josh was all alone at the pin end.  Another, it was Jim Law who was smelling like a rose.  One time, it seemed everybody was at the pin end.  The one start for which the wind was square, was the one where I, myself commanded the pin end -- to no advantage.

The low sun gave us grief, as it often does on and after Labor Day. The west-most mark, which this week was the windward mark, was almost impossible to see from a hundred or more yards away.  It was almost like sailing in the fog.  At least we could see the downwind marks.

Welcome to Susan Rolfe!  There was, what looked to me, some tight competion between Jim's boat and Marc's.  Good to have enough people sailing that there was competition not just at the lead, but all through the fleet.  I remember one regatta I went to at Sturgeon Bay, 10 or 15 years ago when there were four evenly matched boats, none of which were ever out in front.  Ourselves, one other boat from Winnetka, one from Minneapolis, and one local boat.  We dubbed ourselves the final four, and we had a lot of fun competing with each other all weekend long. With a big enough fleet, there is always a race somewhere.

Thank-you, Jim Law, for being the refreshments man.