Wind! Again! Polar Bear Nov 9 Recap
Wind! Again! So far, this polar bear series has seen more wind than the whole of last year’s series, and this is only the second day of racing.
The committee boat, Beautiful Day, set up in it’s normal spot near QC. Soon 23 boats were circling around the start line, waiting for the start sequence.
At 11:07 Div 1 and 2 roared across the line, beating their way to the Pt. Gray Bell Buoy in 8 to 10 knots of wind.
Division 1 & 2 starting the first race of the day
Div 3 and 4 started their race at 11:13. Their mark was a freighter about half way up English bay.
The fleet had to deal with a slight ebb tide on the downwind leg of the race. However, the building breeze helped to offset this.There were a lot of big grins as boats crossed the finish line.
Division 3 & 4 starting their first race
The race committee quickly set up for another set of races, not wanting to waste the wonderful wind.
At 13:01, Div 1 and 2 headed to the same windward freighter that Div 3 and 4 rounded last race. In the building wind, they headed down to the Kits barge buoy, reached to QC and had a quick upwind leg to cross the finish line.
Meanwhile, starting at 13:07, Div 3 and 4 headed to another freighter that was their windward mark, headed down to QC and back up to the finish line.
With all divisions rounding QC at nearly the same time, there was quite a bit of traffic and much yelling of “Starboard!” and “Head up!” Some skippers followed these requests, others seemed to disagree with the hailers, others still wanted to follow the requests but just couldn’t get their boats to do what they were asking of them. However, at the end of the day there was no major incidents.
Traffic Jam at the QC mark
As the last boats crossed the line, the wind started to drop. The tired, but happy sailors headed in for the day and re-lived the days action.
A big thank you to everyone that came up and an even bigger thank you to the race committee.
We’ll see everyone on November 23rd.
Orion Irvine
VRC Race Officer
