Non-Stop Fun!

OK OK! So I have been a little busy this month, and I have not had a chance to update the blog. So here is a recap of this past month to bring everyone up to speed.

Charleston Race Week:
My week consisted of the following:
-Enjoying the beautiful weather, 80 degrees and sunny.
-Working my butt off in the West Marine Rigging trailer, full filling the race participants and locals sailors with there rigging needs.
-Eating a lot of Southern Cooking (FRIED EVERYTHING!).
-Taking in the beautiful scenery/history.
-More rigging!
-More rigging!
-Some Sleep...

While I was gone at Charleston Race Week my only other rigger back at my shop in Alameda gave me his two weeks notice...
Now I am the "Head Rigger," "Assistant Rigger," and "Rig Shop Manager."
The shop is the busiest it has ever been in it's history! I get to hire an all new staff of my choice. All good things!

NorCal Regatta at Santa Cruz Yacht Club
The race was cancelled due to to much wind and thunderstorms.
35-40 Knot winds with huge waves and possible lightning!
It has been postponed to May 8th and is now just a one day event.

Big Dinghy at Richmond Yacht Club

Day One: 4 races 20 boats 8-12 knots of breeze out of the west with light to heavy chop on the South Hampton Shoals. In race one I struggled to find the shifts, and hit a mark to finish in 13th place. Arrrg! In the next 3 races I finished in 6th place. I was consistently in the top three, I had great starts, great tactics, though I consistently lost boats on the last short upwind. It was a great day and could not keep the smile off my face! I finished in 8th place overall.

Day Two: Pursuit Race! 0-5 knots of breeze out of any direction, a bunch of current and 80+ degrees out. The fleet consisted of 30 boats ranging from Lasers too Hobie 20's too Aussie 18's. The slowest boats start first, which meant that the Lasers were first. My training partner Drake and I matched raced each other for an hour or so swapping back and forth for first place. Good Times! Eventually we went our own way and the rest of the fast boats caught up to us and passed us, just in time for the wind to die. After 2 hours of attempting to sail we eventually called it quits and got a tow back in. Overall it was a fun race, and it is to bad that we could not finish. There is always next year!

Thursday Night Laser Series
The beginning of this month was the start of the Thursday Night Treasure Island Series. This is a regatta that happens every Thursday after work at the Treasure Island Sailing Center. We usually get 10-15 Lasers and 4-6 races in. It is a blast! Unfortunately the Laser fleet went on strike from the event for the first couple weeks. We were fighting against a recent race/launch fee that the facility was going to charge just the Lasers and not the other fleet that races there the same night. We negotiated and the fee was removed and now we can all go racing! Last week was my first week and I managed to finish consistently in the 12 boat fleet with 6 races and I finished in 3rd place overall! Oh Yeah!!!!