This was the first of the Tuesday evenings with the early (6pm) start. It went well, except for Thia. Hoisting sails was a trial because boats were lying to tide, with wind from behind. In sorting things out, Thia lost her main halyard up the mast.
Wind was from the Shandon shore, so that a start offwind was needed. A run to D, north of Clynder. Hermes got away especially well, to the north of the fleet. The rest were frustrated by patches of light wind and were blanketing each other. Hermes slowed on the approach to the mark. A wind shift which forced a gybe further disadvantaged her. Not for the first time, Catriona kept her spinnaker a little longer than the rest and allowed her to round the mark unimpeded. The others were three abreast at the mark with many calls for mark room.
Catriona had set off across the loch and was being headed. Hermes noticed and chose to tack down the Clynder shore. It might have been a decisive move, but it wasn’t. Teal and Thalia got into a luffing match with Teal coming out on top.
There was time for a second round, a feature of which was a spinnaker gybe from reach to reach at B, off Silvers. Always a manoeuvre which tests the crew and requires sensitive boat handling by the helm. Catriona had plenty of time and space and made the gybe with the wind directly behind. Others were more ambitious and it was some time before they got their spinnakers drawing on the reach up the Clynder shore to C. Where Hermes dropped a place to Teal.
1 Catriona, 2 Teal, 3 Hermes, 4 Thalia, 5 Ceres.
President: