(Report from the Secretary on board Arke)
The wind was deceptive. The forecast was for a westerly breeze but, at least in central Helensburgh, it was almost calm. However in the Gareloch it became clear that the wind was coming from much further N and being channelled down the Gareloch from the NW. Reasonably consistent and the fetch was creating some waves too. The Race Officer opted – perhaps at first sight boldly for a Tuesday evening – for an H course. But the logic was obvious and it set up a good long true beat to E.
The start line was heavily biased as usual. Shore end favoured. Thalia – being helmed by experienced campaigner Reay MacKay – approached just below and tacked to cross the line with almost perfect timing. Arke ducked and tacked closer to the shore. Behind but higher. Circe made a good start too. Other boats seemed late.
Thalia tacked back to the Shandon shore and crossed Arke. Arke saw the sense in heading up the R shore out of the tide and tacked to follow. Most others – with the exception of Athene who decided to get across – followed more or less. Arke climbed above Thalia and then, spotting dark cloud to the west, tacked to cross the loch. Catriona and Dione – both always fast – doing likewise. Arke crossed Catriona and tacked to head up the loch to E. Rounding first followed by Catriona and then Dione. Athene had made good ground too and in fourth.
Across to F off Shandon church. Reaching in patchy lightening wind. No changes. Round F to the – given the long H course – probable shortened course finish. Reaching again with wind (at least apparent wind) roughly from the W (from starboard on this leg). Now if the race was going to continue to a second round the lead boat would defend against attackers trying to get to windward in order to keep inside rights at the next mark. But with an almost certainly shortened course, Arke was immediately conscious of the biased line – hugely favouring a boat keeping left in to the shore. At this juncture the key word is the German chess term: ‘zugzwang’ – any move you make will worsen your position. Stay high to protect wind: the attacker behind simply heads left to leeward and wins due to the biased line. Stay low to protect the left for the biased line and the attacker behind will get on your wind and either roll you completely (before still being able to head left!) or use the advantage to catch up and dive left. Additionally luffing too far in a fight with Catriona would simply let Dione through!
Arke attempted to protect her wind enough without getting dragged high but it still didn’t work and Catriona got to leeward. To add insult to injury the westerly wind seemed to swing back to come more directly down the loch so Catriona wasn’t even in her wind shadow! Some you win, some you lose! Luck? Maybe but I think it is worth highlighting that Catriona made her ‘luck’ by being in contention and with the experience and skills to execute perfectly to take advantage. The better you are the more luck you might seem to get…
1 Catriona, 2 Arke, 3 Dione, 4 Athene, 5 Thalia, 6 Circe, 7 Hermes
