St. Mike’s Race Back (aka Hammond Memorial)

OK, I promise to keep this one brief – only the highlights.

The crew of Ducks, being the wise old men that they are, decided to save their energy for a better day and elected to motor back to Annapolis. For other reasons, I think, Airborne made the same choice. That left 7 of us hoping beyond hope for wind.

Jump to three hours into the race. Snagglepuss had already thrown in the towel. We were still approaching the first mark, “N”! I made a call on the VHF to try to convince the rest of the fleet to quit but no response. Oh well, I tried. I’ll spare you the details of how we clawed our way to the front of the pack inch by painful inch, but somehow we did. (The truth is, I really don’t know how we did it.)

We rounded N and continued on – Red Rum, Finesse, and Pussycat were not far behind. Shortly after rounding, Red Rum’s jib came down and quickly they were motoring by us. That’s when good things finally started to happen. All of a sudden, a nice breeze (8-10 knots) filled in from the Southwest and we found ourselves moving swiftly and giving a loose cover over Finesse and Pussycat all the way out of Eastern Bay. By the time we reached Bloody Point Light Swell had a commanding lead.

From there it was smooth downhill ride to R86 and the shortened finish. The gun at last and once again, we were doing the math. Yes this race would stand as a High Point finish and the Peter Gookin Memorial Trophy will visit the Anderson residence once again. Finesse successfully held off Pussycat for 2^nd place.

I’d like to thank my crew - Fred Leary and Mike Booher for hanging in there during the painfully slow pace both Saturday and Sunday. Next race is the Twilight race. I wonder if the wind will be any better for that race.