2012: 888 Shades Of Carbon

Why do we do it? Just look at this picture as we sail back up the Auckland Harbour on a balmy Wednesday night in November!
Not just the beer, obviously ;-)

This week we had the pleasure of finishing the entire course, which was touch and go at times, with the GPS reporting an 8:45 finish or maybe 11:37... no wait... its 9:15, now 8:56 - maybe we'll make the cutoff (of 9:00PM).

The Crew

John (Captain) Nicola, Dave and Ian. Crew back from holiday, focused, ready for some wind...

Course 7

Good old course 7 - has us going down the harbour and doing two legs from North Head to Bean Rock - always good as we are sailing in the fleet more... with no shortened course at Resolution this week.

The Start

We came out in time to see the multi's getting a rough start with Vodafone squeezed out and needing to do a 360 at the pin end - only to be seriously close to running into the next start fleet, some of whom were too early into the box. Could have been very expensive. We kept well clear over at Bayswater and ended up with a good start, near the front of the fleet. We stayed in the channel as the tide was still going out.

Progress

Down the harbour hitting over 8 knots at times, and successfully staying ahead of a Davidson 28 U-choose. Up to North Head for the first time, judged well with course and tide, we rounded and started down to Bean Rock. We were on port and noticed 888 bearing down - at some considerable speed. Seems they extracted yet another 360 - this time from us as we gave way - and in so doing gave up our place in our little battle with the Davidson. And down-hill in light air, they were able to pull away. We battled on however, with Ian taking on headsail trimmer, dropping to outboard sheeting, and me trying to find a way to some wind - 5 knots would be good even... We watched the GPS and looked for breeze, finally arriving at the finish line with 2 and a half minutes to spare.

The Result

We were 8th on handicap this week, not completely beaten by the dying evening breeze - but close.

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Beer Review: Stoke IPA

Dave brought this fine drop along for tasting as we made our way up to Resolution and beyond. A fresh tasting IPA, starts well, not huge depth for an IPA IMHO, nice drop though!

Stoke IPA poster boy - he looks happy with the choice of beer this week!.

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cheers, johnhs