Bacardi Cup-Race 3

The forecast for today was not good… A weak NW gradient giving way to a weak sea breeze. That happened and it was a tricky day.

The wind finally filled in around 1300 from 130 at 7-8 knots. It looked promising. In this wind direction the left side is usually favored. We

started near the middle of the line and headed left. Unfortunately as we got towards the port layline, the wind kept lifting us. Our port tack heading was terrible and the boats in the middle of the course had a great shift.

We rounded the first mark about 80th. There were not many people behind us. I did notice that Mark Reynolds sailed off the course so the “black flag” must have caught him today. We managed to pass a few boats on the next few legs including Freddy Loof the regatta leader going into todays race.

For the final run to the finish the race committee changed the course with code flag “C” and indicated a heading of 310. However they actually positioned the finish line at 280… off by 30 degrees. That caught a few people by surprise like Vince Brun and Rick Merriman who had expected the finish line to be where it was indicated and headed down the right side of the run only to over stand and come back to the “downwind” finish with pole down and on a tight reach. Freddy Loof got so fed up with the race he just quit.

We hung in there, eating our humble pie, and finished 55th. To add to the pain, I hit my head in the barney post in one tack and got a pretty nasty gash that Sam our trainer taped back together after the race.

Alfonso Bermudez of Portugal won the race and I think Howie Sheibler had another good race in the top five. I honestly did not look at the scores.

Tomorrow will be our last day of training for this week. I am going home to San Francisco to visit my family and Phil is going to New York to see his wife. We are back next week for a couple days of practice before the Olympic Trials start on Saturday the 20th.