Thailand Worlds Day Two

31 March 2014

Race 1 - Triangle, sausage, trianlge. Another beatiful sunny day. About 10 knots of breeze, with 15 degree shifts at the bottom of the course and 20 degree shifts at the top. which sounds nice, but the 90 kg French and Canadian crews would beg to differ.  Low tide was about an hour and a half before the start, so the against-the-tide windward legs were a bit of a slog, with everyone feeling that they were having to work very hard just to keep the boat moving forwards.  True to form, Birrell/Breary were first around the windward mark, and took off on the first reach. The following pack consisted of Batchelor/Pascoe, MacFarlane/Payne, Schulz/Sheppard, Allison/Blenkle, Gordon/Fletcher and Jospe/Egli. The positions held through the first two reaches and the next windward/leeward, until Birrell/Breary decided that they wanted to practice their match racing tactics with Batchelor/Pascoe. A couple of dozen tacks ensued, letting MacFarlane/Payne slip through and get ahead. In their hurry to catch up, Birrell/Breary decided to get physical and ended up getting whistled for kinetics. Their penalty turns on the starboard layline were some cause for concern (eventually leading to a DSQ), but Allison/Blenkle and Batchelor/Pacoe somehow managed to get through and power away on the first reach. Batchelor/Pascoe managed to pass by Allison/Blenkle towards the end of the second reach, but lost out to them on the final hitch to the finish. Sounds exiciting, but nobody gave MacFarlane/Payne any trouble, and they took a well-deserved first. One point for old age and opportunism.

Race 2 - Sausage, triangle, sausage. The breeze built a bit, which made it up to about 14 knots. The French and Canadian crews were happier, but were exhausted from the first race. With a nice tidal flow agains the line, the fleet got off cleanly, and most boats headed off to the left side of the course, where there seemed to be a bit less flow and less wave stacking. Schulz/ Sheppard rounded in front followed by Birrell/Brearey. The rest of the fleet rounded the windward mark withing a couple of boat lengths from one another, and there was a bit of a split down the first run, with some going for the gybe set. It paid off for Gordon/Fletcher, but not for others. The second beat saw some of the early front runners fall back and let the usual suspects make their way to the front. The two reaches were pretty static apart from  Schulz/ Sheppard breaking a kite sheet and dropping to third and Allison/Blenkle having to Aussie drop their spinnaker to make the gybe mark. The last windward/leeward saw a number of position changes. Schulz/ Sheppard recovered from their breakage to sneak up to secvond agaian, and Allison/Blenkle came out of the right hand side of the course to get back in the game. Birrell/Breary managed to hold the lead with Schulz/Sheppard in second and Batchelor/Pascoe kept MacFarlane/Payne at bay down the run to take third.

After racing, the RVYC boat boys helped everybody get their boats out of the surf (very civilized) and up the hill, and the fleet repaired to the verrandah for some well-deserved bevrages. 

Results subject to gear weight confirmation