June 4, 2013

Pat Broderick of the Wyliecat 30 Nancy filed this report after Saturday's ocean race:

Ross Bliven and I started the 2013 edition of the OYRA Duxship Race with nice wind in the high teens, a building ebb, and the lower batten slide popped out of the track. One tack took us from the start line at StFYC to the North Tower of the Golden Gate Bridge in 15 minutes, then another series of tacks to Land's End took another 15 minutes. Things were looking good! The faster boats were close ahead and the high PHRF slower boats nicely behind. And then…

The wind went away. It was clear the three starts ahead of us couldn't agree on what to do. Some boats were trying the Bonita Channel and others looked like they were heading for the Lighbucket. Ross and I decided to split the difference. Sometimes compromise works; sometimes it doesn’t.

With the ebb helping, we were still going 6 or 7 knots over the bottom as we sailed directly west for awhile. Then we tacked up toward the Duxbury Reef buoy and crossed over the Four Fathom Bank, which was behaving itself nicely with only a few 'slaps' to remind us of what it could do. Then we tacked out some more. Then we tacked back north for awhile. The GPS track is interesting.

Several nearby boats decided to head for the Marin shoreline, but things didn't look much better over there, so we continued north, with Jim Quanci's Cal 40 Green Buffalo for company. About a mile and a half south and another mile and a half east of the Duxbury buoy, we split with Buffalo and tacked out toward boats that were now coming up from the south in what looked like more breeze.

The payoff was that Buffalo beat us to Duxbury by quite a few minutes. So much for that breeze further out. But, we did round the mark at about 1:30 and began the reach down to the Lightbucket with the wind building into the high teens. Several asymmetrical chutes appeared, but mostly disappeared quickly. We were glad to see one of our competitors who owes us time come up from behind with white sails, but not pass us until we got to the Lightbucket.

Rich Pipkin and Mary McGrath's J/35 Racer X is among Nancy's competitors in the Shorthanded Division that owe the Wyliecat time. ©2013 Pat Broderick

It was a romp, with Nancy hitting speeds in the low teens now and then. Ross got his first ocean steering leg in his logbook, and I took a break. At the Lightship we performed the 'mother-of-all jibes' and watched two upper batten slides pop out of the track. With the lower batten slide already popped out, we were down to three out of six – which seems to be the norm for this year's OYRA races on Nancy. On went the cunningham, and the lack of slides didn't seem to affect our speed much.

The wind angle kept most of the boats sailing with their white sails; the ones setting chutes headed for Half Moon Bay. And then the wind began to die, again. By the end of the deep water channel we were only making 4 or so knots over the bottom with the wind moving aft, and more chutes beginning to blossom. Not a good situation for a Wyliecat, so we looked around for a solution.

We had caught up enough to see Green Buffalo and several other boats decide to head northeast to get into a position to set their chutes. Although Wyliecats don't have a chute, we followed because it was more of a reach, and the knotmeter climbed from 4 to 7 or 8. We figured jibing in toward Pt. Bonita was better than slogging along dead downwind, especially in the chop. So, on port we headed for Tennessee Valley.

We jibed over to starboard just north of Bonita and headed for Land's End sooner than the boats setting chutes, which turned out to be an advantage, because it appeared they ran out of wind closer in, while we stayed in the main flow as we sailed toward the middle between Bonita and Mile Rock, avoiding the incoming container ship. Who doesn't love a flood current?

From Land's End to the Golden Gate Bridge, it was a starboard tack with lots of southwest in the wind. Several faster boats flying chutes passed us, but we kept remembering how PHRF works. The Devil at the South Tower was at work with heavy gusts, but, since we were already on a starboard tack, no jibe was necessary, just a few adjustments on the mainsheet. It was all sort of backward from the norm. Maybe not having to jibe again preserved the three batten slides we still had working?

We called in and finished at 15:38:06 for an elapsed time of 05:30:06. But Dylan Benjamin's Dogpatch 26 Moonshine got us by about three minutes on the handicap, so we settled for second once again. Oops! Maybe we didn’t remember about how PHRF works for boat with a higher rating?

It was one of the most enjoyable Duxship races I can remember. Except for the light wind going out and coming in, and the messy swell and wind waves on the Potato Patch, the water was nice, we had just the right amount of wind, and it was sunny. I just need to learn to steer better in that Four Fathom Bank slop when the wind is light! Thanks to Nancy Demauro and the South Beach YC race committee for hosting a great afternoon out in the Gulf of the Farallones.

- Pat Broderick, Nancy, Wyliecat 30

See full results at www.yra.org/OYRA/oyra_race_results.html.