Sailing Magazine
Jof Heathcote reports on day 1 of the Moth Worlds
The breeze was pretty dodgy today. Huge switches and pressure variances. I was down for blue fleet. Four races were scheduled, but only three were possible.
First race was the windiest of the day – about 6-8knots. I got away cleanly and just sailed a pretty solid race. Think the boat only touched the water a couple of times which is a pretty good sign. Finished up with a 13.
Second race we had a couple of restarts, and I dodged a u-flag penalty with one of the recalled starts. I had a shocking start on the one that finally got away; not foiling in pretty marginal conditions, but tacked immediately and foiled out right to make a pretty good comeback, gaining on people around me on every leg. Finished up with another 13 which seemed a pretty good outcome.
Race 3 was in breeze that most people were not happy to race in. There were a lot of attempts to get it off, and when it did go, pretty much everyone was low riding. A few got away at the pin, and I was one of the first few to get up and get going. Got around the first lap and a half probably just below 10th. Felt like it was the best I was sailing all day. Unfortunately I ran out of wind a couple of hundred metres from the line and lost 10+ places as people came foiling down the entire run bringing new pressure with them. Pretty harsh but these things can happen.
To add insult I got timed out a couple of boat lengths short of the line. Ended up with a 22 (taken on top mark positions) which is still pretty solid considering.
There were a lot of unhappy people on the beach. People who did not get foiling at all in races 2 or 3. So that puts things into perspective a bit.
That said, I’m a bit annoyed with myself for not buying a new light air front horizontal when they came out late last year. It definitely would’ve been a big help today. The yellow course had it worse, their third race was only a one lapper, and tons of people were DNF due to the huge separation.
Apparently there will be some decent breeze tomorrow. I’ll believe it when I see it.
