#rssailing – Last Sunday, no one was quite sure what wind to expect with Windguru forecasting a 8-14 knots and the Atlantic charts saying otherwise. Racing got underway in the harbour where the tide was exceptionally high due to the recent ecclipse.
Race 1 got underway in a South Easterly breeze of around 12 knots. The fleet had a clean start and immediately split with Rumball, Emmet opting for the left side and Cleary going for the right side. Rumball and Emmet reached mark a good distance ahead leaving Cleary to play catch up. The racing eventually settled down with Emmet/James crossing the line first followed by the Rumball and Cleary boat respectively after the race was shortened.
The wind was beginning to drop and back whilst waiting for race 2 which was to a starboard rounding course. The line was quite biased to the pin end(now on the right) which led to a bit of a queue to round the pin.
This time, the fleet stayed more compact with the patchy wind not allowing anyone to get too far ahead.
A broken Wing-Wang line saw the Rumball boat retire. Riding on the last bit of wind on the last lap, Cleary closed the gap to Emmet. However, the last phase of the race was to be in slow motion with a nice pile-up at the out-loop leeward mark involving a few Kamikaze lasers fire their way in! Emmet/James finished first just 2 seconds clear of Cleary/Donal!