Different Competition & Club Politics
Yes, I know. It’s not Sunday it’s Saturday. But since tomorrow the Wembley SC organises the MRX and Firefly Open Meeting, I decided to race today. One of the other clubs at the Welsh Harp, BTYC, decided to “open” their Autumn Series to the other clubs in the Harp. So it’s the WHSA Autumn Series. They don’t have a very strong Laser fleet and I assume that they can get more people to sail on Saturday afternoon rather then Sunday morning. Pete had told me he could not make it, but Brent and Steve said they would come.
Somehow I managed to arrive a bit late. I rigged in a hurry but everything was OK. They do three races, 1st and 2nd back to back, a break for tea and then the 3rd. They do 5,4,1,0 start sequences and although I expected that, I wasn’t very sure about the whole thing. For some reason I thought that the GP14s would start first, because their fleet was much bigger, but instead we started first. So, I wasn’t really on the line when I had to be. I saw all the other Lasers gathering on the line at 30 seconds before the gun and very quickly I started sailing towards them. I finished either 4th or 5th out of 6. On the second race I was on the line in time, I had a good start and I was actually doing quite well. Eventually I finished 4th. I cannot say that 4th out of 6 is great, but only 3 boats finishing before me makes me feel quite good. Especially if you consider that they are more experienced than me.
We stopped for tea and biscuits at a clubhouse further down the lake. Apparently, some people got obnoxious because we shouldn’t moor our Lasers by the pontoon. We should pull them up the beach. Only there is no beach there. It’s just people who like the idea of making a fuss about our club and their club, or our class and their class, or whatever else they can think off. What can I say, apart from that club politics strike again. Some people try to make the clubs work together or at least make people sail together and some others, become complete idiots. They even untied Brent’s Laser from the pontoon which started drifting away and Brent had to jump in the water to get it.
On the 3rd race I had a good start again. Brent finished before me but at some point I was getting quite close to him. A bit later I realised that I couldn’t reach him, so I decided to settle for 4th place. I know that 3rd would have been much better, but that’s life. We go step by step. I have to admit one more thing though. Considering that me and Brent were the only Wembley members, it means that they would have been only 4 Lasers. Overall, we came in the middle of the fleet. This shows that the standard of competition is lower than ours.
Tomorrow, it’s the MRX & Firefly Open Meeting and I am supposed to help. Most probably I will be on one of the safety boats.