Today I left early and went to meet Steve. We had a chat because we hadn’t seen each other properly for a while. When we arrived at the club we started rigging but there was not much wind.<\/p>\n
I went to the start line I took my transits, checked the bias and I was ready.I decided to start on starboard although the wind was shifting. Somehow during the start I was further back than I wanted. The wind shifted even more, so as everybody else at the pin end I was at the middle of the line, so I tacked and I was off on port with nobody coming on starboard. As I was getting towards the top of the Harp, it hit me. I didn’t know what the course was! What an idiot! I was at the top of the fleet and I hadn’t checked he course!<\/p>\n
I asked Tom who was coming behind me, I couldn’t hear very well but I heard him saying “One, two”. I continued towards mark 1 but then I saw the rest of the fleet heading towards 2. I had lost quite a few places by the time I rounded the windward mark. The wind was shifting all the time and there were many holes. I fell into one of those and I ended up at the bottom of the fleet. I managed to focus and I carried on. The Merlin Rockets caught up with me though and it was getting too busy. As I was approaching the leeward mark, I had to give water to Merlin Rocket but I had water on another Laser, while a second Merlin was behind me but didn’t have any water on me. I said no water to him and as I rounded the mark he was on the inside. With two more boats on my leeward I couldn’t bear away at all, so I was standing still in order to avoid any collision. His spinnaker pole was poking my sail, so I was literally standing still and since I was in the shadow of the Merlin I wasn’t moving at all.<\/p>\n
He waved “sorry” at me but I told him that it doesn’t work like that. He sailed away without doing any turns or anything. As I was beating, Alan and Ian were with me. I was trying to get away but with such fluky<\/span> conditions it wasn’t easy. As we were sailing to the finish line and with the wind dying I was going on port and Ian was coming on starboard. He hailed starboard but I thought that I could pull it off. Unfortunately with all the shifts and the lulls it didn’t work. On top of that, Ian decided to actually hit my boat in order to prove that I was on his way. I did my turns but I was really pissed off with him. I carried on towards the line but the wind was dying more and more. I was so pissed off that I didn’t bother crossing the line. I went straight in. I de<\/span>-rigged and went for a shower and then a drink.<\/p>\n I was really angry with the whole thing. Ian had pissed me off really bad. I hate it when people abuse public property and I especially hate it when they abuse MY property. On top of that, the racing rules say “Avoid all collisions, no matter if you are right or wrong”. But when a kid sees an adult not following the rules, what can you expect the kid to do? When, we, the adults don’t set an example to the children, that’s the worst thing we can do.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Today I left early and went to meet Steve. We had a chat because we hadn’t seen each other properly for a while. When we arrived at the club we started rigging but there was not much wind. I went to the start line I took my transits, checked the bias and I was ready.I… <\/p>\n