The forecast for today was light wind. I arrived at the club and started rigging. I decided to use my new sail since it wouldn’t be windy and the sail wouldn’t get stretched that much.<\/p>\n
I went out for the first race and I had a pretty good start. I was very close to Steve and Ben E offered me free beer for a week if I could beat Steve. He said that the look on his face would worth it. Unfortunately, Steve got further and further away from me and I was battling with Corbin, Tom and Ben S for 4th place. Although the wind was light I was doing quite well. I was trying to keep the wetted surface of the hull as small as possible and in the same time make sure the sail has a nice belly and enough power. Towards the end of the race and while fighting for 4th place, I was on starboard, Ben S was on port we crossed ways, I hailed “starboard” and although he tacked it was too late and I had to alter my course. He was supposed to do a 720 but he didn’t. He sailed on to take the 4th place and I was 5th. I wasn’t happy with that at all.<\/p>\n
For the second race the wind had picked up and I was hoping things would be better. On the start, I was on starboard second from the gun and Ben E came on port (I have to say that he couldn’t really see me) and on my effort to avoid the collision I bore away and went under him. Because of that I had accelerated, so I luffed up and pushed the boom forward in order to slow down but I got in irons, In my effort to get out of there I moved on the other side and effectively I was on port with Ben E and Steve on starboard. As the wind wasn’t strong enough, we were stuck there and it took as long to get out of there. I was pissed off with the whole thing, because I ended up on Ben’s and Steve’s way out of Ben’s action. It’s just, that at the moment it happened I didn’t think it would make a big difference, so I didn’t really protest it.<\/p>\n
As soon as I could I did a 720 for being on port and on Steve’s way. As far as Ben is concerned we are even. From that point onwards, I decided that I will be ruthless and I will protest anyone who gets in my way and shouldn’t be there. Anyway, I recovered from that incident and fought back to sail ahead of all those I thought I should and claim 5th place.<\/p>\n
During the second race I saw a few collisions and people didn’t protest them. I encourage people to protest every single incident because this is the only way for new sailors to learn the rules of sailing. I encourage every new sailor to go out to buy a book that explains the racing rules of sailing and learn it back to front. This is what I am planning to do fairly soon, in order to make sure that I know when I am right and when I am wrong, especially in an open meeting. There is a list of books from Amazon, on the right on the subject. I have seen the “The Rules in Practice<\/a>, The forecast for today was light wind. I arrived at the club and started rigging. I decided to use my new sail since it wouldn’t be windy and the sail wouldn’t get stretched that much. I went out for the first race and I had a pretty good start. I was very close to Steve… <\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.assoc-amazon.co.uk\/e\/ir?t=capslog-21&l=ur2&o=2\")