Tuesday Night Racing Commences

I raced my first Tuesday night for 2009. It was my varnished Classic Moth again, in and amongst the Lasers at SSA's TESOD (acronym definition - Tuesday Evening Sailing One Design). I did this a fair amount last year as well though most Laser sailors think I'm some kind of nutter. The Classic Moth is slower than the Laser (with one or two exceptions) so I've tried to come up with a slow boat game plan. It's tough when you can't hold your lane after a start, or sail deeper offwind angles like the Lasers with their unstayed rigs. Avoiding bad air, you usually end up early to the laylines upwind, which in short course racing, can be either all right or all wrong. Offwind, my higher angles usually put me also out on the edges. I count it as a good race if I manage to finish mid fleet.

One of the attractions of racing Lasers is getting the Classic Moth closer to Laser speed. Part of the fun is tweaking the Classic Moth in ways completely foreign to the Laser fraternity; new sail designs, different masts, even different hull designs!. I've made progress but since I rank myself somewhere between number 6-8 nationally, there are other Classic Moth sailors that would keep it closer with Lasers.

Well this Tuesday was a good day against the Lasers. Very light air is one condition where my Classic woodie can hang with the Lasers and that is what we had. I had one of those days on the start line where the holes suddenly appear at 10 seconds and I managed to get to the weather mark in 2nd place twice. Offwind usually 5-6 Lasers would go by to get me finishes upper mid fleet.

Not bad, not bad at all.

A video of dinghy launching from one of last year's Tuesday racing.