2004 Cottonwood Regatta

After our trip to Savannah, the next regatta for team Catawba would the Cottonwood, held on our home course on Lake Wylie.  April 25 arrived and we sailed out with eight other boats to tame the winds.  Only there wasn't any!  Forecasts varied the day before, but when it was time to race, we were looking at very spotty conditions with occasional patches of 3-5 knot breezes.  The race committee headed north and settled in on a WL course near the mouth of Crowder's Creek.

The Wayfarers and V-15s got off a start, if you could call it that, and then our turn came.  Starting on the line was not a problem.  Lack of wind was.  By the first mark we had frustrated ourselves into last place.  With a closed line, most of the fleet went high.  We decided to gamble and ran low.  It paid off.  By the leeward mark we had caught the fleet and knocked off a couple boats to boot.  With off an on breezes continuing, we worked the beat as best we could.  Pam Barron and Jill Zakerski decided the shoreline might payoff and tacked away.  It was the  call of the day as they finished one and two at a shortened mark.  We were still improving and found our selves looking at third, only to have Tyner and Marriott nip us from the left.  Still, fifth was not bad and we guessed that some boats might not make the time limit.

                  Picture:  14620 smokin' off the line.  Photo by Wayne Hammett.                                   It seemed to us that the RC was headed back toward CYC.  We headed that way ourselves, but before anyone could head for the docks, the breeze filled in again and the RC staged another race.  This time, the winds were still light, but at least more consistent.   Again, we got off at the line.  Five minutes later, we thought it looked pretty good.  We tacked on the first shift and John declared we had the lead!   Ten more minutes and it was more obvious.  Marriott was heading for the corner, but we looked really good for the mark and when we tacked on the layline, we were ahead by 50 yards!  My adrenalin was pretty high.  John called the traffic to perfection and Tom got every ounce out of the chute.  The fleet challenged, but we we went high for speed when we had to and  then down for distance.  At the leeward mark, we executed a perfect drop and rounding.  All that was left was to cover the beat.  Fifteen minutes later we crossed the finish line.  Our first bullet in SELD racing!  The wind was still up and the RC ran a third race.  We finished fourth.  When the results came up at the clubhouse, we were in second place - two points behind Terry Tyner.

Sunday morning, the winds filled in at 8-10 knots and we headed out for a fantastic day of sailing.  Our confidence was very high and it showed.  We sailed a great start to race one and after one and half laps, we were headed for the leeward mark in third.  We were also staring down a long line of Wayfarers crowding the leeward mark.  Tyner and Pelosi were lower than us and more important, they were in line.  I was forced to round outside and we got killed.  When the damage was over, were in fourth.  We held it to the finish. 

We had some tense discussion on the rounding and Tom explained a method we could use to improve in that situation.  We put it to use in the second race.  Coming in for a crowded leeward rounding, I stayed close and as the boats rounded, I saw an opening and ducked inside.  Using a little gamesmanship, we barked out for room.  It worked and it was our turn to improve and we moved up two notches.   We finished 5 and 6 in the last two races.  It was a SELD best fourth place regatta finish for us.

We felt we were better than fourth too, but we just couldn't quite squeeze a few more places on Sunday.  One difference is Marriott was really on his game in the improved wind and went from fourth Saturday to first on Sunday.  We also felt we could have done better downwind.  More than once we lost positions or failed to hold our place downwind.

Those improvements will come.  For now, we achieved goal one:  top 50% finish in a SELD regatta.  We have already improved on last year.  Next up would be Norman.