We had great conditions last night for the TNT and sailed in a three boat fleet. We had a tower start with me and Fred, Dan and his son, and an FD joining in the fun.
We had some new boat issues last night ... first when launching we managed to wrap the spinnaker sheet around the centerbaord and had to go back to the dock and capsize the boat to fix that. Then as we sailed away from the dock the jib halyard broke, about five minutes before our start. Back to the dock to capsize again and tie the jib up and we were off to the start.
The RC set a pin favored line and Dan won the start, but the FD seemed to sail slightly faster upwind and we rounded with the FD in the lead, Dan in #2 and Fred and I in third. We were the only boat to fly the kite on the short run to 1 and after sorting out some boneheaded poor rigging issues on my part managed to gain an inside overlap at 1 and lead the fleet to 7. After rounding 7, the FD, with ginormous genoa powered away from us upwind to #2 and Fred and I managed to keep Dan slightly behind on the upwind leg. Since my crew weighed slightly more than a whole person more than Dan's, we managed to gain significantly in a couple of the the puffs where we used the wire. We rounded 2 in second place and had a short run to T and then finished in front of the club.
The highlight of the evening was the pitcher of beer and burgers on the back deck and the fireworks from Seaworld.
I am out of town next week and looking forward to sailing the following week.
Also, if anyone is interested in getting out for a weekend daysail or some tuning/practice over the summer, let me know ... I am interested and my boat is at the club ready to go.
Channing