Kingston Last Day

Well, all good things must come to and and Kingston did, on a bright sunny day with light breezes.

I had two decent races and, hallelujah, I did not end the regatta in last place - wahoo!  In fact, I had 2 twelfth place finishes today - my best scores.

With the light breezes I was spared a last day of agonising hiking and only had to hike moderately, trying to go between occasional waves.  (Note to self - must be serious about getting in shape.) But, as always, upwind is my weak point.

In the first race an OK start, but about a boat length behind the leaders.  They all went left and I did also - it seemed to pay off. I was about next to last at the top mark and then on the downwind managed to catch one boat and almost another. Held on back up and then had a very good reach, overtaking 2 boats.  Downwind, managed to catch one more and finished ahead of 4 boats.

In the second race, much the same - a pretty good start with a very clear lane. Lost less than usual upwind and had good downwinds.  But, one sailor really made me angry.  Generally in the GGM fleet we don't protest or make too big a deal of rules violations, but this one fellow was toward the back of the fleet with several of us and a couple of us noticed he hit the upwind mark.  Sailing down, I mentioned to him that we saw him hit the mark and jokingly said he owed us a beer.  He just smiled.

Then, as he neared the leeward mark, with a jury boat lurking nearby, he hit that mark also, and apparently assuming the judges could not have missed it, he did a circle.  Good, I thought, at least a little justice was happening.  Then later, on the final reach, I was slightly ahead and to windward of him.  As we approached the last rounding mark, he started to luff me up above the mark and told him "Sail your proper course" several times. He ignored me and kept doing it.  Then, a nearby judge boat whistled him and he had to do 2 spins.  I was very glad they saw it because I was getting really upset at his cavalier, unsportsmanship attitude, especially in our GGM fleet with its gentlemanly atmosphere.

Then, the wind died and we had a slow trip back and then a long wait to turn in the charter boats, but that allowed several pleasant conversations with fellow sailors I had not yet met.

Tomorrow, after some visits to family, back to the humdrum daily routine.  But, this week was a great one and several times out on the water, I felt fully alive and really in the "flow".  That is worth a lot.