Wow!
Simply the best fun sailing event I have ever witnessed. Three days on and I'm still buzzing from it.
Three separate courses, a mark-foy start, and generous sponsors product, made for a good event.
Awesome fine weather, 10-knot winds, and close to 100 boats, made this spectacle even greater.
The smallest mono in the fleet, we were first of the short-course boats to start. We were meant to start at 1745, the time limit was 2000.
The last starters were about 45 minutes after us, all doing one lap. Last to start was the big cat XL.
Our course was 7 miles, the medium course was about 8.6, and the long course was around 11.7.
We actually started almost alongside (arguably) the fastest offshore sailing boat in the southern hemisphere, the big tri Team Vodafone, who was sailing the long course, twice.
We also finished very close to them. The guys in the race tower were giving every finisher a hoot, which seemed to be about one hoot every ten seconds.
The other boats sailing the short course eventually passed us just before the finish, as with our tiny rig we couldn't keep any speed on, especially in the lee of downtown Auckland's tall buildings.
To be in the middle of almost 100 boats all converging on the finish line, doing around four knots watching big boats coming toward the line at over ten knots, is both exciting and a little scary.
Especially when those boats are much wider than we are long. We finished 25th, and then had to wait for a wall of finishers to go past before we could head back to the boat ramp.
I'm urging everyone who can get a boat over to Westhaven next year, to book the day (and the next one) off work, and join in the fun.
Once again, I congratulate the handicappers in working out three totally different courses, and 87 totally different boats, to all finish within moments. That was very impressive.
