Key West 2006 - The Race to the Race
Filed in archive Sailing by thefluidpen on January 13, 2006
C Squared was awash in the silver light of a fat moon that descended through the clouds. The glow of the cities on the western shore disappeared astern, as she skimmed over the black ocean. Nobody on deck spoke, enjoying peace and serenity while savoring their own thoughts. All aboard the Wyliecat 44 were in good spirits because the boat lived up to its promise, even though it was new and untested in racing. The crew chemistry was positive and we had neither broken anything nor embarrassed ourselves. The squalls stayed home, so it was still T-shirt time after midnight.
"Desired course 250 degrees," Robert's voice broke the silence from the chart desk down below. As the navigator, he was cooking up the numbers, which we had to sail the boat by. "Okay guys, let's throw up the flatter kite," was boat captain Bill's response, effectively jolting the deckhands back into action.
In plain English this was a call for a sail change so we could hold the required course, a few degrees closer to the wind that now blew off the land. It also meant wrestling hundreds of square feet of the spinnaker's nylon sailcloth down through a hatch into a dark cavernous space in the bow. This place quite fittingly is called the "sewer" and quite fittingly was manned by Yours Truly.
We were well past the half-way point of the race that had started 12 hours earlier, and we were sailing alone, miles behind the much bigger boats and miles ahead of the smaller ones. What kept us pushing hard were numbers, and they were all around: Speed through the water, speed over ground, course over ground, distance to the next waypoint, velocity made good, distance and time to finish, and estimated time of arrival. Sailing on a competitive level is as much science as it is a sport.
Boats with one sail are difficult to sail backwards, but somehow we managed to wiggle free of whatever hampered our progress. Instantly the spinnaker went back up and we resumed on our course, but noticed that the swells were getting larger. Then the breeze freshened and our speedometer spat out numbers well above 12 knots, but the VMG was dropping. This meant we were sailing fast through the water, but not fast toward the finish. "We feel the Gulf current that runs counter to our course," Robert explained. It's like running on a treadmill that requires a lot of effort but produces little progress.
More about Key West, the party and the adventures of C Squared in the next episode.
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