Tag: J70

J70 sailing

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Another beautiful Friday night for some J/70 sailing at Fishing Bay Yacht Club.  This evening I was sailing with Steve Quiriconi on his new boat Hotty Toddy along with Jerry Latell.  Steve and Jerry had been out earlier in the afternoon to get everything setup and tuned and so the three of us got out to the race course a little early to practice some maneuvers.

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In the 4 races tonight we did pretty well.  The very short line made for very tight and late starts, but the shifty winds meant anyone could catch a shift up the beats.  We did well to keep up with the leaders and got through our maneuvers pretty well without any major goofs.  We even did some gybe sets and a Mexican take down at one point.

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The final race was 2 laps and then the trip up the channel back to the dock.  We were the first boat to legally complete the course and a nice way to end the night and the first time out for the boat.

Jon’s Pictures | Carrie’s Pictures | VIDEO

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We started the July 4 weekend with some J/70 racing at Fishing Bay Yacht Club.  We had 6 boats out in 12-16 knots of wind for a few races.  I was on Nostalgia with Blake Kimbrough, Julia Page and Tommy Roper.

7/3 J/70 Fri Night Series

This photo was right after we finally got a correct spinnaker set.  It only took us 4 laps to get it right.  On the plus side we got a lot better at outside gybes.

7/3 J/70 Fri Night Series
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Saturday’s Cut Channel Race at Fishing Bay Yacht Club had a bit of everything from the weather.  Light air, heavy air, storms, chop, smooth seas, etc.  Lud Kimbrough, Mike Karn and I sailed the J/70 Nostalgia in the PHRF-B fleet of 6 boats out of 15 total for the race.

The race took us south and east and then due east across the bay before heading north up the shipping channel and back to the Piankatank.  We had a great start and did well on the first upwind and reaching legs.  On the 2nd downwind leg out to the channel we made a bad bet on the weather and fell back into the fleet.

After rounding the channel marker to head North we could see storms in the distance but with being so far out into the bay we didn’t have reliable cell service to check the weather.  We donned our life jackets and battened down the hatch – we really did this – and prepared for some weather.  We were also monitoring VHF 16 instead of the race channel so we could hear ships coming up the channel, etc so we didn’t hear any race announcements that the race was being shortened at the next mark.

Most of the storms stayed away and we could see lightning in the distance.  One frontal system did come through and as the wind hit the boats behind us, we quickly executed our emergency chute down procedure to get it in the boat just before we were hit with a 25-30+ knot gust.  We rode out the rest of the leg under jib and main still making 6 knots and as we approached the mark we saw Mr. Roberts there and saw the race was being shortened.

We didn’t save our time, but we had fun and got to try something different on a boat none of us had ever done a distance race with.  Unfortunately for us, we finished at the farthest point of the course from home, which meant we still needed to sail upwind back home.  We definitely didn’t have enough fuel aboard to motor the whole way, plus the boat goes faster under sail anyway.  2 1/2 hours later and after narrowly dodging another squall line and motoring from about 6 miles offshore once the wind died, we made it back to FBYC.

RESULTS | PHOTOS | VIDEO

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Friday

Traveled to Newport today in preparation for the 159th New York Yacht Club Annual Regatta.  I’m sailing with Noel Clinard on his J/70 Loonatictu.

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Team New Zealand has their boat docked right next to us at Sail Newport.

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We launched the boat and tried to go for a practice sail.  By the late afternoon the wind had nearly died so we didn’t get much practice.

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We finished the night off with a drive past all of the mansions and dinner at Scales and Shells.

Here’s the entry list for the weekend.

Saturday

This morning we headed out for the first day of the New York Yacht Club 159th Annual Regatta. Heading out to the course it was amazing sailing past all of the bigger boats including the 12 meters on the way to the course.

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We were sailing in area A which was just on the other side of the bridge in an area called Potter’s Cove. Our fleet included 10 other J/70’s. We got to sail one race in breeze before we started a 2nd one and abandoned it when the wind shut off.

A little light (air) reading:

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An hour or more later the wind came out of the South and we got two more races in.

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Following racing we headed over to the New York Yacht Club for cocktails and dinner.

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Sunday

The forecast for today was for better wind and we got it. Out on the course in the same racing area, just north of the Newport Bridge, we started out with 8 knots out of the south and by the last race we had 12-13.

In the 4 races we had some decent starts and seemed to get a little faster and had better boat work as the day went on. While we didn’t have any great results to show for it – it was fun sailing in the J/70 fleet. And being my first time in Newport it was nice to see the town and New York Yacht Club. Thanks Noel Clinard for having me along for the weekend – it was a pleasure sailing with you, Jerry and Carrie.

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4/7

Couldn’t have asked for a nicer day of sailing.  The day started with 15-18 and we took out 3 J/70’s for practice.  We spent about 2 hours doing starts and laps around a short course.  This time I was trimming the jib and spinnaker.

Then in the afternoon I spent 3 hours on the Laser just sailing 1mi-1.5mi upwind and downwind legs.  One of the club’s junior sailors – Nina was also out there (pictured).

 

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