2 June 2018 – Yarmouth Gaffers Race

Start position	Yarmouth	Start time	10:06	Start engine hours	765.9
Towards		ETA	11:01	Distance travelled	12
Finish position	Yarmouth	Finish time	13:09	Finish engine hours	766.5
Skipper	Richard	Crew	Louise, Tim, Lyn, Miles, Emily
Weather	WSW 1-3 Sunshine		Tide	HW Portsmouth 14:50
New faults			Np->Sp %	75

It’s a bright sunny day as we motor out with a crew of 6 on board. Yankee and topsail again, with the flood tide running throughout the race. Starting off Bouldnor, upwind and uptide encourages close tacking inshore. We have to remember not follow the smaller boats too far in, but make good progress with a full crew tacking well. There’s the odd close cross and one crash tack, which leaves us just able to clear the first upwind mark. From there it’s close hauled across the Solent tide, a couple more tacks then back to the island side. ‘Passager’ passes us easily off the wind, but we’re soon close tacking inshore again and soon make progress back past both her and ‘Polly Agatha’. It’s a short leg up to the pier and back again, which a final wind shift turns into a reach. We’re third across the line, behind ‘Corncockle’ and ‘Alice III’.
Then it’s back to the harbour, where Louise joins in the harbour games, before prize giving, dinner and ceilidh.
We were third in the gaffel race and 1st in Class 1 for the today’s race.