Laser: midweek therapy

Stood lakeside this Wednesday evening just gone, I found myself in a fix. The lake looked relatively calm, but the forecast suggested gusts up into the mid 20's by 1900, which was when the race was scheduled to start.

But the average windspeed wasn't forecast for much more than 12 knots. Half the Aero fleet, similar in layman's terms to my own Laser but  much more modern, lighter and correspondingly more expensive, were rigging their smaller No. 5 sails. The women and juniors of the Laser fleet were rigging their Radials.

A couple of weeks ago, with a not dissimilar forecast, I stuck with my full size Standard rig, and regretted it from the moment I launched. That regret translated into a mid-fleet finish, so was well founded. But, despite the forecast suggesting the wind was due to increase, it just didn't feel like Radial weather.

So I compromised, set up the Laser with her Standard sail, but rigged her with a thicker mainsheet. It's lived in my kit bag, mostly unused since my Frampton days, when it was my only "reefing option" before I moved to South Cerney where the bigger lake and more exposed waters quickly convinced me I actually did need a Radial.

It proved to be the right choice. The gusts were energetic, but not as frequent, brutal or as sustained as the previous week, so the conditions were pretty much right in my sweet spot.

The start didn't go to plan. I'd intended to sit early at the starboard end of the line, forcing the rest of the fleet to queue behind me, but ended up having to guard my space to leeward when a couple of Aeros threatened to steal it, which put me out of my original position and much further out towards the pin than I'd wanted to be on the relatively unbiased line.

So I accelerated early instead, which put me much further out to the left than I'd wanted to be. But in clean air, so I held on to my starboard tack until the boats astern but above me began to tack away, and then tacked and worked my way back over to the other side of the field, squeezing in front of the rest of the fleet so I could finally lay the windward mark rounding safely on a starboard tack.

It worked, and I third around the windward mark, sneaking in just ahead of David's Aero, behind Burt in his OK and Ian in his Solo. I spent the rest of the race chasing Burt, but never quite catching him, so in the end took 2nd place behind him.

The video at the top is from the start line and up the first beat to the windward mark rounding.

It was a fine evening's sailing.