Ducked Again!

Daniel scores the prize from the Committee Boat.

Yet another duck joins the flock.

Fading wind made positioning for the start of the “70s Night” Duck Dodge a little trickier than normal but Full Moon crew Art “Humushoe” Teller, Tammy “Wind Whisperer” Cross, Robert “New Again” Leykam, Daniel “i-Pod” Mengedoht, and skipper John “Induced Heel” Mengedoht managed to be more or less in the front row of boats. Joining Full Moon in third start was old rival Shogun. Full Moon initially pulled away from Shogun but as the wind began dying, they found a better path and pulled back in front. Meanwhile, the Santana 20 Sushi had picked up a decent bit of breeze by the Westlake shore and took over the lead before stalling out near the AGC buoy.

Converging boats and boats trying to escape the buoy area under spinnaker made for a morass of barely moving hulls. Full Moon eventually made it around and launched the mighty Equalizer. As the wind had clocked around a bit, the course was much closer to the wind than ideal for a symmetrical spinnaker but the greater sail area was worth the bargain in the very light breeze. Full Moon soon passed Shogun again plus a few others, including some from second start. At this point, it was hard to know exactly what position we were in other than being very far behind Sushi!

After passing a few more boats, Full Moon engaged in a slow-motion battle with a well-sailed Cal 30, rounding the Freeway buoy not far behind them. As the Aurora buoy had been placed about as far northwest as possible, the leg past Gasworks was agonizingly slow, though there was some comic relief from a conversation with a person aboard the Buchan 37 Distance (see the previous post).

Full Moon did get by the Cal before rounding the buoy and then set the Equalizer once again for what was now a downwind reach and run to the finish, still in extremely light breeze. Full Moon managed to pass the San Juan 28 Zephyr from second start and continued to battle the Cal 30, finally pulling ahead for good just yards from the finish line. Nearly two hours after the start, Full Moon finally oozed past the Committee Boat to find that we had managed to pull off third place and the Bronze Duck!

Distance vs. Mata Hari?

It seems more people read this blog than just the Full Moon crew, though apparently not all are happy campers! During the Duck Dodge this week, one of the Distance crew hailed your faithful scribe to express some displeasure with a posting from back in 2009.

I confess I don't have perfect recall of the incident described in my post but Distance and Mata Hari had a side-to-side collision right at the finish line with Distance also hitting the finish line buoy. I implied that Distance was at fault for the collision. I'm reasonably sure both boats were on starboard tack with Distance to leeward, which would mean Distance had right of way and that Mata Hari should have yielded, assuming they had room to turn away. (Score one point for Distance).

However, rules 3, 5, 7, 9, and 11 for the Duck Dodge also clearly and repeatedly state "No hitting one-another!" If Distance was sailing to leeward, they would have had the best opportunity to avoid a collision. Thus, I still feel pretty solid about laying some blame on Distance. (Score one point or more for Mata Hari.) There may be more to the story, of course, but from my vantage point, I simply called it the way I saw it. In my book, failure to avoid a collision is worse than failing to yield right of way.

Meanwhile, an attentive reader will notice a little symbol at the end of each posting with some text which typically says “0 comments” right next to it. Clicking the symbol or the text opens a dialog box to add a comment about the posting. I filter all comments before they can show up in the blog so as to avoid all kinds of potential troubles but I welcome any reader to make a comment, especially if they feel wronged by anything I’ve written. If the comment favors the profound over the profane, I will publish it. And if I’ve made a mistake (certainly always possible!), I’ll revise my posting accordingly.

Two for Two!

Daniel, Randy, John, Eileen, and Max enjoy a brief bit of sun.

Daniel shows off the golden prize, along with his new rain gear.

It wasn’t quite so easy this time. On a gray evening with occasional showers and shifty breeze, Full Moon crew Randy “Mini-finger” Olsen, Michael “Almost Wet” Medina, Eileen “Guinness” McHugh, Max “Quick Study” Foley, Daniel “Barking Spider” Mengedoht, and skipper John “Hat Trick” Mengedoht nailed the start near the middle of the line but boats closer to the Committee Boat had a slight advantage. Full Moon was rolled by the Catalina 27 Deception and then mixed it up with Columbia 26 Tuesday, and Ranger 22s Anakena and True Blue through a number of tacks, ending up rounding the AGC buoy in fourth place.

After a short pause to raise the pole, the mighty Equalizer was launched in a building wind. All but Tuesday were soon left behind as the magic nylon pushed Full Moon to hull speed in the puffs. Old rival Fortis and a few others from second start were also passed. Eventually Tuesday also succumbed, only to catch back up as Full Moon dropped the Equalizer a bit early to prepare for a smooth jibe around the Freeway buoy. Tuesday kept their spinnaker up to the last second to poke their bow inside but then had trouble with their jib after the take-down and Full Moon was gone, gone, gone!

Reaching across to the Aurora buoy, Tuesday slowly faded back and no other challengers appeared. Heading back upwind to the finish line, Full Moon pulled even farther ahead to claim the prized Gold Duck by several minutes! Tuesday was second, followed by True Blue for the Bronze Duck.

And so it was two Golds in two tries, or three Golds in a row if you count the Duck Dodge Rum Run last October. If this run continues, the Race Committee may reconsider inviting Full Moon to third start!

Golden Glow

Daniel, Marcelle, Michael, and John zipping along upwind to the Freeway buoy.

"Loose Ends" gives Dad a big hug while holding the coveted Gold Duck!

Last June, the Duck Dodge Race Committee invited Full Moon to switch from second start (“half-fast boats”), where she had raced for many years, to third start (“cruising and slower boats”). This was a tough choice on many fronts, including no longer competing with old rivals, worrying about having an unfair advantage over some truly “slower boats,” and suffering from the image challenge of being classed as a slower boat. Ouch! However, the Committee has been allowing more and more really fast boats into second start, rendering Full Moon essentially uncompetitive. Third start was chosen and Full Moon managed to collect two third-place finishes over the summer and a first in the Rum Run.

And so it was, on yet another gorgeous May evening, that Full Moon crew Randy “Grad Dad” Olsen, Michael “Zeta-Jones” Medina, Marcelle “Overboard” Lynde, Chuck “Zip-Grip” Weldy, Daniel “Loose Ends” Mengedoht, and skipper John “High Gloss” Mengedoht lined up for third start for the first Duck Dodge of 2012. Starting on port tack, Full Moon had to dodge the Merit 25 Incognito coming across on starboard but still managed to be the third boat across the line for an unusually good start (for us). With a good lane and clear air, Full Moon pulled ahead of Incognito to take over first place half way to the Freeway buoy, also overtaking Fortis from second start in the process.

Rounding the Freeway buoy and heading past Gasworks to the Aurora buoy, Full Moon passed still more second starters, including Shogun, Distance and, amazingly, Runner! Heading back south on the long run under spinnaker featured some big wind shifts, necessitating some quick (and somewhat messy) jibes for the mighty Equalizer. Distance caught back up (it is, after all, a 37-footer!) but had issues with their take-down and Full Moon zipped by again just after rounding the AGC buoy.

The final upwind leg to the finish saw no boats threatening from behind and Full Moon cruised on to easily score the coveted gold duck! Was it the fresh bottom paint? Was it the shiny new graphics on the freshly polished topsides? More likely, it was a good start, followed by solid sailing from a veteran, if slightly rusty crew! Regardless, it was great fun and wonderful to be back racing again.

New Vinyl

With new bottom paint and some polish on the hull, the ancient peeling graphics had to go! The new vinyl letters were applied last weekend and are a close match to the originals. Lookin' good, Full Moon!

Splashdown!

On the lift, heading back to the water!

Full Moon returned to the water yesterday afternoon with two new coats of blue bottom paint, a new transducer for the knotmeter/depthsounder, and freshly polished topsides (hull above waterline). The new instrumentation won't be complete until I can infill the bigger hole from the old knotmeter display and install the new one but that's coming soon. Meanwhile, the teak is nearly done with new varnish and I've cut the plywood for a new hatch board - Full Moon will be lookin' good for the first Duck Dodge next Tuesday!

Hauled Out!

Full Moon hangs in the slings, freshly out of her native element.

The old bottom paint was worn through from all the scrubbing over the years.

New electronics are coming soon!

Full Moon was hauled out this morning at the Canal Boatyard for the first time in... a lot of years. She will receive two coats of bottom paint (applied with rollers, unfortunately) plus a spiffy new depth and speed transducer ("smart sensor") for a new Furuno FI-504 display. Since the old instruments are vintage 1978, they don't work reliably and it will be nice to know how fast (or slow) we're really going, not to mention having more than a vague idea of the depth!