Yellow Goose?

The Goosebumps Race Committee elected to create two starts for Race 3. The goal is (apparently) to split the fleet into roughly equal halves but, for Race 3, boats were assigned starts roughly based on the break between first and second start in the Duck Dodge races. Other than Scat, which went in first start, Full Moon and her usual Duck Dodge competitors were all in second start.

Crew Randy “Twisted” Olsen, Marcelle “Careful” Lynde, Chuck “Big Dinghy” Weldy, Daniel “Sideways” Mengedoht, and skipper John “Patience” Mengedoht had a decent starboard tack start but boats starting on port at the pin (buoy) end of the line did better and Full Moon suffered in disturbed wind for much of the first leg. After rounding the Freeway buoy a couple of spots back from arch-rival Zephyr, Full Moon took a line closer to Gasworks Park. This paid off quite well and Full Moon rounded the Aurora buoy nearly in the lead.

Crusing fast downwind on the first lap toward the Aurora buoy.

The Equalizer went up smoothly and Full Moon took off down the lake, forging into the lead and pulling away from the fleet. With a clean drop at the AGC buoy, Full Moon enjoyed clear air for the long close reach back to the Freeway buoy, though the T-bird Poco Mas and Ranger 26 Runner gained a bit upwind.

Yes, the knot meter is reading 6.12 knots!

By the Aurora buoy, Poco Mas was only a few boatlengths back. Then disaster struck as the Equalizer went up sideways! It was quickly dropped to the foredeck but, once sorted, it went back up with a horrendous twist that took several long minutes to clear.

The Equalizer is flying again! Yee Haw!!!

By the time the Equalizer was properly flying, Poco Mas had gone by, though Full Moon was able to get back to an inside overlap before the AGC buoy as both boats caught up to the Nomad 17 Patuxent.

Heading upwind to the finish, Poco Mas slowly pulled ahead. Unfortunately, Patuxent found a nice line of wind further west and also pulled a bit ahead. In the end it was still close but Full Moon was awarded the yellow vinyl sticker for third place with Poco Mas first, Patuxent scored second, and Runner about a minute or so behind in fourth. However, it turns out that Patuxent was actually in the first start! That boosts Full Moon to second with Runner third and Zephyr further back in seventh place out of 32 boats in second start.

The top three boats will be in first start next week, which is just as well since it turns out it is better for the series score to be last in first start than it is to be first in the second start! Who knew?!?