Not Last

The amazing string of beautiful Tuesday evenings finally came to an end for the Sesame Street Duck Dodge with cloudy skies and even a few sprinkles of rain. It also brought decent wind out an unfamiliar direction – the southeast! Full Moon crew Michael “Murray” Medina, Debra “Cookie Monster” Ricard, Doug “Big Bird” Schoemaker, Katie “Kermit” Freels, Sophie “Zoe” Ricard, Daniel “Grover” Mengedoht, and skipper John “Bert” Mengedoht set up for a port tack start near the pin end, which worked well, though boats starting right at the buoy faired a bit better.

The Full Moon crew, sans Michael. More crew makes us faster, right?

After a nearly straight shot to the AGC buoy, the Equalizer was quickly launched and Full Moon began to reel in some boats in front while dodging third start boats coming the opposite direction. Approaching the Freeway buoy, it became apparent that boats were able to carry spinnakers onto the next leg. Unfortunately, the jibe near the buoy went badly wrong with the spinnaker wrapped around the forestay. The entire leg to the Aurora buoy was spent getting the nylon monster down on the deck and the jib could not be hoisted until after rounding. The net result was that Full Moon was dead last and even passed by a third start boat. Ouch!

What happened to our weather?

Continuing on, Full Moon played the shifts, tacking several times before rounding the AGC buoy and relaunching the Equalizer. As before, gains were made but this time the spinnaker was brought down before reaching the Freeway buoy. A fast reach to the Aurora buoy then just allowed Full Moon to catch a J24 and hold on to stay ahead to the finish line in the dark.