Equalized!

Full Moon crew in the prestart maneuvers.

The weather wasn’t especially tropical for the Tropical Night Duck Dodge but there was no rain and enough wind from the SW to move. Full Moon crew Michael “Pointy End” Medina, Chuck “Geezer” Weldy, Tammy “Takedown” Cross, Kelly “Buried Alive” Laleman, Daniel “Quick Hoist” Mengedoht, and skipper John “Dull End” Mengedoht enjoyed a decent start about a third of the way down the line from Committee Boat and ended up just to leeward and slightly ahead of old rival Ignitor. The “lee bow” position was effective, causing Ignitor to fall behind and then to leeward. A J24 then elected to tack away to avoid a similar fate.

Cruising upwind not long after the start. The black boat is Ignitor.

Unfortunately, boats closer to Committee Boat enjoyed slightly stronger wind and faced a shorter distance to the AGC buoy. Full Moon tacked west for better wind but then had to deal with traffic, ducking a few boats. Nearing the buoy, Ignitor approached from the east, back ahead of Full Moon. After rounding, it was a very short leg to the floating “island” to snag a few free cups of beer. Full Moon then headed toward the Chandlers buoy before remembering it wasn’t part of the course!

After a quick jibe, the Equalizer was brought into play. A J24 and Ignitor were busy battling each other, leaving a nice lane to pass them both to windward. Nearing the Freeway buoy, Full Moon nearly caught Selchie and was not at all far behind speedy Scat! After rounding, Ignitor was working hard to catch back up, but to no avail. On the long leg south, Full Moon stayed in touch with Scat and Selchie but Ignitor managed so slide by approaching the AGC buoy. Full Moon swung past the “island” again right on Selchie’s stern while Ignitor stayed clear, sailing a bit less distance…

Heading for the finish line...

Then it was time to hoist the Equalizer again and pass Ignitor again. Full Moon nearly got past Selchie as well approaching the Freeway buoy but couldn’t quite get by, though Full Moon had the inside line at the buoy. After rounding, Selchie faded north while Full Moon stayed more on the wind in hopes of laying the Aurora buoy without tacking. This worked just fine, Full Moon rounding ahead of Selchie and still ahead of Ignitor and then maintaining the lead to the finish to take eighth. In fairness to Selchie, they had a LOT of people on board, which can’t have helped much with performance!