Jinxed!

Full Moon crew Michael “Gridlock” Medina, Dave “Big Pull” Pulsifer, Christian “Local Brew” Grange, Neil “Dad” Piispanen, Calvin “What Is This For” Piispanen, and skipper John “Low Pole” Mengedoht enjoyed a decent start for the Hippies and Hipsters Duck Dodge. Full Moon held starboard tack nearly to the Westlake shore before tacking into clear air. This paid off pretty well, Full Moon crossing ahead of 40’ Thundorca and several other boats before tacking back to round the Freeway buoy.

Next was a tight reach to the Aurora buoy, the wind getting very light for the last third of the leg. After jibing around the buoy, the Equalizer was quickly launched and Full Moon began to reel in a number of boats, including some stragglers from second start. A slightly early douse before the AGC buoy set up a nice tight rounding, followed by a fast close reach to the Chandler’s Cove buoy.

Returning upwind, it appeared there were still a number of boats in front of Full Moon but it was hard to tell how many. We didn’t see it happen but, somewhere on this leg, the zippy J22 Jinx lost her mast! We didn’t hear any collision so it may have been a hardware failure (shrouds) but the word is nobody got hurt and the crew were able to gather up the mess and get the boat safely back to the dock. Good work, guys, and we hope to see you back on the lake soon!

Once the rain began to clear out, we were treated to a double rainbow!

Meanwhile, Full Moon had her hands full battling some bigger boats from second start, fortunately being able to outpoint them until they tacked away. Approaching the Freeway buoy on port tack, a different pair of bigger boats on starboard tack were converging. A smooth tack brought Full Moon into a perfect “lee bow” position and the two boats tacked away.

The sunset was also spectacular!

The next leg was very similar to the first lap, though the wind was even lighter near the Aurora buoy. Full Moon launched the nylon monster for the southbound leg, passed a few more boats from second start, and began to slowly close the gap on the Capri 25 Tailwind. After a hasty spinnaker douse, Full Moon again hugged the AGC buoy and romped toward the Chandler’s Cove buoy nearly close-hauled. For whatever reason, Tailwind was on a track further to leeward, along with two second start boats (including our old rival Ignitor). Full Moon was able to round the buoy in front of Tailwind and then hold position to the finish line where we were greeted by a toot of the horn – and some rain. Having figured on being fourth place at best, this was a very pleasant surprise, Full Moon actually finishing second behind always-competitive Tuesday (Columbia 26).