Who IS out THIS weekend

Medway this Sunday.  Great sailing with plenty of wind.  Our performance was not able to shine this weekend due to a new crew and a couple of capsises.  My son crewed and he's really good but we were not in tune.  The forecast was for sunny intervals but it was mostly dull grey and drizzle at times.

 

Race 1, a downwind start that put all but one boat in dirty air left us near the back of the pack when we sailed straight into a mud bank with the kite up.  Capsise inevitable and rather a long time to get it back up and going.  However we caught the Ospreys and 2 or 3 3000s near the leeward mark and then sailed over and away so that by the finish we were closer to the leaders than we were to the tail enders.  The wind got up to the bottom of F5 on the way back and we were overpowered.

Race 2, a better start but some confusion about whether we should go high or go low to avoid a bouy produced another capsise whilst in the lead.  This took a long time to clear as the tide was pushing the boat onto the bouy and made it very difficult to right.  However by halfway downwind we had caught the Ospreys and a few others when we dropped it again.  By the leeward mark we were back in contention and left them all well behind as we gained on the leaders but not enough to get a decent result.  Just near the end the wind dropped so that my tweaks at lunchtime left us rather underpowered in the top end of F3.  The weather cleared and the sun began to shine.

Off to Whitstable to get shouted at a lot Saturday.

From my point of view (contender inlands, Rutland, fat, lazy, out of practice) the forecast for this weekend looks terrible....

My boat is very fast in such winds - usually without me in it.  Now if you need a fatso crew for an osprey.....

There is an undercover on his boat, so it looks likely.  I am watching the forecast closely.  Luckily we don't have to make accommodation bookings cos Rutland is nice and close.  If it gets very hairy I will stay home, but otherwise I will go.