Center Sound Series Wrap

Scatchet Head

The second and third races of CYC-Seattle’s Center Sound Series were both Puget Sound Specials, with quirky conditions Northwest Sailors (usually) take in stride. What was a little unusual was that the race committee adjusted the courses in both races so that instead of going all the way to Scatchet Head and Three Tree Point, racers sailed around the Sound never too far from Shilshole Bay.

The Scatchet Head Race was most notable for a parking lot that formed near Edmunds at one of the turning marks. We don’t have any photos, but here’s a video from Doug Frazer aboard the J/105 Corvo and an image of the melee at the north mark courtesy of Kwindoo.

When all was said and done, while there were several Did Not Competes, it appears everyone who started finished.

Three Tree Point

The race committee opted for not sending the fleet all the way to Three Tree Point, no doubt urged by Bruce Hedrick’s pre-race weather brief and suggestion. Bruce himself raced aboard Tahlequah, and here’s his report:

There was a lefty at about 1:30 before the start so the pin became favored so we took it. With that shift the boats astern were all into our dirt and one by one were forced to tack. Once everyone had tacked we dug a little deeper into breakwater and then tacked. We held that and it looked good until the breeze went back to the SW. Those who had tacked early also got into more wind so when they came back about 5 boats crossed us. We tacked into the beach just north of West Point and then tacked when we could just scrape over the sandbar at WP. What was weird was the tide was ebbing at WP instead of flooding as predicted. So the folks who were on port outside the buoy got slowed while we just decided to stay inside the buoy and stay on port. Most of the group that crossed us got past the Point and then tacked back to starboard to sail under Magnolia towards Four Mile Rock. One J-105 found the mud and parked up for a while. We held port and got a nice shift to the SW so we tacked and for a while we were aimed at Alki. Using  the HB compass it became apparent that the boats on the beach were in more anti-water and maybe less wind as we lifted out on them. The J-109’s went further out than we did and that didn’t seem to hurt them as they stayed ahead of us. Once we got headed down to Duwamish Head, we tacked and were laying the top mark.

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We rounded in third behind the two J-109’s, did a starboard set and just started sailing our numbers and watching as the breeze continued to oscillate. In that breeze especially in the lighter spots we can sail deeper than the J-109’s at about the same speed. We did three gybes going across Elliott Bay holding the port gybe to sail inside the buoy at WP. We did one gybe just north of WP to stay away from Lodos who would have been a problem on starboard. With a sprit they have to sail hotter angles but with our shadow they couldn’t get past us so they finally slowed down and went astern of us. I think they also wanted to get back to the east to stay in touch with the other J-109 Eclipse who had gone well to the east but it looked to us like that hurt them and the other J-35. We waited until the breeze went back to the SSW and gybed for the mark.

We had a nice opening to get around the mark and just held port to force the bigger boats that were coming up on us to tack and leave us with a lane of clear air. This was good because both Lodos and Eclipse got caught up in traffic and this allowed us to extend. We tacked to starboard and held that until we were about ½ way to the finish. Both Lodos and Eclipse went back out to the west so we decided to be conservative and just keep us between them and the finish. We had about a 100 yd lead so we waited until we could tack back to starboard and then tacked directly in front of Lodos who waited a while and then did two tacks to clear their air. We gradually worked up underneath them again and put just a little more distance on them. We held starboard until we could lay the finish on port. When we crossed it was becoming apparent that the breeze was going away and as I drove home you could see that Elliot Bay had glassed off and when I got back to West Seattle, it was calm from Alki to the north end of Vashon. So again, a great call by the Race Committee.

That’s a wrap for Center Sound. Three good races, and it’s all starting to feel a little post-Covid normal. A windy Blakely Rock and challenging Scatchet Head and Three Tree Point races. Aaaaaah. Somehow, complaining that the conditions weren’t perfect doesn’t feel appropriate at this time. Many kudos to the race committee that had to overcome a faulty YCV transmission and two bad weather outlooks by thinking on their feet. Results are here. The usual suspects are atop the leader board with Sabrosa (Alex Simanis), Dark Star (Jonathan McKee) and Terramoto (Bill Weinstein) in the top three PHRF fleet spots. The ORC class, all TP 52s, was won by John Buchan’s Glory.