Sailing results

This having your own boat thing appears to be paying off. That, or the handicapping system is being really kind to me. Today we did a handicap start - depending on how good or how... inexperienced a sailor one is, one gets to start a number of minutes ahead of the 'scratch' boats - those with sailors that are good enough not to need a head start.

I had a 15 minute headstart. I'm not sure whether to be pleased (that I don't need the biggest headstart in the fleet), or miffed (cos I can use all the advantage available to me). I suppose the mark of an accurate handicap is if (for example) I finished close to the scratch boats... I was 3 minutes behind the leader, so plus my 15 is a normal 18 minute split. Pretty good.

Of course, I didn't help myself at all. Nearly capsized once, stuffed up a gybe, stalled twice (didn't think sailboats had clutches...), and stuffed three rounding three marks. Add all those mistakes up, and my handicap would have been spot on, if not a little generous.

Yippee, this is a fun sport.