Bad Day on the bay

[chucklesR]

Like Jeff said, don't beat yourself or the skipper up, it happens.

I learned a long time ago that hindsight is almost always 20/20.
Translated to my boat, The Admiral can almost always see I'm backasswards.
and
If I was right more often than wrong I'd probably be up there on the line mixing it up.

[jimmyb116]

I f your area is like mine the racing is very competitive, even the local around the cans, it sounds like the conditions were too much for the new crew and you should have called it a day.

[T34C]

I'm going to assume that the gust that was preventing you from ducking B was a header and B was tacking in the hope of taking advantage of it.

While it goes without saying that it was the skippers fault (it always is). I think in this case if he couldn't see the other boat from the helm, he should have asked you to move to a position where you could both sheet and watch the other boat. As Jeff mentioned, your position as main sail trimmer was the best suited to help keep an eye on other boats to leeward.

Where was the genoa trimmer? Were you cross sheeting the genoa or was the trimmer on the leeward side? If they were on the low side, they should have had an eye on B as well.

[T34C]

As mentioned earlier, many sailors / skippers have been there and done that.

I was the bow man on a j22 in a heavy weather race. While aproaching the lay line to the windward mark on port tack, we managed to over look a tiny boat coming accross on starboard (tiny meaning a Tartan 10). We also had to crash tack to avoid a collision. The boat was completely knocked down with me left hanging perpendicular to the mast. We recovered and went on to finish the race, but it certainly does get your attention.

I personally find it highly valuable to de-brief and talk thru these sorts of things. It helps make everyone better as a result.

[PalmettoSailor]

Lots of woulda', coulda', shoulda's on my part and the skippers part. I technically wasn't assigned as mainsail trimmer, but was in the best position on the rail to handle the traveller, so I that's what I was doing. I honestly don't know what happened with the mainsheet trimmer. Me being on the traveller may have lulled them into inattention or they may have been off balance and down on the leeward side.

To that point we'd been fine easing the traveller to stay on our feet. It was just a few seconds when all the factors came togther in a bad way. While I was keenly watching the water and boats ahead and to windward for advance notice of the gusts, I never attempted to catch a glance to leeward. Since none of the boats ahead that I could clearly see had yet tacked, I sure didn't expect a boat just ahead of us to leewward to tack so I was also lulled into a type of inattention.

Its somewhat odd that we faced none of the worries we left the dock with that day (ie we were thinking more of being miseable from rain than worrying about a crash).

[Sabre66]

1) Overtaking boat needs to keep clear.

2) Tacking boat needs to keep clear until he's established his tack.

3) Next time dump the sheet, In windy conditions the traveller should have been all the way to leeward already.

4) You guys should have retired after the first incident.

It's all a learning curve. But you need to keep it safe. Maybe next time you should worry less about winning( I know that sounds stupid) and more about practicing tactics and boat handling.

[PalmettoSailor]

Originally Posted by Sabre66

1) Overtaking boat needs to keep clear.

2) Tacking boat needs to keep clear until he's established his tack.

3) Next time dump the sheet, In windy conditions the traveller should have been all the way to leeward already.

4) You guys should have retired after the first incident.

It's all a learning curve. But you need to keep it safe. Maybe next time you should worry less about winning( I know that sounds stupid) and more about practicing tactics and boat handling.

As a discrete final word, the idea of taking it easy and rolling in some sail was suggested both subtly and not so subtly by the most experienced crew member (other than the skipper) on board, but the idea(s) was vetoed.

In hindsight, I'm sure the skipper wishes he'd heeded the concerns of his most experienced crew member, that discretion would be the better part of valor on a heavy wind day when you're short of experienced crew. At this point of my sailing evolution, when I'm the 3rd most experienced person on a boat, things are getting thin. ;-)