Saturday, October 23, 2010

Staying in the Lane-way


Today on the Lake was a great day with a southerly of around 10 to 15 knots. The wind was shifty and you needed to keep on your toes if you wanted to get any advantage over the others. A fantastic example of this was on the numerous reaches from St.Kilda, with a boat not 4 metres away from you gets a nice breeze to get him planing and all you can do is watch, as you are not in the same breeze :(. When the reverse happens it is all good  with the world :).

My lesson from today was when beating up the eastern side of the island, unless I am positive that I am on a lifting tack. I must stay within the lane-way, as this mitigates my risk of potentially losing ground on the others. As I did on my first leg, as I was looking for a lift off the south end of the Island, which did not eventuate.

I am writing this lesson in my blog today, so it can be a reminder for me in the future. I have learnt this lesson in the past, but again I have fallen for trying a high risk option with no benefit on the first leg. The result I ended up at the tail end of the fleet and I spent the rest of the race playing catch up.

Till next time.