Dear Friend of CHARIAD:

CHARIAD sailed in her most competitive regatta of the season this past weekend. We finished 3rd in class against very competitive boats.

My bottom line was that we did well. But the two boats that finished above us sailed a little better than we did. Our debrief covered our being a little slower getting the spin up and a little slower getting the spin down and sailing fast back upwind. That was the difference.

CHARIAD racing crew in Ted Hood Regatta

Hot Spur won the regatta in our class. She is owned by a former Boston YC Commodore and another BYC Commodore was crew. Scirocco finished 2nd and is owned by the current Commodore of the Eastern YC. You are getting the theme here. EYC hosted the regatta, so no protest permitted against Scirocco.

Congrats to Hot Spur and Scirocco for well sailed races. We beat the perennial Boston Harbor champion and also beat the boat that bested us on the Beringer race to Provincetown and won that regatta. As I said, we sailed well but not enough to win the regatta. For the record, we won the regatta two years ago against the same boats.

The racing on Friday was in light and spotty wind. Saturday was 12 to 15 knots from the NE. Sunday was 16 to 20 knots from the NE in waves. We went out to the starting area ready to race. The race committee did not even come out of the harbor and cancelled the races for the day. Would have been a rough day but valuable learning experience. High wind and high sea days are tough on the race committee, and I was told they were concerned about the smaller boats.

CHARIAD sailing crew after Ted Hood Regatta

Here is our Sunday team back on the mooring at noon.

The Hood Regatta was great for building our team. We sailed better Saturday than Friday, and I am confident we would have sailed still better Sunday.

Our On Dock Time was 10 AM Sunday. I did a short photo shoot before getting on the boat. Here is one of the images from Sunday morning.

Sunday morning photo shoot of boat Independence

Special thanks to Shayna Loeffler for hosting a wonderful Friends party at her lakeside villa in Arlington. Lots of folks enjoyed the Saturday evening on the lake with stories and laughs for all.

My best,

Rick