8th at Canadian Nationals

The above picture is from one of the starts. That is us reaching down closest to the camera. We found the only way we could get off the line was to start on our own, it seemed to work. The one time we tried to start in the middle of the fleet we found ourselves clawing back.
Below is a little writeup I did to summarize the Canadian F18 Nationals. Todd partnered up with John Harmuth for their first regatta together. Thursday's 2 practice races went well as we had one mediocre finish then won the 2nd. I've always heard that winning a practice race was bad luck but never read too much into it. I will in the future as on the first day of racing, while waiting around for the start, sloshing around in the waves, we both started to feel sick. We struggled through the first race than while sitting before the 2nd race started to feel even worse. Barely making it through the 2nd race we decided we were a danger to ourselves and others and sailed in, missing 2 races. A tough decision as we thought this would take us out of the regatta. Friday night we were in 28th place, we definitely thought we were out of the running. However, with 8 more races on Saturday and Sunday (Saturday in moderate to heavy conditions, and Sunday in very light conditions) we managed to string together a very consistent regatta with all 8 finished in the top 9. This was good enough to move us into 8th overall! We are very happy with this result but can't help but think where we would have been had we had our A game on on Friday.
The 2009 Canadian F18 Nationals took place last weekend in Toronto out of Etobicoke YC. With an initial entry list of around 25 boats the word spread and more entries poured in. It quickly became evident that this was going to be one of the largest fleets of F18s ever in North America. The final number was 37 boats, nearly doubling the fleet from last years regatta! Boats came from all over Canada and the U.S. and by the regatta end everyone was happy they did! The regatta organizers put on a top notch regatta with amazing food (literally half a chicken for each competitor for Friday’s dinner!), a live band, AND the weather cooperated for the whole weekend providing 3 days of excellent racing in all sorts of conditions.
Racing was close with many different boats mixing it up each day, especially in the top 15. Proving to have another gear than the rest of the fleet Team MicroWind, Mike Easton and Tripp Burd of Marblehead, MA put on a clinic, winning the event by 50 points!
Thanks again to EYC, the organizers, and competitors for such a great event! The New England Fleet (which has about 25 boats) is looking forward to the continued competition between us and the Canadians in several events next year.
This regatta is a great representation of the F18 class and it’s tremendous growth in the last year or two.
Photos courtesy of Rob Van Den Enden
Full results and more pictures can be found at: Cat-Alist.com