Last weekend, or rather, a week and a half ago, I sailed in the national open championship in my class, H-boat. It was somewhat frustrating. On the bright side, we have improved a lot since last year, when we ended up third from last among thirty boats - this year, we managed 15th of 21. What keeps itching at the back of my mind is the fact that bad luck alone made us drop a lot.
Some backstory is needed. We definitely do better in calmer waters and very calm wind conditions, because those are the normal conditions were we do most of our training. As the captain loves citing, "the best sailors appear in calm wind". The sailor who said that was the late King Olav V of Norway, and thus is very citable in this country. Anyway, we really shine in weather were most others would just crank up the engine and go home. Something we really proved in the nationals. In almost total calm, we made a perfect start. Unfortunately, a lot of the other boats were caught in a stream that carried them across the starting line, and a restart was ordered. While we prepared for a new start, we were caught in a spot of dead calm behind the line, and lay completely still for ten minutes. That is not fixable in a short race. So, we finished last in a race that was ideal for us, weather-wise.
The fact that bothers me is that in sailed time, i.e. withdrawing the 10 min 40 sec we started late, we were 3 min faster than the winning boat. Damn damn DAMN!
We could in no way have won the entire championship. The top five boats are WAY out of our league. But in these conditions, we should have been able to make it in the top ten. And next year, we may not be as lucky with the weather. Argh.
