American Toast Council 57th Laser Sail of 2012

It was the first day of frostbiting at Newport on Sunday.

But I decided to join the Duxbury Bay Laser Fleet for the last day of their frostbite season instead. I had such a good time sailing with them the previous week, and their fleet captain is doing such a stellar job of building and growing the fleet, that I decided I would show my support by going back a second week.

In passing, I guess it says something about the relative "hardcoreness" of the two fleets that one is just starting their winter season as the other finishes theirs.

Oh well! It is what it is.

Yesterday the wind was coming off the shore in Duxbury and, as one would expect, there were huge variations in wind speed and velocity. There were gusts coming in from both sides of the course and it was impossible to predict in advance which side of the beat would pay. At least it seemed impossible to me. At times I would be doing great on one side of the course (due to my superior wind reading and race strategy skills of course) but then all of a sudden the bozos who had gone the other way would get lucky and experience a huge puff and a favorable shift and I would be toast.

Sometimes I had only myself to blame for doing badly in races. A couple of times when I figured I wanted to go right I tried to do one of those fancy squirrel starts at the committee boat end of the start line, partly to test how good I would be at stealing a hole in the line at the last second and how aggressive the sailors to leeward of me would be at protecting that prime real estate.

They were plenty aggressive enough.

Lesson learned.

But I did get plenty of practice at doing penalty turns and staging major comebacks from last off the start line to only third from last at the finish.

Then there was the time that I fouled someone right on the finish line. I retired from that race.

We did 12 races in all I think. A nice mixture of triangles and sausages, one lap and two lap races, upwind and downwind finishes. I think I like sausages best.

After a while I was getting decent starts and was only choosing the wrong side of the course about 25% of the time. I was even first at the windward mark in a couple of races (once again due to my superior wind reading and race strategy skills of course) but then half a dozen sailors would get lucky puffs and pass me downwind.

(Or maybe it's because I'm so fat and heavy from eating too many sausages.)

After racing, one of the local sailors invited us back to his house for a few beers to celebrate the end of the season. But it had been such a rewarding day of sailing that some of the fleet members didn't want to hang up their drysuits just yet. They were hassling the fleet captain for some extra bonus days of racing. Next Sunday? The Friday after Thanksgiving? I also got some questions about the Newport fleet so perhaps some of the Duxbury guys will be sailing there in the coming weeks.

Then home to Tillerwoman for a hearty dinner of Cornish Pasties. Yum.

I was pretty tired last night. Even fell asleep in front of the TV machine. So unlike me.

I'm still aching this morning. But in a good way.

I think I'll go for a run now.

This post was sponsored by the American Toast Council - protecting the quality and reputation of American toast since 1797.