RON BANNER MEMORIAL REGATTA JUNE 4, 2006

I was awakened brashly by the alarm at 6AM so that I could get the old joints moving. I was greeted by overcast skies, breezes from the SW and rain that was making puddles in the street gutters. Will it or will it not turn out to be a good sailing day? At this point in time, it did not appear too promising. However, I have seen occasions when these conditions cleared up later in the AM and ended up being good sailing WX. I and we could only hope.

It was about 8:15AM when I, Joe Brohan, University Place, WA arrived at Noel’s for skippers’ breakfast. Already there were "Chappy" Chapman, North Tacoma, Gary Kohler, Keyport, WA, Harry Lange, Enumclaw and Roland Krona, Gig Harbor, WA Roland did not have a boat so tallied the heat sheet for us. Howard Rasmussen, University Place, WA would usually do this, but could not make it to this regatta. We left for the lake at about 9:15AM.

When we arrived at the lake there were nice breezes blowing from the S & SW at about 4-8mph with gusts to 15mph. Temps were in the low 50sF. The clouds were beginning to break and there was no rain. Harry L put out the marks with the usual N/S, E/W right angle orientation to take care of any wind changes. He also put out a good triangular course. Thanx for the great placing, Harry.

The level of the lake this year amazes me. Usually at this time, it’s down about 1 ½’ from the dock deck. This year it’s only about 10". We’ve had a lot of rain this year so it shows. They’d best not tell us this year that they are short of water!

While Harry was about setting the marks we were about cleaning the goose poop from the deck. It really amazed me to see the amount of the GP that there was considering that there has not been much in the last three weeks. Must be that they were saving it and dumped it all at once. At least it appeared that way. Some of those piles were as large as dog poop.

At about 10:15AM the starting gun was fired and for the first 7 heats we sailed a windward/leeward course. However, as the winds became more steady and picked up in velocity, we sailed a triangular course.

There was an almost total absence of mishaps with the boats. Only problems that came about were a halyard problem that Gary K had with his jib and Harry L with a main sheet.

It was great sailing the EC12s in these winds and keeping them under control when we were hit by the 15mph gusts. It was an experience watching the gusts come and preparing the 12s to handle them when they hit. On one such occasion I was going downwind when a gust hit. I stopped the "death roll" sheeting in a bit, the boat continued straight ahead and proceeded to submarine 3/4s the length of the boat! I recovered from that and then proceeded into another "death roll" and submarined again halfway to the mark. Fortunately, this did not happen near the mark. It was at this time that Gary K was ahead of me in first place. When the gust hit, he had the devil’s own time attempting to keep his boat under control. It proceeded to go in directions he did not wish. Lucky for me though, ‘cause it was then that I overtook and finished ahead of him.

It amazed me that after all of the submarine experiences that I had, there was very little water in the boat. There could not have been more than ½ cup of water in the boat. What apparently made a big difference was the ¾" raised fairleads and the ‘tight to the deck’ hatches (even without tape).

It was 12noon when we had sailed our 12^th heat! Harry L and Gary K rounded up the marks and put the boat and gear away. Thanx, guys. We the headed for the Tav to figure the placing and have a bite to eat. By this time the winds were fairly steady around 8mph, with much blue sky and the temps were then in the mid 60sF.

The great sailing conditions probably had something to do the way the placing turned out. There was only a 1 point spread between 1^st and 2^nd and a 4 point spread between 2^nd and 3^rd. After we figured the scores and had a bite to eat we headed for home about 1:30PM and so ended a great day of EC12 sailing.

1. Gary Kohler 16 Pts.
2. Joe Brohan 17
3. Harry Lange 21

Joe Brohan

NOTE NOTE NOTE ODOM #3 Sunday June 11