Thursday, July 15, 2010

July 15 - Too Much Wind!

We just can't seem to win here in Scheveningen. The system came through last night and lasted all night and is still here! It is very windy. I'm not sure how windy, but the 470 class likes to pride itself on racing in 30+ knots so it must be more than that. We were supposed to start at 10 this morning. They postponed until 11 and then we went out. We had the boat pinned down two and a half full pins (something we've never done before) and everything was good to go. We got just outside the Harbour and headed downwind towards our course when a gust hit the boat. I looked back as the boat started to wipe out and Jen was no longer with me! She was in the water already, holding the tiller which had broken off in her hand. We got a tow in from one of the rescue boats and by the time we were back in our spot the rest of the boats were headed back to shore. We are now postponed on shore again. I did some running around to the hardware store and a machinist and managed to source some aluminum to fit an insert into the tiller and after some hacksawing and rivet-ing we are good to go sailing again! Hopefully the breeze drops off and we can get some races off. We need two more races to complete the seeding round. More later.

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