final of series

it was foggy when i left home at 730 and little wind predicted.
after a snooze i was woken by the sun shinning into the van, new launch wheels were added to the boat and worked very well.
sam arrived after a long spell of no crewing with me, the job to do was to beat mike and kamil.
the first race i got to a good start in hardly any wind. after going way right when i tacked  kamil had done much better.
by the end of the lap we were not to far behind, course was  triangle(laid by club) far beacon club.
2nd l;ap the tide was getting us to go around the windward mark. we fell behind and mike was catching. we made up some goround on kamil and the wind filled slightly.
it wasa long race 1h 13m
durng the break we quickly replaced the lower batten which was broken.
r2 was far beacon (s) 3(s) club(s)  a funny start as we went to early headed off mike to the pin, he was over so was i and kamil was behind, i quickly went behind the line and started again and soon got close to kamil. it was close for the rest of the race even doing a port starboard on them at far beacon.
i made one mistake gybing off to soon on one lap so we fell behind a little.
mike was behind but catching slowly.
we ended 2nd again and enjoyed the wind that made up for r1.
kamil took the series and i was 2nd, first time ever a 2nd in a series.

RACE 2

RACE 1

home built big wheel launch trolley

finally finished.
thanks to cadkat.de for the wheels , wheel bearings and cups.
all terrain tyres for the tyres
and ebay for the alluminuim 50mm bar.
total cost posted approx £400, i did buy some bolts to fix the cups but didnt use them in the end,
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working on a handle extension, carbon pole 25mm   6ft long,  pics to follow

5th september

busy day ahead, picked up richard and got to the club early.
task 1 put new adhesive protection on old launch trolley, too small and not sticky enough FAIL
so off we went to force 4 which i didnt know was only down the road. we got some skiaflex 291 black and used that to stick my old rubber backed carpet i had in the van.
stuck it on the trolley put it under the boat job done.
job 2 measure up the new big wheel trolley for wheel position and cup postion. job done

just waiting now for the cups to arrive from cadkat. saved a fair bit on the price i would have paid from windsport doing it myself.
£550+ postage for them , mine came out around £420 posted.
the next job was to sort the trapeze on the contender and pratice on land getting in and out. sorted.

the race wasnt until 4pm and around 2.30pm patrick turned up to crew for the day. many question s were asked which i didnt mind.
we launched early with the course in my head
when we were out there we were told it had changed. when we did it everyone did what it

was before. ???
we started well behind the line and it wasa one start for all out to boundary which was very flukey on the wind. a good reach and we cleared most of the pack going to moorehead, then off too netley for the downwind section.
mike and ugly duckling were well in front.
patrick came up with good ideas about the taletales on the sail and i tried to adjust to get them sorted. tactics wise we tried different to mike. at the end of the race were were surprised we just edged mike on the line, his tiller rubber joint had broken. not sure when it happened but a 2nd is a 2nd either way.

next race again we were behind the line and soon caught up again. this time we were ahead of mike.
at the end of lap 2 we caught U.D and then lost it going to boundary. mike caught up as well and off netley we went our own ways . we met on aport starboard but mike covered us instead and then started to luff, i tacked off knowing going on starboard was the best sailing direction. we made good speed ad then by the time we tacked for the pin end of the start line we were way ahead. good job done, and patrick did a good job too. no tack messed up by moving over early, so well please
all richard said after was we were sat to far back, patrick was a tall guy and thatw as the only problem really, needed to be the other side of the shroud most of the time.
both races about 45mins +  course was (boundary) (moorhead) (netley) (club)

race 1

race 2