Day 2 was a carbon copy of Day 1, and good times were had by all onboard the J/111 Kontiki. We’ve made it a pre-race tradition to have a pre-race beer before the first race of the day, and it seems to help calm the nerves and cure the Key West hangover.
Today our team did not fair as well as yesterday. We finished the day with a 3-2, not too bad, but we have high expectations. The first race was, again, all about finding the breeze. Our team was heads out of the boat the entire race, which got us around the track as fast we could possibly go. The thing with sailing PHRF is you have to focus on your own boat and sail your own race. The other boats in your class are either faster or slower, so it’s not a reliable reference to use your fleet as a indicator. The second beat, we began focusing on another boat in our fleet, and we sailed ourselves into a zone of lighter breeze, which caused us to lose valuable time on the leader. Taking a third place was very respectable, though.
Our second race, we positioned ourselves to start on top of our main competition, the J/109 Rush. As soon as they tacked, we followed suit, tacking on them and forcing them out to the unfavored side of the course. This was a huge move for us, as we go into tomorrow only 1 point behind Rush. The second race was very fun. We had the two faster boats in front of us forcing us to sail hard the entire race, and I think we sailed the J/111 as fast as we could to get that second place.
We’re now in second place, one point behind Rush with three days of racing left. The J/111 is a fun boat, and the team is having a great time sailing it. Tomorrow’s forecast looks very light, as a high pressure system moves closer to the Keys. The PRO is already talking about an onshore AP. We shall see.
