Sailing in Chile

Joc and I have have landed in La Serena, Chile so I can sail with Eduardo S. Ramos on his brand new Soto 40, Fenix. This is the first time the boat sailed with the same basic crew that sailed with last year. We have had two races so far. A 21 mile light air affair down the coast to Tongoy. We had a good start only to be passed by 4 boats in a 8 boat fleet. As we worked out way upwind the wind died and it was time to rock hop around the corner. We were able to get by the others at the turn by staying very close. The distance opened up as we went on to the finish. The picture above is from Matias Capizzano. He has taken many great shots over the last two days of racing. Check out his website on the right to look at more shots of the race and other regattas he covered. Celfin Capital sailed a very good race to take second.

The second race back started with a twice around windward leeward then back to home base. We had another good start to lead around the 4 marks. Then it was a jib reach in 7 knots of wind lifting to a run as the wind came up to a max of 18 knots. It is a lot like sailing in California. Good size swells that run pretty fast. As the wind built it was first stronger in shore but on the way back it built off shore. We had a good plan not to be either furthest off shore or closest. Santander was second and tried to take the inside lane. They slowed and ended 5th. We opened a good lead on the outside boats but the wind lifted a bit more than I thought it would and when they came back we lead only by about 10 lengths. As we gybed in toward the finish everything was fine until we ran over a big patch of kelp about 4 miles from the finish. We were lucky to hold on to second, loosing by about 20 seconds to Mitsubishi. So after 2 we have a 1,2 and Mtsubishi is in second with a 3,1. Tomorrow we have 2 up and downs. Fun racing looking forward to more, this is much better that winter in Annapolis....