BRUCE HEPBURN “SHENANIGANS”
SANLAM ROUND THE ISLAND RACE JAN/FEB 2009
BRUCE HEPBURN “SHENANIGANS”
The 51st Round the Island Race on Vaal Dam, the biggest inland yacht race in the world, was enjoyable this year because for the first time that I have sailed this race, the wind blew all day, and generally from the same direction.
On Saturday evening, after a braai and a hot shower at Pennant Nine Yacht Club, we went on board our Holiday 23 Shenanigans for the night. My crew of six had dwindled to just two, which made for plenty of space on board.
I was up at 04h30 and at that time of the day it was pitch black outside with a light drizzle falling and mist surrounding the boats and making it even blacker. I went about preparing the boat for leaving while my wife slumbered on in her warm sleeping bag…
There was activity too on board Doug’s Stadt 34 Sea Quill and Rob’s Atlantis 36 Fairwind. Other boats from PNYC had left the day before.
At 05h00 the drizzle had stopped and we left the mooring a few hundred metres behind Sea Quill and motored off for the 20km trip to LDYC. After being 15 minutes late across the start line for the Single-handed Round the Island Race last month I was determined not to give myself the same handicap again, though that tardiness was caused by a big thunderstorm on the start line and survival conditions. By the time we were at the Confluence, my crew finally roused herself and made me some welcome hot coffee. By now the mist was gone, but it was still cool and overcast. We rounded the south end of the Island and turned for LDYC with the GPS saying that we had 90 minutes in hand, so I cut the motor down to a fast idle and we gently motored towards the start with boats appearing from all sides and heading southwest for the start.
We had plenty of time to get the sails rigged and check out the start line, which was going to be exceptionally busy with over 300 boats on it in the second fleet start for keelboats.
We made a good start on time and on starboard tack. Port was a better option, but not when faced with 299+ starboard boats bearing down on you! Soon after starting we had to change tack onto port anyway as we got closer to the shore and now had to frequently duck behind starboard boats, but eventually we got away and were able to get clear air.
The low clouds were now gone and it was turning into a nice sunny Highveld summer’s day with a good breeze from the north. We made a long tack to the east while most of the fleet went west. We were being overpowered and having to spill wind so I opted for the slightly calmer conditions.
We were beating up to the island at 6 knots which is almost hull speed for a Holiday 23 and we appeared to be roughly in the middle of the fleet as we rounded the lee mark and started up the back of the island.
We were still beating into the wind, but the narrow channel of 1000m between the island and the mainland means that it gets very busy with all of the boats tacking their way to windward.
Last year I had owned my boat for just a week when we did the race, and I was handed a hiding up the back of the island when my boat refused to point anywhere near optimum. A year of experience and a change of sails had worked wonders. We targeted and picked off four other H23s on that leg, and sailed past many big boats too.
Once around the weather mark north of the island we could see that we were onto a dead run for home. Ahead of us in a long line astern were a hundred multi-coloured spinnakers. What a sight! No wonder we had planes and helicopters flying low overhead!
I was dead keen to fly our kite but had no matching enthusiasm from my crew. I told her to take the helm and explained that all she had to do was keep pointing the boat at the back of all the others up ahead. Eventually she reluctantly agreed. I was glad because there was another H23 a few hundred metres ahead and we needed to get him.
I pulled down the Genoa and rigged the bag and it flew up and flapped around while I ran back to the cockpit and hauled in the guys and the sheet. The big colourful kite filled with a bang and the boat surged forwards. This was more like it! Up ahead there was now frantic activity on the other H23 as they started trying to get their spinnaker up too. I don’t know what their difficulties were, but we surged abreast of them under full power and then away ahead and they never recovered the distance lost.
As we came level with the wall, the wind shifted abeam and I had to trim in the kite for reaching. The wind then gusted hard and the boat began rolling heavily. This would be an easy situation to cope with if I had big, experienced crew on board, but in the interests of safety I doused the bag and hoisted the Genoa again. At the very moment that this sail change was completed, the wind veered aft again and we were back on the run. Ah, those Wind Gods! We only had a short distance left and no other class boats in sight, so I opted for playing it safe and we ran down to the line, finishing an hour faster than last year’s time.
We had an average result. We were 171st out of 376 finishers overall, and 11th in class out of 23. At least this time we had halved our class winner’s lead from an hour to 30 minutes. We were just five minutes behind the Atlantis 36 and 14 min behind the Stadt 34 after three hours of racing.
We didn’t hang around the finish line because we had to sail all the way back to PNYC and arrived back at the mooring in the late afternoon after a highly enjoyable day’s racing and a 70km round trip. Pity we now have to wait another whole year to do it again!
