Practice Makes Perfect

A bunch of the Sunfish sailors wanted to get together and have a practice race before Christmas. Being the Sunfish Fleet Captain, Dave came up with the Holiday Warm-Up Regatta. To add a little spice to the race, he decided to make it a LeMans start from the Nathan's Bay Beach on the Sea of Abaco. This means that the Sunfish all line up on the beach with their sails down, and the sailors have to run down to their boats at the starting signal, hoist the sail, and push the boat out into deep water, in order to start the course. This worked well since we had no race committee boat, and it was really fun to watch.

Ready to run!

Our starting signal was this super loud cannon!

Time to hoist the sails and push the boats out into the breeze.

Off they go.

 

The sailors varied in age from a couple of spry 70 year olds to an 11 year old junior sailor (who came in 4th!). This made us wonder if we should rename the event  "Are You Faster Than A 6th Grader?"

At the finish, the racers had to beach their Sunfish and run back up to the starting line, with lots of cheering and encouragement as each competitor arrived. Dave did really well and came in second out of eight boats, which proves that practice makes perfect...well, almost!