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Sail-World.com : Try Flying’s 24-hr sailing adventure (thru the eyes of a 15-year-old)
Try Flying’s 24-hr sailing adventure (thru the eyes of a 15-year-old)
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Before the starting line, boats of different types and sizes were racing to find the best possible spot to kick off the One Lap Dash and 24hr race. Hulls only centimetres from colliding and crew members screaming their lungs out at each other seemed to be how some boats were handling the stress of the 5 minute warning signal to the start of the race.
The only thing that stressed me out was whether I had right away or they did. With massive fast boats racing towards me you could imagine why I was asking every minute.
Then over the radio we heard the start signal and every boat tacked and bolted to cross the starting line. Our boat Try Flying was keeping pace in the middle of the fleet while bigger boats such as Two Tribes ripped up to the front.
1st lap was running smoothly with the wind picking up with Windchaser just behind us and of course…I was steering. It was probably the smoothest lap.
2nd lap, wind picking up even more and the boat was rocking like crazy. I sat out on the tramp and I was glad to have my new wet weather jacket although I could have done with some good wet weather pants too. We were half way into our second lap when we had all decided that it was time for a feed.
It was the calmer side of the lake so it was the best time to start cooking some hot spaghetti. But as calming as it sounds we had a bit of a dilemma when our stove caught fire. It was actually pretty hilarious even if it did nearly catch the whole (TIMBER) boat on fire…
But after we successfully and reasonably calmly put the fire out I headed down to the now warm cabin to have some well earned rest…
*Several hours later….*
'What time is it?' I asked.
'Oh nearly four…' Dad replied.
'What!? I went to bed at 9, I’ve been asleep for 7 hours?!'
'Yeah, Phil told me not to wake you up because you looked like you were sleeping really well, so I slept out on the nets.'
'Where’s Windchaser?'
'Um, yeah, they are in front of us now…'
'WHAT!'
So we were once again chasing Windchaser. For the rest of the race I rubbed in the fact that when I was steering and awake we kept the lead on Windchaser and as soon as I went to get some rest, things changed…
'Oh what’s that? They caught up to us when I was sleeping?'
The third lap went quick (partly because I was still in my long slumber) but thankfully I got up in time to see a very cool sunrise.
So we finished our third lap and were racing to see if we could fit in just one more lap before the 24hr race was up. Our goal now was to catch up to Windchaser with me back on the tiller.
With a half hour to go we were definitely gaining, with less distance between us and Windchaser at every turn.
Then we heard something over the radio we were actually dreading….. 'The 2009 HCW 24hr race is now over.'
Disappointingly we didn’t catch Windchaser in time but we did complete three and a half laps of Lake Macquarie and break our goal of more than 100 nm around the course which was a great effort.
By the time we got off the boat in our soaking clothes, everyone’s mind was on a hot shower, a comfy bed, and more hot showers…
As I passed the people from the sailing committee and overheard them telling everyone that they had done a fabulous job, I was thinking …this would be a bad time to ask me to staple more sailing instructions or fold HCW shirts… (editor's note: Meggan spent the Friday afternoon before the race doing just that for the event and her effort was much appreciated by the HCW Committee).
by Meggan Hastings
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http://www.sail-world.com/index.cfm?nid=63035
8:02 AM Thu 5 Nov 2009 GMT
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2011 Heaven Can Wait 24-hour Yacht Race
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