By John Rousmaniere
See also: posts from competitors on the course.
The
Newport Bermuda Race fleet made their upwind starts in 16 classes over
a period of more than two and a half hours on Friday afternoon. There
now are 183 boats, after Avatar didn’t start. In addition,
Blue sailed back to the shipyard to get her broken centerboard cable
fixed; she’s expected to start again after the repair.
The
start found some skippers were surprisingly aggressive. Apparently
forgetting that this isn’t a day race but a 635-mile marathon running
several days, they also seem to have experienced a touch of amnesia
about the tide table. As the new ebb tide ran with every great
velocity out of Narragansett Bay, it pushed them inexorably toward
Bermuda,
but also over the starting line a little earlier than their tacticians
had planned.
Of
the 13 boats in Class 4 (St. David’s Light Division, 45-55 footers),
four found themselves over early at the pin end, with Star Chaser
getting what one of her crew called “the best start in the fleet”
in an email to media@BermudaRace.com. “We were at the committee boat
end of the line with some of the J-Boats but higher and faster. We all
chose to be slightly late on the gun: no use being OCS on a race
of 635 nm!”
In
Class 8 (St. David’s Light, 65-footers) two boats were premature.
One was Aurora (with Gary Jobson in the afterguard), and she
had to pick her way back to the line, losing at least three minutes
in the process.
Aurora returning to the start after being called over early
As
the moderate southwest sea breeze gradually clocked to the right and
west, the right-hand end became increasingly attractive, and not only
because so many boats insisted on taking a chance at the pin end.
By the end of the start sequence, the New York Yacht Club Race Committee
and the rest of us who were lucky enough to be on the committee boat
(the very elegant 125-foot ketch Axia) had an intimate closeup
view of the action. By then the boats at that end were fetching Bermuda.
Since the Onion Patch was still nearly 635 miles ahead, nobody in her or his right
mind would expect that that this happy situation would be permanent.