12:00, Tuesday 12th November 2024, Alimos Marina N.C.Kalamaki, Greece.
Starting from Faliro Bay and marking a figure eight 35-mile course around rocky little islands in the Saronic Gulf is the classic menu of Race 2 for Winter Series organized by Yacht Club Creece. A bit chilly northeasterly of 14-20 knots and mostly sunny skies on Sunday greeted the competing teams and a powerful downwind start was demanding for tacticians to fight for room to hoist and hold a clear downwind lane. Team OPTIMUM-Samos Steamship nailed the start and led the fleet towards the first island. However, following a tangled halyard issue and other unforced crew work errors, we lost our composure and scored 6th in Race 2, same as in Race 1 a week ago.
“The windy warm up training session on Saturday wasn’t very successful either but did alert the crew on the pressure it would face in the race on Sunday. As such, we managed to position and time our start better than the two TP52s, start clear ahead of them and hold the lead, and then trail them tight. We were expecting to get headed and we were ready to switch from Spinnaker to Code 0, a move that would surely put us back in the lead since the TP52s have no Code sails for reaching. But a tangled halyard not only delayed the move and threw away the advantage, but we had to go for a slow drop and rehoist instead of a fast peel. The crisis and the lost distance demoralized us all, and the afterguard had no option but play safe on the moves from then on, so no more downtime reoccur. It is not the first that we are unable to execute crew work as we should, and it cost us dearly in many ways”, shares headsail trimmer and Quantum sails designer Patroklos Tachtatzis, Team OPTIMUM member since 2012.
The debriefing that followed at the dock back in our berth in N.C.Kalamaki was far from happy hour, so the crew of the day consisting of Fanis Dalezios, Theodore Papakyriakou, Mily Tirla, Patroklos Tachtatzis, Nikos Apostolakis, Nikos Kountouriotis, Manolis Markogiannakis, Vaggelis Nikolopoulos, Lambros Nakis, Periklis Hoegger-Anemogiannis, Periklis Livas, Nikos Lazos and new comer and tryout Vasilis Kritidis returned home knowing that more work and concentration is needed to raise our game and be able to win races.
Two more race weekends follow, with a training session on Saturdays and round the cans racing on Sundays.
Never give up!