It was just another Wednesday Night at the Races. If fact it wasn't even my turn to drive. Since three of us own CaribCat, the now infamous J29 sponsored by CaribCat, the famous WWWeb On Line magazine, we take turns steering . It was Maddog's turn to rip 'em up but since he's quit drinking he's gotten serious and he felt he could better help the cause on the foredeck and leave me on the helm because admittedly I'm the helmsman to beat.
So there we were headed for the start, and it was perfect and
we were out in front
(57k gif) pounding for the weather mark...which,
unfortunately is a big ugly red hard/heavy-metal ocean going sea
buoy. Well it was obvious we were not going to make the mark,
but since we were ahead and these are not supposed to be serious
races towards any kind of championship I thought we test our skill
and "shoot the mark". The idea here is:
We, being good sports, immediately did our 360 for fouling the mark. Except one of the many yachts that were now sailing by informed us that we had only done a 270! After much discussion and further loss of time we determined that in the total interest of fairness we'd do another 360.
We'll, now there was a level playing field. We were two or three
boats behind and did not have our spinnaker set...time to show
the Wednesday night crowd what Team CaribCat is really capable
of! And we did! Got the chute up and we were really gaining on
John Foster's boat. 
(63k gif)maybe
four boat lengths behind at the downwind mark. All we had to do
was round the mark, jibe the spinnaker round another mark, crank
everything in and scream for the finish line...another trophy-case
of Heineken Beers for the crew!
Foster's around the mark, I can't miss ...all I have to do is round the mark then jibe wham, all of a sudden the wicked witch of the north sneezes and we get knocked down....try to recover and broach to the OTHER side!! Then I look up and realize that the mark we were rounding was another buoy...this one marking a rocky shore!! And we are headed for that shore...no brakes, all the sails full (and in all different directions)...bedlam...people running to the front of the boat, people running to the back of the boat...knives flash.."cut the spinnaker sheet!" people in the water...well on land, actually...holding us off the rocks...
Well... we got the spinnaker down, drifted off the rocks and got
'er under control. In fact we set the sails, finished the race,
and came in 5th....and we got the Capt. Crunch award! 
(102k gif)
Wednesday Night at the Races is club racing at it's best. The whole idea is to get top racing sailors involved with cruising class boats and racing-wannabes. This is accomplished with a rating system that moves each week's winners down in the ratings...giving the other guys a crack at the top spot. The Capt. Crunch award gave us that advantage this week. No that's not to take away from our racing skills, especially since steering this week was by Shep Barrows co owner of CaribCat. Shep's really the best sailor we have on board - he did a lot of time in dinghies as a youngster. Although we got beat at the start we were out in front by the first mark and no boat passed us during the entire race...but it's not match racing so you always have to sweat corrected time, especially with the rating system used for this series. We thought we might have a third but when the awards were announced we did not hear our name till the end and that means a first! Trophy... a case a beer which we'll put to good use next Wednesday Night at the Races. The award ceremony is held at Barnacle Bills a legendary St. Thomas water hole that features Pizza. Here's our crew chowing down.
(41k gif) Left to right Foredeck: Brendan "Maddog"
McLaughlin, Jennifer Amerling, ( rail meat), Justin Tyrrell (sheet
tender and tactician in training), Ryan Nichols, (Rail), Dave Nichols (Ryan's
dad and Mastman), Lynda (Capt. Crunches' wife), Eddie & Barbara
O'Brian (Mother ship), Rosie Nichols (Ryan's mother and foreguy and
down haul), Janelle Ramsey( Guy), Roma (groupie), and this week's
winning skipper Shep Barrows. Yours truly was taking the picture!