![\"\"](\"http:\/\/j30.org\/images\/bmt.jpg\" "\\"2007")
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And so, it all comes down to last race.\u00a0 David McConaughy\u2019s White Boat and Bob Putnam and Mary Grealy\u2019s Better Mousetrap are tied for the lead with three other teams, Insatiable, Big Kahuna and Fuzzy Wuzzy within two points.\u00a0 Any of five different boats can win the regatta on the last day.\u00a0 None of the top three boats has yet to score a bullet.\u00a0 No one team has dominated.\u00a0 Everyone has a pocketful of \u201cif only\u2019s\u201d and \u201cwhat if\u2019s\u201d and \u201cwhy did we do that\u2019s?\u201d\u00a0 Who would put together the winning combination of speed and smarts on the last day in the last race with a national championship hanging in the balance?\u00a0 Better Mousetrap wins the start, takes the lead and approaches the windward mark in first place.\u00a0 Can this team of amateurs actually win this final race?\u00a0 Well, it would have made for a great story, but hey, it\u2019s Annapolis and some days you just don\u2019t get the wind to cooperate.\u00a0 As it was, the winds did cooperate for the first two days of the 2007 J 30 North Americans hosted by the Annapolis Yacht Club and provided for some great racing in varying conditions.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Months earlier, I had been asked to sail in my first J 30 NA championship by my dear friends and longtime class stalwarts, Bob Putnam and Mary Grealy.\u00a0 I had sailed with team Mousie in the 2005 NOODs and jumped at the chance to sail with them again.\u00a0 Bob and Mary\u2019s team of Eric, Kathy, Whitney and Todd were a well oiled machine.\u00a0 Bob had the boat perfectly prepped and going fast.\u00a0 My job was to catch a few shifts, play the main and keep us out of trouble.\u00a0 And as the regatta played out, keeping out of trouble was huge.\u00a0 On the first day with the breeze up and a shortish line, there were a number of things flying, including red flags and Russell Dunleavy, the bowman from Smiles.\u00a0 Some of those red flags involved Bill Wallop\u2019s Cannonball with Larry Leonard onboard who a great day on the course but not so much in the room.\u00a0 The wind was consistently inconsistent and tough to figure out as evidenced by the fact that there were nine different boats that placed either first, second or third in the three races sailed.\u00a0 The trick was risk management on the first day and Bengt Johansson\u2019s\u00a0 Fuzzy Wuzzy did the best job at that and took the first day lead by two points over Better Mousetrap.\u00a0 Fuzzy Wuzzy also rescued the flying, swimming crewmember that I mentioned earlier.\u00a0 The swimming crewmember resulted from an unfortunate port\/stbd collision just before the third race that put Smiles out of commission for the day.\u00a0 We scored Russell Dunleavy a 9.5 on degree of difficulty and 9.7 on style as he did a back flip off the bow pulpit and landed in the water between Smiles and Fat City.\u00a0 Smiles had to withdraw before the start and motored back with a gash in the port bow, bent bow pulpit, head stay sheared off and the crew member who \u201cjumped ship\u201d!\u00a0 AYC did a great job with their RC and the dinner and the class did an awesome job with some beautiful awards for daily first, second and thirds.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The second day dawned with a stiff breeze and predictions for it to build.\u00a0 Everyone bundled up, put on their foulies and put up their number threes for the first race.\u00a0Amazingly, Smiles showed up at the starting line ready to race looking like \u201cRudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer\u201d from the red duct tape used to cover the port bow gash.\u00a0 Big Kahuna took an early lead in the big breeze and got the bullet with the White Boat second.\u00a0 The wind dropped substantially for the next race and Cannonball took the win with Kahuna, Ron Anderson\u2019s Insatiable with Jonathan Barlett and the White Boat putting up some low numbers and moving up the standings and looking forward to the sixth race when the throwout would kick in.\u00a0 Seeing that wind was dropping, at the next start we decided to try the America\u2019s cup trick of sending a man up the rig to spot the wind.\u00a0 Well actually we lost a halyard in the previous race but I thought the AC story worked better.\u00a0 Unfortunately, he was having such a good time that he refused to come down, so we had to do the old \u201cman up the rig, no headsail\u201d start.\u00a0 I don\u2019t recommend it.\u00a0 Deckworks found some breeze and a nice shift and cruised to victory with Circus second.\u00a0 After our nonrecommended \u201cman up the rig, no headsail\u201d start, we had closed the fourth and had Cannonball in our sights.\u00a0 Foolishly our tactician, me, called for a slam dunk not realizing that you can\u2019t do it in a J 30 in light air.\u00a0 Well, you CAN do it but it doesn\u2019t work and is not recommended.\u00a0 With the throwout now in play, we got to the dock with no idea of the actual standings but I knew it was going to be close between a bunch of teams.\u00a0 I had no idea it was going to be five teams within two points!<\/p>\n
Again AYC provided a great dinner and again the J 30 class provided some great daily awards.\u00a0 With the standings so close there was some good natured ribbing and some attempts to over serve certain team members in order to gain an advantage for the next day\u2019s racing.\u00a0 If we only would have known that there would be no race the next day, we could have bought ourselves more drinks instead of our competitors!!\u00a0 Nonetheless, it was an extremely close fought and well sailed contest.\u00a0 Congratulations to Team White Boat on their first NA win.\u00a0 Congratulations to Team Mousetrap on their second place and top amateur prize and thanks Bob and Mary for letting me sail with you.\u00a0 Thanks to all the competitors and everyone at AYC.\u00a0 I certainly hope to do some more J 30 events in the future.\u00a0<\/p>\n