| A Trying Day, 2011 Chicago Cup | | Print | |
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August 12, 2011 
Photo: (c) Chicago Match Race Center 2011
We
had some mishaps today that cost us a couple of races, but we didn't
sail too badly overall, so we are happy with that. We had a few tight
races during the day which were fun for us. One of them we lost, and
the other we won.
The
first race we lost, was very close with a couple of lead changes
around the course. Our opponents led us off the line and around the top
mark, but we held it close and passed them at the leeward mark. We
were pinning them to the port layline when they pulled a good move on
us and it cost us the lead. They luffed us with two lengths until
layline, but then dropped their jib. We lingered and forgot to think
about where we were on layline. We exited the luff on starboard and
they exited on port. Unfortunately, they was able to make the mark and
rounded ahead of us. We raced hard downwind, but they was able to cross
the line about half a length ahead of us.
Our second close race was the last race of the day. There is great video footage if you go to the event website and watch the last race of the day (around 2:22.00 in the video). We had a penalty off the line, but were able to lead at the top. We tried to draw our opponent into a penalty situation at the top mark, but he did a great job at hanging back and not biting. We set the kite and sailed downwind and rounded the mark ahead and got into a tacking dual upwind. At the top it was crunch time and we had to draw a penalty back on him. We got into some close luffing encounters but no flags were flown as we drifted around the mark. Just after we rounded, he set his kite and we didn't, allowing us to gybe to starboard and luff him. We luffed once and then headed down to give him a chance to drop his kite. He didn't so we luffed again, and then he did drop his kite and it smothered our boat. We flagged them for contact and the umpires agreed, gave him a penalty which cancelled out our penalty so now we could race to the finish. He had kite problems after that so we were able to race to the finish freely and take the point. Tomorrow racing starts again at 9am. You can watch the racing live on the regatta website: http://chicagocup.org/ and also check out the results. We would very much like to thank our Title Sponsor, Maclaren, our Gold Level Sponsors 11th Hour Racing and Laser Performance, and our Bronze Level Sponsors Carmeuse, Trinity Yachts, and Chicago Match Race Center for their continued support of our campaign for the 2012 Olympic Games. We would also like to thank US Sailing Team AlphaGraphics (USSTAG) and its sponsors for their continued support. Also, thank you to our private donors. Please remember that any and all donations/contributions to our campaign should be made payable directly to either The Sailing Foundation of New York (tax deductible) memo'd Anna Tunnicliffe, or to Anna Tunnicliffe. Sail Hard,
Anna
Team Maclaren
And as usual, don't forget, email us your questions and comments. We love getting them and sharing our love of sailing and women's match racing.
Anna: 4D's: "Dream,Desire,Dedication,Discipline"TM
Team Maclaren: 3P's: Passion...Performance...Perfection...TM
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