Evening Beer Can Racing’s School of Hard Knox Lesson on Collision
A gorgeous sailing weekend started with a breezy but sunny, warm Friday night race. The Corinthian YC Friday evening races are held on the Knox course area to the West of Angel Island. The Knox buoy is a common feature of the course and often a source of continuing education for adults. Paolo Juvara posted this video of a (thankfully mild) collision as some of the J/105 fleet rounded the Knox buoy.
We are big proponents of signing up for evening beer can racing since it’s a “relaxing” way to get together with friends to spend an evening on the Bay. It’s also a great way to sharpen your sailing skills. However, we know it’s incidents like these that turn people off from racing. Still, the benefit of signing up is that it gets you out sailing more often, and you can avoid situations like these by remembering Rob Moore’s Beer Can Ten Commandments and staying away from tight quarters.
Sometimes staying away from tight quarters is more easily said than done. We proved that again in a rounding at the Easom buoy when Richard Garman and his crew aboard his J/124 Good Call were approaching the buoy on starboard and we tacked onto starboard on their lee bow. That was a poor choice. We should have passed astern and tacked for a smooth rounding. Unfortunately, we misjudged: The current was setting us onto the mark and we had to luff up to try to make it around. When we luffed up, our jib backed and spun us back onto port, right in front of Good Call. Yikes! Luckily for us they’re good sailors and were prepared for our screwup. They tacked away quickly, avoiding a collision by inches. It was another lesson learned. Or should we say “learned again?”
Despite the occasional avoidable drama, summer evening sailing on San Francisco Bay is one of the best reasons to live in the Bay Area. So are midwinters. This past Friday evening on the Bay was its usual stunning self with plenty of breeze to keep us entertained. We were warned that there were three whales on the course, though they thankfully stayed out of the way. Racers should heed the wisdom of the whales.
This coming weekend is the summer solstice and Summer Sailstice weekend. The sun will be out for its longest day, making this week one of the best to spend an evening or more on the Bay. You don’t have to sign up for beer can racing to go sailing in the evening, but those doing so are typically the only boats we see out there. Adding your upcoming solstice weekend sailing plans to the Summer Sailstice map is another way you can commit to using your boat and joining the world sailing as the summer sailing season kicks off.
Sign up for something and sail more!