A Little Bit Better...

Two more races were sailed today on the third day of the Miami OCR.  I was in blue fleet today and started first, sailing the outer trapezoid course.

After a few general recalls and postponements, our first race started at about 11:30.  I had a great start near the boat and played a few shifts up the middle right.  I did a good job of connecting the puffs and eventually consolidated across the fleet in first place.  I rounded the windward mark in first with Jesper (SWE), Andreas (AUT), and Tonci (CRO) right behind.  Those guys closed a little on the first reach and downwind, but I was able to pull ahead at the leeward mark and escape from the crowded mark rounding well.  On the second beat I maintained a comfortable 5-10 boat length lead and rounded the last windward mark in first.  On the downwind, Andy, Jesper, and Tonci went lower than I did and got some nice pressure to close the gap.  The four of us were duking it out with someone pulling ahead a little and then the others catching up.  Right at the mark, Andy pulled ahead last to round first.  Tonci just got an overlap on me to round second.  I rounded third and reached into the finish for a third place finish.  While I would have liked to have won the race, I was pleased with my decision making and speed, and the race was a keeper.

In the second race, I had another good start at the boat and tacked quickly to the right.  A lot of people tacked to port shortly after the start and the guys at the pin were looking quite good.  As we all sailed to the right, the fleet caved a little, and I thought that I was looking ok.  But at the top the breeze went left again, and I struggled to get back, rounding in 25th.  I rallied a little on the first downwind and caught up to the 12-18 pack.  I battled with those guys for the rest of the race, ultimately finishing in 16th.

Overall it was a better day, but still not as good as I'd like.  It was very tricky sailing again today:  very difficult to see the pressure and pretty shifty.  Tomorrow is the first day of Gold fleet so hopefully with a few good scores I can make some ground up on the fleet.

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