Report from Blue Jade, X362 Classic, Class 4
Aden collecting the prize - pic from
JOGWe love this race although we always feel a touch guilty at only doing one JOG Race a season. We positioned the boat to Cowes from Guernsey on Thursday leaving at sparrow cough and enjoying a brisk ride across the Channel surfing at 13.8 knots bringing a smile to the Skippers face as he took back the boat speed record from Chilli who sadly witnessed three years of one-upmanship come to an end. Shephards Wharf provided their usual warm welcome and excellent facilities; nice to meet smiling and cheerful marina staff. The traditional Blue Jade pre race lunch at the Island Sailing Club with the crew of Moojo another Guernsey boat was followed by a few boat jobs
Having experienced the wind getting up on Thursday (35 knots at the Bridge Buoy is no fun – even from behind) we spent Friday anxiously checking the weather forecast and I have to say were relieved by the sensible decision of JOG to postpone the race to Saturday morning. Unfortunately the delay cost us a crew member as Ron had to get to Birmingham for Saturday evening for a steam train outing – don’t ask; it’s too complicated to explain. Of the rest of the crew; Aden and Chilli are old hands at the Race (well – just old really), Fingers had last done this race 14 years ago and had been tempted out of retirement, Spike was fresh and gung-ho from this year’s Fastnet, Young Charlie just loves sailing anywhere, anytime and Mike saw it as a convenient (and cheap) way to get home from Southampton – typical student.
On Friday morning we had a good start and stayed Island side only crossing as we passed Yarmouth for the run to Bridge Buoy. We had gone for our new No 1 which we have had a few issues with as we don’t seem able to hold it as long as our much loved old one. However, while undoubtedly overpowered we bore off a tad and could see we were doing well against the rest of our class. We actually ended up holding the No 1 to the finish.
We had an uneventful run to the Casquests and despite being lower than our opposition were able to take the forecast tide offered there to get round without tacking. We had expected big seas at the Casquets given the weather but were pleasantly surprised at how benign it was. Onto our home turf now and we fairly flew down the Little Russel to the finish. A slight panic near the end as the wind dropped then filled. We headed up to our usual race finish line between the Castle and the GYC distance buoy and lost time to other boats that finished ‘up to 3 cables’ from the Castle as per the race instructions. (Longest finish line I have ever seen – especially in the dark! Ah well RTFI as they say.) I would add a big well done to JOG finish line crew for clearly announcing the finish procedure.
The Vin d’Honneur was excellent and the Castle proved, once again, to be a superb venue at reasonable rates (a shameless plug for more business from Chilli here) and Blenheim a great sponsor with excellent prizes.
We were delighted to win our class, to be the first Channel Island Boat and to have the best time overall. Thanks to Peter and JOG for a great race and see you all next year.
Postscript – Sadly Fingers has announced his retirement (again).
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Here's Chilly Snr looking deliberately nonchalant whilst flying the spinnaker, to impress the sailors..jpg)
And here is the ship itself, Guernsey is its 'affiliated port' so it shows up here a fair bit. Call me old fashioned but I prefer my destroyers to be a bit more impressive: it only has one piddly little gun, looks like it is made out of tonka toy boats and has a silly bobble hat on. Ridiculous.
