VISA JV/Team 2 regatta hosted by Peninsula Catholic at NYCC

 We were given one berth with Ben and Sebastian sailing the first two races (finishing 13th and 17th) and with Hunter and Noah sailing the 3rd and 4th races (finishing 10th in the 3rd but capsizing shortly after the start of the 4th race earning a DNF.) During the 4th race the breeze built with gusts around 25 and racing was cancelled. As the front came through the wind gusted to around 35. It was good we cancelled when we did!

Here is the report as written by the host school:Saturday, October 7:

VISA welcomed a combined group of Varsity Team 2 and JV sailors composed of 18 teams from 12 schools to the Lafayette river for single division competition. Seas were a light chop. Drizzle moved in mid morning and persisted for the rest of the event. The morning started with westerly winds of 5-8mph and gusts slightly higher and clocked north building to a short period 17 mph wind with at 11:00 with a gust at 25mph at which point a third of the fleet was upside down, and the racing was called for the day.

Four W-4 races were accomplished. Hampton Roads Academy Team 1 captured first place, followed by Christchurch Team 1 in second and Christchurch Team 2 in third place.

We extend thanks to the race committee and cast of volunteers that made this event possible, with a special thanks to Joe Bousquet for serving as PRO.

Below is the score summary followed by the race by race breakdown.

VISA regatta at YSV hosted by Kecoughtan

 We participated in a varsity regatta on Mill Creek at Fort Monroe. Here is the report by the host school:

Saturday, September 30:

VISA welcomed 18 teams from 13 schools to Mill Creek for today’s races. Temperatures were a bit brisk in the mid sixties with overcast skies dosing a damp mist when it wasn't outright raining. Seas were relatively flat. Winds came from the North with speeds between 8 and 14 mph and gusts between 18 and 20 mph. Mild oscillations occurred during the second part of the day.

First warning was 9:45am. Sailors completed 8 W-4 races in each of two divisions with racing concluded by 2:45pm. Norfolk Academy finished in first place, followed by Hampton Roads Academy in second place, and Norfolk Collegiate taking third place.

Many thanks to the volunteers and race committee for a day of solid racing. Special thanks to PRO Alan Mason.

The score summary:

The race-by-race breakdown. Note the Division and race number is at the top.

Regatta at NYCC

 

Our first regatta of the year ended up being a non-event. We attending the varsity regatta at Norfolk Yacht and Country Club (NYCC) on Saturday the ninth on a hot and humid morning with teams from Christchurch, Norfolk Academy, hampton Roads Academy, Norfolk Collegiate, Maury, The Hauge School, Grafton, Poquoson, Kecoughtan, Heritage, and Peninsula Catholic. The high school sailing rules require at least three races in each division to qualify as a scoring event. With the light breezes before the thunderstorm we only managed 3 A division races and 2 B divisions.   

Since this was the first regatta of the year (and the first regatta for most of the team) the results were disappointing. Ben finished with scores of 18, 16, anf 19 and Hunter finished with scores of 19 and 20.

I was able to record some of the starts. Here is Ben in boat #1 (near the RC boat) with about 20 seconds to go. Not a bad start but was forced over to the other tack and had trouble regaining boat speed.

Here is Hunter in boat #3 well below the line. Note the team in #1 from Poquoson deliberately slowed and managed a slightly late start right at the RC boat but got off the line ahead of many of the others.

Leeward Mark round practice

 We practiced rounding the leeward gate marks. The key is to exit the gate going upwind close to the mark. Swinging wide is to be avoided because trailing boats can sail in the gap between you and the mark and pass you. 

In the first video you see how giving a trailing boat a gap will cause you to be passed.

 1st video of flying scots

In the second video you see a opti dinghy rounding with the basic idea of "enter wide, exit tight." This doesn't give any trailing boat a gap to pass you.

Optimist rounding

The next two videos show Lasers in a leeward mark rounding. Again: approach wide, exit tight.

Laser video 1               Laser video 2                 

Lastly, here are the videos I shot:

         

Fall 2023 regatta scheduled posted

 See the sidebar for the regatta dates and venues. The Classic Moth regatta is for skippers only and is optional.

First practice of the year

 Five team members sailed at the naval station sailing center in moderate breezes. Skippers were Ben and Hunter. Switching off in the crew position were Sebastian, Brandon, and Noah.

https://youtube.com/shorts/TedGUuLUjLY

https://youtube.com/shorts/AZVbLlDcMxg

JV Champs October 29th

 Pretty breezy. The two crews decided to only use one boat, swapping off every other race. Results below.

The bottom six boats in the results are those that did not sail, so we effectively as a school finished 6 out of 10.  Here is the running total calculation:

Awaiting pictures of the team.

Grafton regatta at YSV

 Our first competition at Youth Sailing Virginia at Fort Monroe saw light and shifty winds as we struggled in every race. The results:

and the running totals:

Regatta on October 8th

 

Is this sailing or swimming? Yep, a little breezy at times with boats turtling and folks falling out of their boats. We sailed conservatively and stayed upright the entire day.

Abbie and Kelly working to windward.

Abbie and Kelly trying to chase down Hunter and Sebastian

Hunter and Sebastian

Finishes here:

Hunter and Sebastian

Abbie and Kelly

Final scores

 

 

Light air regatta on 9/24

Waiting for wind

 The scores:

And the running totals of the three races completed...

A light-air practice session

     We worked on weather mark roundings, picking the lay-line, and choices/roundings at the leeward gate marks. Most of the time the wind was in the 5 kt range.

First regatta of the season

We participated in the first regatta of the season on Saturday September 10th at Norfolk Yacht and Country Club. Not only was it the first regatta of the season for the team, it was the first regatta for all of our sailors.

Here is the report form the race committee:

    Saturday, September 10:

     Today was partly sunny with a light breeze in the AM of 12 to 15 MPH from the east. The wind built from there and was consistent from the east. A total of 13 boats began the regatta, representing        seven (7) schools. A total of ten races were completed. The top three (3) finishers were: York #1; Norfolk Academy #2; and Bruton.

      I think we never had breeze over 12. There was enough breeze to cause boat handling problems. There were a number of capsizes during the day, including two by our teams, resulting in scores of DNF (Did Not Finish). The final placings are here:

Note we tied on points (102) with one of the Norfolk Academy boats, but lost the tiebreaker because their best finish was higher than our best finish (they had a 3rd in race 2 nad our best finish was an 8th.)  So, overall we finished 10th out of 13. The running totals are below:

Overall I was pleased. We learn a lot about racing. Highlights include race #7 where Hunter and Kelly rounded the weather mark in second place due to a good start and a well-sailed beat. Here is a snippet of a video of Hunter and Kelly wounding the weather mark. I'll try to get more pics and vids the next time out.

2022 Regatta schedule posted

 See the sidebar to the right. The venues this year are Norfolk Yacht and Country Club (NYCC) off Hampton Blvd in Norfolk and Youth Sailing of Virginia (YSV) in Mill Creek off Fort Monroe in Hampton.

The Moth Nationals in Elizabeth City are optional. Coach Bousquet will make available a boat to those who want to sail.

2021 Fall Season updates

 We expect to be back on the water this coming fall! Tryouts will be dependent on the date that we can get back on the Naval Base (expect mid-August.)

Before then, get as much water time in that you can. We'll be using the school's 420s but any small boat will be good to polish/build skills. 

If you have the means to store and launch a small boat I have a few classic moths available that you can have to use over the summer.  Contact me at bousquej@chsvb.org

This post:  https://crusadersailing.blogspot.com/2019/09/moth-nationals.html has some of our folks in action at a regatta a couple of years ago.

Coach Bousquet

 

Team race championships

We competed in the VISA team race championships at NYCC on Saturday 12 October 2019. Participating were Abbie and Maria in one boat and Chase and Frances in a second boat. Below is the regatta report by the organizers.

   Fifteen teams from 11 schools arrived on the Lafayette River for the season Championship Team race regatta to find unusually high tides covering the entire lower parking lot at NYCC and a good portion of the fixed docks. Some cloud cover gave way to partly cloudy skies and a high temperature of 75 degrees. Seas were flat. Light winds NNW at 3-6 mph with gusts higher and some oscillations shifting slightly north before dying at 3:00PM when racing was abandoned.

   Sailors completed 2 round robins on two digital N courses. Teams were initially seeded into three groups on the two separate courses, with Group 1 on course 1, and groups 2 and 3 on course 2. After the initial rounds were completed teams were re-seeded into 4 groups with teams moving up or down based on the initial round results. Lack of wind precluded a third round with more movement.

   Final rankings are based on Round 2. Christchurch School Team 1 took first place, followed by Norfolk Collegiate School Team 1 in second, and Norfolk Academy Team 1 in third place.

    We are very grateful to all of the volunteers that made this event possible, especially Levi Thomson and David Chase who served as PRO's on the two different courses.

Again we struggled in the light air, but Abbie and Chase found getting on-time starts to be much easier with the small size fleet (we raced 2 v. 2 since we couldn't muster a third skipper.) At the end of the day, we finished with 2 wins and 4 losses to place 12th of the 16 teams. Below are the scores of the teams on course 2 (the lower seeded teams.)

Regatta report 28 September

On the 28th of September we sailing in a regatta at Fort Monroe, hosted by the Youth Sailing of Virginia. Here is the regatta report from the organizers:

    Eighteen teams from 14 schools gathered on Fort Monroe to compete on Mill Creek. Morning overcast skies gave way to blazing sunlight combined with little breeze and temperatures in the mid 80's, making for a long hot stiff, but fun, day on the water. Morning breezes were ENE 3-7 mph with gusts to 10 mph, slowing considerably to NE 2-3 when racing was abandoned.

    Two divisions each completed 4 W-4 races followed by 2 W-2 races. Races averaged 20 minutes long. A seventh A division race was sailed and scored, but had to be thrown out because a seventh B race was unable to be completed.

    Norfolk Academy Team 1 took first place. Behind by only one point, in second place was Norfolk Collegiate School Team 1, followed by Poquoson High School Team 1 in third place.

    Many thanks to Alan Bomar for serving as PRO, and not leaving anything on the water.

Our finishes are below. We struggled in the light air, finishing tied with Granby on points but beating them by finishing ahead of them in seven of the twelve races completed.

Moth Nationals

On Saturday and Sunday the classic moth national championships were held in Elizabeth City, NC. Abbie and Sev attended Saturday and Chase sailed both Saturday and Sunday. There were 23 boats in the fleet broken out as vintage, generation 1, and generation 2 boats. Of the 23 competitors, seven were "juniors" (under 18). The oldest competitor was 75 years old (coach Bousquet was only 64.)

Some shots of our Crusaders, first heading out to the start area:

And then some taken during the race:

The breeze was shifty and puffy giving challenging conditions.

Winning the championship was Mike Parsons from Philadelphia with finishes of 1-(3)-1-1-1-2-2 = 8. Coach Bousquet finished in 2nd place with 2-1-2-2-(4)-1-1 = 9.  Both Mike and Coach sailed the Mistral design, the fastest in the Generation 2 fleet.

The scores for Chase, Sev and Abbie were
Chase: 15-(19)-17-19-16-15-15 = 97 for an 8th place in the Generation 1 fleet
Sev: 20-15-18-11-(DNS)-DNS-DNS = 112  for a 5th place finish in the Generation 2 fleet
Abbie: 16-21-19-21-(DNS)-DNS-DNS = 125 for a 12th place in the Generation 1 fleet

More pictures and video are posted on the Classic Moth Boat Association: FB page

The regatta was written up in Monday's The Daily Advance (the Elizabeth City newspaper): http://www.dailyadvance.com/Sports/2019/09/23/Family-ties-throughout-Moth-Boat-Nationals.html

Team race at NYCC

On Thursday 19 September we went to NYCC for a team race event. We had a reduced contingent (only 4 sailors) so couldn't field a third boat. The was an extra NC sailor so Coach Bousquet and Jake (from NC) jumped in a boat to join Chase and Jean-Santiago and Sev and Jack out on the water. We first simply sailed around the digital N course (shown below).

After a course orientation, we did sail two non-scoring races against three boats from NC. Our skippers Sev and Chase learned a lot and we're looking forward to the next team race at NYCC next week.

Re-posting old links

Please review these:

 https://crusadersailing.blogspot.com/2016/09/w-4-explained.html

https://crusadersailing.blogspot.com/2016/09/sailing-rules-discussion.html

Regatta report

On Saturday September 14 we competed at NYCC in the first VISA varsity regatta of the season. We entered one varsity A/B team with Josh and Chase skippering and one boat in the JV division with Abbie and Sev alternating as skipper. 

Here is a description of the conditions on the varsity and JV courses from the event organizers:  

A beautiful day on the Lafayette river welcomed sailors to the first regatta of the season today. Winds were NE 4 to 10 with gusts higher with some oscillation serving a challenging calm to the course at times. Seas were flat with beautiful skies. The high school regatta season was kicked off with 23 varsity teams from 14 schools. On the JV course we had 18 teams from 9 schools in a single division.

We accomplished five W-4 races in each of two divisions on the varsity course. Races averaged 15 minutes. Congratulations to Norfolk Collegiate School Team 1 for capturing first place followed by Norfolk Academy Team 1 in second and Christchurch School Team 1 in third place.

JV alternated between W-4 and W-3 courses. Ten single division races were accomplished. First Place went to Nansemond-Suffolk Academy, followed by Norfolk Academy Team 1 in second place and Norfolk Academy Team 3 in third place.

Our varsity results are below. The highlighted line shows each finish position, the cumulative points accrued and the relative placing in the fleet. The race sequence scored was A division races 1 and 2, then B division races 1 and 2, then A division races 3 and 4, then B division races 3 and 4 and lastly A division race 5 and B division race 5. At the end of the day we finished ahead of a team from Poquoson (on a head-to-head tiebreaker), York, Walsingham, and two teams from Christchurch.

Here are the JV results:

Skippers Abbie and Sev learned a lot and are looking forward to racing again.