When we bought our trysail, as part of the equipment required for doing the Fastnet Race, I suppose it was rather like getting a liferaft: you accept the wisdom of having it there just in case, but you never really expect to have to use it.
Well, we have used ours, in anger, as it were, and we have to report that very good it was too!
We were entered in Friday's RORC night race from Burnham to Ostend. As there are only two East Coast races in the RORC programme this year, we had to complete both of them in order to qualify our boat and crew for the Fastnet.
When planning the season ahead, we had assumed that it would be no problem to deliver the boat to Burnham on the morning of the race, which didn't begin until 1900.
By the law of averages, we could have expected a reasonably relaxing cruise from Levington to the Crouch, especially as the tides were ideal: leave at 0900 to take the last of the ebb down the river, and then carrying the flood all the way to Burnham, arriving in plenty of time to have a late lunch, a little rest, get the boat ready and get to the start line in good time.
But of course this year has been anything but average. And on Friday morning there was a southwesterly gale blowing, albeit forecast to moderate slightly by the time the race started in the evening. The idea of beating to Burnham into the teeth of a gale frankly was not appealing.
But the skipper was adamant that we had to go. We had to do the race to qualify, or our entire summer plans would be in ruins. Furthermore, he pointed out, if we weren't prepared to face a gale, we really ought not to be thinking about doing the Fastnet. He added that it was an excellent opportunity to try out the trysail. And in this he had the enthusiastic support of the racing team.
So the trysail (very small, and very bright orange) was duly rigged, before we left the marina, the mainsail released from the track and lashed securely on to the boom. Getting out of the marina was probably going to be the hardest part, but that was safely accomplished, and once out in the river, with the trysail up and a handkerchief of jib unrolled, we were astonished how well the boat sailed. She was absolutely flying along. And we didn't have to bear the pain of deep reefing and bashing up our nearly new racing main.
True, pointing angle wasn't that great, but with the tide underneath us, that didn't really matter: our speed over the ground was impressive. It wasn't the ideal preparation for an overnight race. It was still quite a bumpy, tiring trip. But it was a huge confidence booster. It was great to see how well the boat performed and to know that, if we do meet evil weather in the Western Approaches, we have what one member of the crew memorably described as a “get out of jail card.”
Going into the Crouch itself in a southwesterly gale is not for the faint-hearted. The entrance is very narrow, with shifting sandbanks on either side, and with the wind blowing as hard as it was, there was white water and spray everywhere and the buoys were hard to spot. It was comforting that half a dozen boats were making the same delivery trip - safety in numbers, as the saying goes.
Also, as we were heading for a RORC race, all the boats had all the safety gear they might need, should the worst happen. One of our number did hit the sand. The tide was still rising, but getting off proved tricky as the wind was pushing the boat further on, and she was bouncing alarmingly on her fin.
We were close to them, but could not get close enough to offer assistance without running the risk of going aground ourselves. We offered to stand by anyway, and immediately received a radio call from Thames Coastguard warning us not to put ourselves into danger. We assured them that was well understood!
The Walton RNLI lifeboat was called, but fortunately our friends eventually managed to motor themselves off before the “cavalry” arrived. Thames Coastguard gave us another call to thank us for our assistance. We had been happy to do what little we could: a case of “There but for the grace of God etc.”
But between the head winds, huge seas, and that additional delay, our supposedly relaxing delivery had become something of a race against time. We arrived in Burnham with just an hour to whip off the trysail, get the boat ready to race, swallow a (very) late lunch and head off back to the start.
Maybe we might have done a little better in the race if we hadn't been tired before we started. But we weren't at all unhappy. In terms of preparation for the Fastnet, that delivery trip had actually been a bonus. We'd all developed huge confidence in the boat and her ability to look after us in “grown up” conditions. And we've learned to love our trysail.
