Been a long time ...

The end of a long dry spell

It's been months since I've been out on a sailboat on a lake. While it hasn't been months since I've posted a blog post, I've posted only one, fairly recently, in nearly a year.

I need to fix both conditions. I got a start this afternoon, sailing with Pat and Zorro on Zorro's boat. Conditions were, for the most part, light, but not so light as to be disappointing. We got in several hours on the water, including some high-quality spinnaker time, and we didn't get back to the marina until well after sunset. It was similar to the experience Zorro and I had a few years back, except with Pat and without the full moon.

We've had other positive developments lately. One is that the big Bayliner we bought earlier this year has now undergone some maintenance and  repairs, and so it should be available for race committee use in the coming year. Also, Pat and I have been getting a lot of training lately, so that we can run races consistent with the Racing Rules of Sailing (including a really informative session with Dick Rose, who was one of the folks making revisions to the rules for the new 2013-2017 rule book). And soon we'll be taking an intensive course that involves both basic powerboat handling and specific ways of operating powerboats in support of sailboat racing. Once we're done with that class, we should really be able to cash in on the potential of the Bayliner.

Also, Pat has been asked to be the race committee chair for the Rio Grande Yacht Club. He's looking forward to being able to bring our training and experience (we've been doing race committee work in Arizona and Colorado) to the RGYC in order to improve the quality of racing at Elephant Butte.

Meanwhile, thanks, Zorro, for so many things. The sail today helped me to remember a whole lot of what is so special about sailing, and especially about sailing with you. And you reminded me about how important this blog used to be. I hope I can bring it back to that level of importance.