Racing in the B Class

montauk7

New Member
This fall my wife and I raced our Capri in the 44th Annual Lake Lemon Regatta (11mi. NE of Bloomington, IN). The A class Thistles and Flying Scots from the Bloomington Yacht Club, who put on the regatta, looked way out of our class. We hoped to do better against the Lasers and other smaller boats. Our two year old sails looked nice on our 18 year old boat but the previous owner bought the sails with no hull number so we taped the number 4 on the sail with electrician's tape to simplify record keeping on the committee boat. Having no attaching points for our new whisker pole, we lashed a small ring to the mast and another to the jib clew and practiced using the pole while the A class edged toward their start. :confused: With 35 boats in both classes milling about we paid much more attention to our sailing.
While we got good starts, the Finns from out of town, the Lasers and the newer Force 5s whizzed past us, :mad: leaving us to race against an old, poorly maintained Force 5, a Sunfish and a wooden canoe with a cotton sailing rig. We loved sailing the Capri and we did manage to out run the competition in the bottom of the B class.
For the new racing season we will have a bigger window in the jib and our hull number 1167 on the main sail thanks to the friendly folks at North Sails. Catalina Yachts has yet to respond to my email about getting a whisker pole eye for the mast. Any suggestions on how to install it, just SS machine screws into the aluminum mast? :)
 
Whisker pole

As for the whisker pole fitting (called a whisker pole eye), it's okay to drill into the mast. (Dispensation from the Pope.) Only be sure to coat the screw threads with silicon to make them water-tight. The eye goes 3 feet above the deck. Oh, if you can't get it from Catalina, try checking westmarine.com.
 

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