A Family Day on the Rocket

This is the kind of sailing story we love to get as it shows the other side of Rocket sailing when a family can go out and enjoy racing together and even kick some butt at the same time. Well done Jim! Looking forward to getting the pictures.

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Hi Anthony,

Here’s a story for you.

This past weekend our club, the Grapevine Sailing Club, held its annual Mayor’s Cup Regatta which typically brings boats from neighboring lakes to compete, so for our club it is a fairly big event. This year we had a number of sailors from the Fort Worth Boat Club and surrounding area join us for the event. We registered, and were put in Division 1 which would be the fastest handicapped boats (boats with ratings of 105 to 120).

As the weekend approached, I had two sets of crew bail on me for several reasons which left me in somewhat of a bind. As of last Friday, the boat crew remaining was me and one other person. With winds forecast for Saturday in the high 20s to low 30s and cold temperatures that wasn’t going to work. Having exhausted my search for crew, I decided not to race on Saturday so I could attend my kids’ volleyball and baseball games. I also decided that since the forecast for Sunday was for light winds and mild temperatures, we would just race that day with me, Allison, and our two kids, Amanda and Jonathan, on the boat. I figured it would just be for fun and that we would not be competitive against fully crewed boats, but Amanda really wanted to get into a race on the new Rocket.

We went to the lake later on Saturday afternoon to attend the dinner and Saturday night party to find out that all races scheduled for Saturday had been cancelled due to the high winds (mid 30s) and low temps (low 40s). All of a sudden we were in contention for first place!

Sunday morning rolls around, and we get on the water. The winds start out in the low to mid teens, and we sail upwind and down with the asymmetrical with no problems. By race time the wind has dropped down to just under 10. Our crew positions are Allison on jib and spin, Amanda (age 10) on foredeck, Jonathan (age 8) on the sprit and tack lines, and me on helm, main and spin halyard. The course was a three leg windward/leeward. We got upwind nicely, round the windward mark and hoist the asymmetrical. We had a fouled lazy sheet on the spinnaker so I handed the helm to Amanda while I cleared the foul, and she drove most of the downwind leg. At the upwind finish, we are in third place and watch the boat behind us fail to correct over us. We were all excited that we finished that well since it was our first race as a family, and being able to race together was one of the primary reasons for buying the Rocket.

The second race scheduled for Sunday was abandoned because the wind went to essentially zero at the weather mark, time had run out, and the wind shifted about 180 degrees when it filled back in. We were all stoked with our third place trophy, and the kids were on top of the world. We were beat by an Olson 30 and J80, and finished ahead of a Santana 30/30GP and Olson 30.

Now, this was not an important regatta in the sailing world, but it was important for us in that it proved that in light to moderate winds the four of us can take the boat out and race it easily and competitively in our club with the kids having an active role. We found that our primary purchase criteria for this boat had been met. The kids are not relegated to fetching drinks (we get our own now that they are at our feet!), but are actively involved in sailing the boat. We all love the speed, acceleration, responsiveness, and stability of the boat. Sure, we made mistakes Sunday, we were conservative on hoists and drops, and need more time on the boat to smooth things out (this was the first time just the four of us sailed the boat), but we had a blast.

I should be getting a picture of us receiving our pickle dish, and I’ll forward that to you when I get it.

Jim