The Jim DePue Memorial is the first race of the seven race West Sound Sailing
Association (WSSA) series. It is a 16.5NM race run in the waters of Puget Sound,
starting at Point Monroe and sponsored by Port Madison yacht club. All week
before the race, the predicted wind were reported to be light. Furthermore, as the weekend drew near, the weather forecast started predicting a chance of snow. The prediction
was pretty close as we saw winds up to 5-6 knots for a while after the start with overcast skies and a light soaking rain that lasted throughout the day.
The winds at the start was blowing out of the north. We got a good start in the middle of the line on starboard. It was not long before we tacked to port and our heading was straight toward the weather mark. Three quarters of the way to the first mark, the wind shifted suddenly to the NE. We tacked and by now had overstood the mark a little bit and two boats rounded just ahead of us.
After rounding the mark, we sailed for a while close reaching with the jib. The wind lifted and we were finally able to set the spinnaker. We talked about heading high to get across the sound before the ebb current started flowing stronger, but the wind stayed steady and we were headed to the second mark at West Pt. We passed the two boats ahead(actually three, one was a cruising division boat) before the wind died and started coming ahead. Down with the spinnaker and up with the jib and we were close reaching on starboard with a light SW wind. We drew away from the boats behind and slowly made up ground on another boat that had passed us.
As we started closing on West Pt, the wind died entirely and the current swept us back to the north. A few boats from behind worked to the east and avoided the current and found a little breeze along the shore. We finally got some light south wind and sailed close hauled toward the east shore. By now we had slipped to at least fourth. We worked the beach north of West Pt and sailed close to the land where we obtained great current relief. The committee boat moved to just off the tip of West Pt to shorten the course. Our last tack took us very close to the beach at West Pt and when we tacked to port, we were inside of the boat just ahead of us. And two of the leaders were now on starboard trying to sail up to the finish against the current. We sailed close to the stern of the committee boat and tacked across the finish line in first place easily in front of the starboard tack boat. The boat just ahead of and below us went behind the starboard boat and lost more than the time that we owed them. The cruising class boat finished ahead of us, but as time after finishing got longer before other boats finished, it looks like we corrected to first in the PHRF Division 1. And if my times are correct, I think we probably corrected ahead of the PHRF Division 2 that finished behind us. Results when they are posted can be found here: Jim Depue Memorial Race Results
It was a fun day for a race: cold, rainy, no wind. But the crew worked well and we had a "never give up" attitude that carried us through to a good finish. Thanks to the crew of Jim and Tim for all their hard work.
Following the race, there was a social event at Port Madison Yacht Club. I did not attend(my Social circle is limited), but I did sit down with some of the sailors for some nachos at the Deli at Brownsville Marina and dissected the race
Jim trimming the spinnaker on the second leg of the race.
Our track for the day. If you look at the track in Shilshole Bay, you will see a big "S" where we were swept north by the ebbing current.
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