Should Cruisers Race????

Eileen Quinn has a song, “Gotta, Gotta, Regatta” that sums up the events of the Regatta in Placencia. Tom and Kim on SV Miramar invited us to crew in the race. Michael wasn’t too sure and I couldn’t wait. They also invited friends of theirs, Nick and Kim.
Tom, Nick, and I went to the Captain’s Meeting. At the meeting it was decided that the race would be postponed for an hour so that we could have more wind. This put a crimp in Nick and Kim’s plans as they had to navigate the mangrove swamp to get home by launcha and they didn’t want to do that in the dark. Tom decided to call the race committee and ask if we could start an hour earlier and they could adjust our time. Not a problem.

Everything is set and we are heading to the committee boat to cross the starting line. Things are going really well right up until we catch the anchor line of the committee boat! We are also trying to avoid T-boning the small ketch that is parked by the committee boat. Tom has line cutters on his prop shaft and sure enough they work! So now the committee boat is free and alongside us. Kim and I are holding the boat off Miramar and we realize that we don’t have much left of the anchor rode to hang on to. Just as we are about to set the boat free I see a bow line and grab it. We are able to tie the boat to us though it wants to lay alongside of us. Once we get it hanging off the back of Miramar things start to calm down. Don’t think that Tom is just standing around. As we are securing the committee boat he and Kim are dropping the anchor and the sails.
All is all it wasn’t too bad. No digits were lost, no one got hurt and it only cost us the race and Tom the price of a new anchor.
So here is to Tom… the first to start and the first to finish…quickest race in history.