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Marmaris International Yacht Week was held last year from 28th October to 3rd November. The event included offshore and inshore race courses. Over 120 yachts participated with over 1000 sailors onboard. I was lucky enough to be one of them, or so I thought. Our friend, Trevor Plane, has a Dufour 48, and having taken part in a couple of races had decided that he would like to enter Marmaris Yacht Week but, under IRC rules, this meant applying for IRC certification. The yacht’s handicap is determined by its measurements and, crucially, its weight. Only then will the IRC certificate be awarded. So, with this in mind, everything but everything that had not been nailed down, screwed fast or glued to the hull was removed from “Fourth Plane”. Books, cutlery, tools, boxes of useful bits stowed in out of the way lockers, all were taken out… and then she was weighed. There was little that could be done to ease the yacht size, so we supplied the sail dimensions, the mast height, the length over water and all other necessary measurements. All of the information was sent off to France and Fourth Plane was given a TCC of 1.037. The next job for Trevor was to put together a team for the Marmaris International Yacht Race Week. Trevor is an experienced racer from days gone by and to his team he added the skills of Mike Scouse from Windsea’n, a previous 470 Olympic Dingy sailor as well as a yacht racing coach and racer. Alongside Mike came Yair Michaeli from My Mermaid, also an Olympic Dingy sailor on Flying Dutchman, a dingy Olympic coach and for some years a yacht cruiser. Three more experienced racing crew joined up; Dafna, Julia and Leda. They have sailed in many races and were fresh from the first Women's International Yacht Week in Turgutreis. Halluk, Batsheva and Andrew joined the team and so did Edward and Jordan, two young boys. That made a crew of 11 people. The first 4 races went well with a 4th, a 1st, a 6th and a 3rd. They were |
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working well together and seemed to be enjoying the experience. Now for the last race. Unfortunately Jordan was beginning to feel the strain and decided that he would have to step out of this last leg. So the obvious solution was for me to step into his shoes. At this point I would like to mention that I have never participated in a race and had no idea of what I was letting myself into. Cruising, of course, is a piece of cake and I have plenty of experience of gently cruising along, in no rush. Whenever a boat comes within a distance of 500 meters we turn away… but in a race? Well, it’s slightly different. There were 120 yachts in the race and in our division about 40, so you can probably picture the scene. Somewhat crowded would be an understatement. Even as we pulled up to the start line I could see collisions everywhere. There was Yair standing at the front saying “right, left, go go GO!” There was Mike on the wheel. There were boats in front, behind, on the right and left. There was wind. There was the boat on our starboard nearly touching. There was the whistle and then we were off. I sat down, with my legs overboard, thinking thank God I don’t have to stand now; my legs couldn’t carry my weight. For a few minutes I thought great, this is really nice, I could get used to it. Then the mark loomed before us, and I thought, oh God the same thing is going to happen. More collisions. This time there was rain and more wind to add to the equation. Still, we got round it in one piece. The spinnaker went up and we were away. The next leg was the most relaxing for me. There were only a few yachts nearby. Of course this didn’t last long as the 2nd mark appeared through the now torrential rain. We went round in one piece with the spinnaker still going strong. Then bang! It blew out. As we struggled to pull it down we saw behind us two yachts, one broached with his spinnaker caught on the Genoa of the other. They had stuck together and with the fierce wind and rain were struggling to pull apart. At that stage the committee abandoned the race. Later on we found out we’d been in 50 knots of wind and, apart from the 2 yachts that we had seen stuck together, |
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there had been other collisions and even some broken stays. We settled with 3rd place overall. So that was my first race, but will it be my last? When I set foot on land I said “NEVER AGAIN”, but now I’m not so sure. I can understand why people do it and I can appreciate the thrill. I had never been so frightened in my life, but maybe, just maybe I’ll try it again... Images courtesy of Marmaris
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A DAY AT THE RACES Mandy of ‘My Mermaid’ |
