Percussion Ensemble Dayton Regional Day 1

5:15 AM is awfully early. The kids were great though. We loaded the bus at 6:15 and ... the bus won't start. After ten minutes one of the snow plow guys realized there a switch set wrong. OK NOW we are off.

For those of you that do not know what an indoor percussion ensemble is, here is a little background. Outdoor field band season is late July through early November. So what do the 100+ band geeks do in the off season? They move indoors. There are three Band Boosters sponsored groups at Victor: Indoor Percussion Ensemble, Indoor Colorguard a.k.a. Winterguard, and a younger version for middle school kids called Cadet Guard. Between the three groups there are about 65 or 70 kids participating.

Percussion ensemble has 31 kids, 29 on this trip. They include drummers (snares, quads/tenors, and basses) as well as keyboard and mallet instruments. Plus there are guitars, timpani, cymbals and any other instrument that is played by using the hands to impact or strum the instrument to create the sounds.

I have two kids, both in the drumline. Emily is in her fourth season playing cymbals, and Danny is in his first season playing synthesizer. The group plays a show about 5 or 6 minutes long. It is typically in a gymnasium. The battery (drums cymbals) moves in a highly choreographed show. The pit stays put. The whole show is judged in competition with other schools.

Here is a YouTube video from last year's show. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSEv_3hiFMQ

Reputations for drummers are that they are the "bad boys" of the band. I have to contradict that. In fact this group of kids is the easiest bus load of kids to chaperone ever. These teens today played with Paly-Doh, played Risk, did Where's Waldo books. OK they made a big deal out of planning on doing kid stuff. But heck I'll take that any day.

This trip is a WGI regional competition, an early season event held after shows are typically complete but maybe not final. The kids are still learning and refining the show.

This is also our inexpensive trip. The kids are sleeping on a gym floor tonight. The bus arrived at the practice site, we unloaded, had some dinner and thay are rehearsing as we speak. They will probably go until about 10:30 or so. Then simply drop sleeping bags on the floor and pick up where they left off tomorrow.

The even tomorrow has a preliminary round where we perform at 11:39, and finals that start at 7:00. After the event it is back on the bus to drive home overnight.

I Need a Bigger Garage

2700 miles for 2 races seems a bit much. After working in Jacksonville for a couple days I made my way home. First was a short hop to see my Dad in South Carolina. Then I tacked to Port on Thursday and banged the left corner in Charleston, West Virginia. This let me avoid the nightmare that was the I-95 corridor in the Northeast. Then Friday morning I tack to Starboard again and sail up through Pittsburgh to home in Victor, NY.

Saturday morning I took the salt-caked boat to the car wash. The hand sprayer thing did a nice job knocking all the crud off the boat and trailer. But at 19 degrees, the remaining water on the boat and spar froze solid pretty quickly. So the boat is in the garage melting and drying now. I figure another week of that before I pack it away for a couple months.

The next job is to get in shape. And I mean some other shape than round. The goal is to drop 15 pounds and regain some stamina in the next 2 months. In the meantime, I will shift my priorities over to the kids and indoor drumline.

Pain

Saturday I sailed for maybe 1 1/2 hours, and SUnday we were on the water for only about 4 1/2 hours. Why do I feel like I just ran a marathon uphill while getting pummelled with rocks?

OK, the three real sore spots on my head I get. Two on top and one sore ear are all good solid whacks in the head with the boom.

The swolen knee, beats me. The sore butt, yeah it hasn't hiked out in awhile. The sore pecs, arms, back, thighs, calves, ankles, definitely a result of a year or so of no workouts. I take that back, I did work out once, sort of.

I'm feeling old.

First Regatta is an Eye Opener

The Train Wreck regatta is in the books. Unfortunately Mother Nature didn't allow us to complete more than 2 races.

The day started with tempatures in the 40's, and winds in the upper teens. The direction had shifted to Northwest making the wind offshore and much more tolerable while on shore. We started drinking early Saturday so the party was over by 9:30 or so. Plenty of sleep still didn't help the aches and pains from the prior day's aborted race. We found out we sailed in 23-25 and it piped up to over 30 as we tried to get boats out of the water. It remained 25-35 all day.

The first race I had a second row start but was able to immediately clear my air. I played the major shifts and struggled to find the groove in this cute little boat. It was an eye-opener when I was able to both pass the hot shots and get passed by not-so-hot shots. Shifting gears was tough. I was working the boat like an E-Scow, over trimming the vang, cunningham, and outhaul. Then over loosening all as well.

I rounded in the top 10, lost a couple downwind (I don't know how to go fast there yet), and pretty much picked up afew upwind and lost them downwind. I finished 10th ahead of a couple people that doubted I would be able to hang with the big boys.

It was so cold my exposed skin was purple with white splotched. I simply do not have the gear for the cold. On the way back down to the finish I relaxed to try to save my energy for two more races. Of course I then got colder. By the start I was uncontrolably shivering at times. But the workout helped.

Unfortunately the start was bad, again. I cleared by was driven where I did not want to go. I rounded the top mark about 15th. At the mark my board did not go down and my mainsheet knotted. I was able to get the board down before I hit the mark. But the knot meant I lost a lot of time and position. Through the entire day, I lost probably 15 boats on simple boat handling issues. Many I could regain when back in control. But I ended up 20th in the second race, a very poor showing. The third and final race was my last chance to break the top ten, which was my goal.

The sun came out, the wind got shifty, the Race Committee did their best but the deadline came and went with no start. So I ended up 13th overall out of something like 32 boats. Not as good as I wanted, but I got noticed.

I have ridiculous aches and pains. I need to lose more weight and do a LOT to get in shape. I met a lot of great people, made some new friends, and now have my new boat in the parking lot of the hotel.

Mile 1490 complete. 1250 miles to go until I'm home. Three days of work here in Jacksonville might allow me to recover enough before hitting the road home Thursday.

pic 1: Who needs a cover!

pic 2 & 3: packed up..

Chicken Jibe

This morning looked quite promising except for the forecast. The wind was definitely blowing hard. The question was if it would stay below thresholds until after racing.

Sailing out to the start I was testing my abilities. It was more wind than I could handle. The only people that seemed to be OK were those that picked up a crew member and were pretty close to the limits on weight, near 300 pounds. Even they were having trouble.

I used an old trick and started on port at the boat. In heavy air boats tend to overshoot and slide down the line. Sure enough there was a good hole. I sailed to the right then tacked on a header to cover the fleet. Sounds like a normal description of a good start.

Really what happened was I was in a good sequence for a mid line start. But when I tacked I smacked my head with the boom so hard I saw stars. Glasses were gone. As I wondered if I was dead, the boat took off. When I recovered I was 20 seconds from the start and third row. I baled on that, circled around and looked for a hole to my right. Off I went to the right.

The race started in 16 to 18 mph wind with gusts higher. Survival was paramount. Don't break the boat, don't break the body, and don't break anyone else's boat or person. I succeeded in that. As I tacked to a layline though I pulled the vang tail through the mainsheet block which successfully uncleated the vang and locked up the mainsheet. I survived but the recovery took me below a layline and out of line. A 10-15 position went to 20 pretty fast. Plus it was easily now blowing 22-24.

Around the top mark I immediately picked up two boat as I launched into a plane. I was flying faster than any darn Laser could go. I was dodging and weaving, keeping the bow up, driving down in the flats. Then I hit a launcher that put me maybe 2/3 airborne. Very cool! Except when I landed I stuffed the bow big time. The wall of water was about 8 inches up my mast. I couldn't see any of the bow. The boat stopped dead.

There are three things that can happen. 1) the boat resurfaces and off you go, 2) the boat pitches forward like going over the handlebars of a bike and flips, 3) the bow shoots out sideways and you flip. There was the looooongest one tenth of a second while the boat decided what to do (no control from my perspective). It couldn't decide to pitch pole or float. So it just stood on its nose. Eventually it settled backwards and I shot off again like a bullet.

I was gaining like mad! Boats were flipping left and right. If I survived I would be about 10th at the bottom mark. Boats ahead were flipping like mad. Each one that tried to jibe ended up in trouble. Only one chicken jibed.

I stuffed it again. Same result. The 8 inches of water in my boat may have kept me from losing it that time. It all sloshed back into the cockpit when the boat took off. Oh look! My glasses. Spray and waves were coming in faster than the bailers would drain them out.

OK, ready to jibe. I make the move. No go. I can't pull hard enough. Chicken jibe. no problem.

"Cancelled! Head in!" shouts from the passing committee boat.

Crap.

On the way in I collect 2 paddles that were lost by capsized boats. After I dock, the wind picks up even more. It is 2 hours before all the capsized boats are recovered. The wind picks up more. Steady 28-30 lasted for the rest of the day.
pic 1: Still a few boats being recovered.

pic 2: Too rough to drag dry.

pic 3: Hold a paddle with 2 fingertips as a wind sock.

pic 4: The only way to come in sometimes.

PURCHASED THE BOAT

(published a bit late)

I arrived at Lake Eustis Sailing Club yesterday mid morning to find it pretty busy, but only a couple boats on the lake. From the car I saw the occasional white cap. On Keuka that means a nice steady 8-10 or puffs of 12. That would be perfect for the first day out. Then I opened the car door and it was almost ripped out of my hands. It was blowing 15-18 with puffs well into the 20’s.

I met Greg and purchased the boat. The thing about one-designs is that the less distinctive a boat is the more appealing. There is nothing different from factory new on this boat other than one zipper handle on the cover broke. I’m very pleased.

After a quick listen to the weather radio I decided to wait and see. The front was passing through late afternoon and that would not help. So the non-sailing activities started. We kicked the first keg by 3:00. It’s a great bunch of guys.

Last night’s dinner was at Crazy Gator followed by raw oysters at the Oyster Troff where Princess (her real name) was slinging beers and a guy was able to shuck oysters and drink beer with only two hands and never lost a finger. I learned that Bob is bottomless. After drinking through the afternoon, he proceeded to have two dinners of all-you-can-eat fish fry, a couple dozen oysters, and a few pitchers of beer. Unbelievable.

This morning the weather is very different. It is sunny, cooler, and looks like winds about 13-16 from the West. The forecast is for this to build a bit more then die down. I don’t care. I’m just happy to be sailing in February.

Psyched

All set to take delivery of the boat tomorrow, do some sailing and get ready for Saturday's regatta. Weather looks good. I feel good. Should be fun!