This year's Semaine Olympique Francais was the most interesting one I've done so-far. This was my 5th or 6th time doing this event, and I've never seen so little wind in Hyeres. With the wind ranging from 0-7 knots for the first 4 days of racing and shifting at least 30-40 degrees all the time, it made for some tricky situations. Everyone had a shocking race at some point or another. I unfortunately had the opposite, with only one or two good races and the rest were shocking! It really was good practice for light wind racing and the racing was actually quite close most of the time. I was struggling, not so much with the light winds, but with the placement of myself against the fleet in these shifty conditions. You never really knew when the next shift would happen, or where the wind would die off first.
At any rate, I had some fun sailing in the breeze, even though I was in the silver fleet. In one of the races though I had the fun of having my outhaul come undone!! What a pain in the butt that is in 18knots to try and re-tie it! So I finished the race 3rd last. I had to have a sense of humor about it otherwise I would have been really upset. It was frustrating, but it wasn't the end of the world. The next race I came through and was going really well in 4th, and just on the last run before the reach to the finish, I capsized... lost about 4 boats and finished 8th. At least we got to stretch our legs on the last day of racing and get some hiking in for once!
Right now I'm in the Pyrenees Mountains with my good friends Mike and Kat. Its beautiful here and we've done some hiking and managed to make a day trip to Andorra. Its been really nice to get away from the stress of the last event and to unwind with the beautiful backdrop of the Pyrenees. We're leaving the area today, heading to Nice so that I can catch a flight to Russia to see my Brother! From Russia I will go to Cascais (where the worlds will be) for a solid 6 day training camp that I'm really looking forward to. It will be nice to see the venue and get an idea of what's to come. There will be lots of people to train with, so that will be really great.
I'll post some photos when I have a better internet connection!
Ciao!
