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The Black Bottle - A Personal
Reflection on the Law of natural
Order.
Tony Beck
The ancient philosophers in developing an
understanding of the complex world around them
proposed a law of natural order. As opposed to the law
of the Gods, Divine Law or the Positive Law sourced
from the authority of government, the law of Natural
Order derives its moral authority from the immutable
and ever-present natural relations of beings to one
another.
The question is does yacht racing have a natural order?
On a recent Sunday one of the Club’s signature
races, the Black Bottle (single handed race), was
conducted and I competed in my S80, Escape. There
was a good selection of boats ranging from a Club
Elliott, Diamonds, Spirit of Down Under and Doug
Hem in Tamesis, touted as the red hot favourite.
The wind started at 15 knots and built to 20 as the
afternoon progressed.
The other S80s to enter were Kasam(Wayne
Cullen) and Serious Yahoo(Tony Spencer). I had
the number 3 jib and full main, Wayne has a small
number 2, and Tony a number 3 and a reefed main..
Wayne and I missed the start (due to some self
induced confusion) by a couple of minutes but I
managed to cross ahead and to windward of Wayne.
The first mark was a beat to the pipeline channel
marker off Altona and Serious Yahoo had opened up a
big lead on Escape, and I held a good lead on Wayne.
My speed seemed slightly better upwind than Kasam
with the smaller headsail providing better balance.
The next leg was a long beat/shy reach over to
Sandringham. I held onto my lead over Wayne and
closed marginally on Serious Yahoo. Then a problem as
a commercial ship departing the Port crossed, requiring
me to point, allowing Wayne to close the margin by a
minute or so. I rounded the next mark ahead but with
Wayne closing. The next leg was a long run down to
Port Melbourne. Slowly and inexorably Wayne closed
and I tried everything to prevent the inevitable.
As Wayne closed, my concentration started to falter
and my mood darken. My disposition not at all assisted
by Wayne’s now clearly audible stream of laughter and
commentary.
We both slowly made up some ground
on Serious Yahoo as Tony steered a shyer
course before gybing to the bottom mark.
In my desperation to keep Wayne out I tried everything
from my seating position, altering and fiddling
with all available sail and rig controls and finally to
goosewing the headsail. This meant sailing by the lee
(as I couldn’t go forward and hold the sail out and as it
was sheeted on the inboard tracks it collapsed quickly).
Of course, as Wayne’s harassment intensified and his
laughter became more maniacal, my concentration
deteriorated and the inevitable eventually happened
as I crash gybed, and just avoided knocking my block
off. As I gybed back, the inevitable happened and
the pole (suspended from the boom) snagged in the
halyards at the mast, trapping the boom centreline. I
then had to go forward to disentangle the mess and
the inevitable happened as the boat, without any helm
did a complete 360. By the time I sorted out the mess
Wayne had passed and was now 100 metres or more
ahead.
The inevitable then happened, I had a mental
breakdown!.
I eventually calmed down, regained some measure of
composure and set about catching Wayne. I rounded the
final mark on port tack with Wayne clear ahead. With my
set up I felt I was able to point higher with good speed.
Half way up the final leg Wayne tacked to starboard
and I crossed ahead on port clearing him by only feet.
I had regained the lead, victory would surely be mine.
I then tacked to starboard and coming to the
layline crossed Wayne, by only the smallest
margin. Tacking onto port for the race to the
finish Wayne was below and slightly ahead.
While I gradually closed, we crossed the line together
with his bow only feet ahead. I had some how manage in
one manoeuvre to convert a narrow lead to a narrow loss.
Serious Yahoo finished a minute further in front.
Final elapsed times.- Serious Yahoo 146..73, Kasam
147.73 and Escape 147.88.
After 2.5 hours of sailing, only a minute serparated the
three boats.
Newsletter of the Royal Yacht Club of Victoria • June 2007
21