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Light wind racing

I enjoy light air sailing. We had a race in dyeing breeze 2 weeks ago. I race one design so we always know where we stand against the competition without having to figure out handicaps. The evening had been a little fluky but maintained at about 5 knots until the last two legs. On the last windward leg the wind dropped to almost nothing. There were 4 boats fairly close together but we were the furthest back. Two out to starboard of us and one off to port. We were approaching the mark so we were fairly close together all on port tack. We managed to sail right between all of them with about 5 boat lengths between us and they were soon all behind us. I think the trick that helped us get through was that they were all trying to sail to the tell tails on the sails but I ignored them and paid attention only the mast head wind indicator. Two of them abandoned the race before getting to the mark, the other one finished well behind us.

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