Leg 2: Stay Close
We had a good spinnaker set and got going well right away. Extending to the right, B-Lin jibed 15 lengths shy of the layline. We kept going until we reached the layline and jibed in clear air and good pressure.

“We have a good opportunity here.”

As we approached the leeward gate on port jibe, B-Lin jibed clear and came in on the starboard-jibe layline. We were bow to bow, but there was another boat between us, so we were third in line for the left-hand mark (looking downwind). We could have jibed for the right mark instead and had a clear rounding with a split, but I decided against it because it would’ve been a more challenging manuver.

“Big mistake,” I thought, “I hope we didn’t just blow our chance.”

Leg 3: Make a Move
We rounded the left gate two places behind. Things were not looking good.  A boat ahead normally gets into clear air and water sooner and extends its lead. Still, the race was only half over.

“Keep cool,” I thought.

We sailed on port for about a minute, cleared the boats coming downind, then tacked to starboard in a place where B-Lin had to continue past another starboard tacker’s bad air. This gave us a little leverage.

“Nice move.”

After a minute, we got headed and tacked. We had gained; B-Lin’s lead was now down to just two lengths. They tacked in a tight leebow position, forcing us to tack away. We sailed on starboard until we met the next header, and tacked back. B-Lin leebowed us again, and we had to make another clearing tack. We were nearly on the port layline, so we had to tack back. Again they tacked on our lee bow, still two lengths ahead. But as they approached the mark, they were blocked by a starboard tacker and had to make two extra tacks. We rounded the last weather mark right on their tail, with the regatta on the line.

“That was lucky, but we’ll take it!”