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Nice day at Bird. The wind was NE, which doesn't happen very often. The wind was also only about 6 or 7 mph less than last Saturday, when I struggled with my 4.7. Today I was great on my 6.6. I don't know what to think about all of this. I guess some days I have good days and others I have bad days.
I am doing okay on my jibes again. I'm not great, but I come out planing quite a bit, and when I don't, it's not terrible anyway. I want to do better, but I'm going to start working on other things I want to do. I hope that by moving on, I'll take the pressure of being perfect on my jibes away, and I can get better in general. I don't want to be stuck at back-and-forth, reach-and-jibe for the rest of my life.
Last fall I made up a goal list: by fall 2002, I want to be able to jibe at a high rate, duck jibe at a decent rate, fast tack at a high rate and chop hop at a high rate. So today I worked on the fast tacks and chop hops. I think if I can get a little more chop, I can get some good jumps. NE 6.6 wind at flat Bird Island Basin doesn't set up too many good ramps. Maybe tomorrow I can get out into the deep water past the Intracoastal Waterway and get some more waves. Having said that, there was a guy there who got some impressive air right in front of me a couple of times. I think he saw me trying to jump (I can get the fin out consistently, but can't time hitting waves very well). I was going slow, recovering from a jump and a lull, and he passed me and jumped right in front of me twice. The second time he had a decent piece of chop -- about 2 feet and steep. Nothing major, but good enough for him to jump about 5 or 6 feet up. I was looking up at him (I was hiked over the board, maybe 3 feet over the water, stretched out). It was impressive, especially since I couldn't get out of the water very well. I wanted to stop him and tell him to keep passing and jumping in front of me so I could learn, but I never ran into him again. There were probably 30-40 sailors out.
All in all a very good day. Added on top of the fact that I was worked-out for the week, it came at a good time. The forecast looks good for tomorrow, too!
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