Turtle Rock Race Frustrations

[Ed]

So, today was the Turtle Rock Race on Lake Allatoona from Harbor Town Marina to Turtle Rock.  Last year we led the entire race on Strange Bird, our Sea Pearl Trimaran, until the turn  to the NW where I chose the right side of the channel due to Red Top Mountain being off the port side figuring the wind would die close in but run over to my side.  Ooops, ended up getting passed by a Sun Cat and Hunter 23.5 and with the handicap the Sun Cat, sailed by Scott Windemeir of the FL 120, won and we came in third.
This year we knew we weren't going to be in the front of the fleet but hoped to place with our PHRF of 305.  The race started with 3kts gusting to 5.  We crossed the start line in 5th place out of 7 boats which isn't bad.  Turned northerly with a wind shift and started catching up with a couple of boats doing 2 - 2.5 kts but the wind was puffy.  Poled the genoa out and jumped to 3kts.  We were creeping ahead of a Hunter 23.5 with just a 110 jib and main and the Sea Scout Cal 25.  Made the turn into the big S turn leading to the Atlanta Yacht Club and the wind started getting getting even flukier, this was an hour and a half into the race. Ran up on a Rhodes 22 and stalled!  Both of the boats that were barely behind came up to starboard and stalled just in front of us so there was a wedge in front of us.  Started tacking to starboard to avoid everyone and Urchin suddenly started jibing to port behind everyone else.  We were in some kind of vortex of light/no wind with weird currents!  No matter what we did we just kept spinning while the other boats scattered ahead of us.  I was getting the regular comments from Becky; "Do something, we aren't moving/why does this always happen/I don't understand!" and after the third 360 I said the heck with it, dropped the motor down, and fired that mother up.  Went about 100 yards and killed the motor and voila, we were sailing again.  The Hunter 23.5 had motored off the starboard bank after turning with no control, like we did, and nearly grounding.  The Rhodes went way off to port and was able to tack back to the turn, finally. The Sea Scout boat just kept creeping along and finally found the wind to make the corner. We caught up with two of them after the turn with the genoa poled out again wing on wing.  Gave it another hour and then withdrew because the dogs were ready for a potty break. Mountain lakes are not my friend, yet.  Finally figured out how to have my iPhone take Jpegs but they are too large to post.  I'll work on it.  I think we're doing alright learning to sail Urchin, but it is a steep learning curve.