Texas Youth Race Week 2023
Texas Youth Race Week takes place each year in early July. This regatta proceeds over the course of 5 days, with day 1 being practice for people coming in from other cities or states. For me, this is a home town regatta that takes place at Lakewood Yacht Club. This is the Club that I practice with. The first day of practice went smoothly, with us getting in 4 practice races at the location that the course would be the next day.
The following day, or the first day of racing, was a mess. Lots of thunder and lightning forced us back to land after just minutes on the water. This made for a crazy tow out to the race course because of the heavy seas and loud thunder. This resulted in us waiting for over 3 hours to be sent home with no races taking place. I felt very disappointed, because I knew that we would have some extra long days of racing to catch up on the time that we lost.
On the second day, racing finally happened. After some minor storms that we had to wait out, we launched our boats and towed out to the race course. By the end of the day, I did quite well. I got a first, fourth, and a ninth, but unfortunately had a bad 17 at the beginning of the day due to the wind completely shutting off for the later half of the race. In all, I was ecstatic with my performance for the second day of competitions because I was worried prior to the racing. This was in consequence of the fact that I had not sailed in the few weeks prior to the regatta.
Continuing on with the week, we had clear skies and sun for a predicted great day for racing. On this day we towed out to the course at about 10 o'clock. Then, the race committee set up the course and we began to start the races.
Over the course of the day, I did well with a first, seventh, and thirteenth. Unfortunately though, despite finishing the fourth race in seventh, I was over the starting line at go. This resulted in a disqualification from the race, giving me 37 points. By the end of the day, I was extremely tired because I was out on the water from 12 pm to 8 pm.
By the last day of the regatta, I was in 7th place overall and hoping for 6th, so I needed a good day of racing. This is because 6th had 8 less points than me. Despite this, I managed to get into 6th place because of a solid 5th, 3rd, and then 13th, allowing me to gain a position, getting my overall standing into 6th. This means that this coming April, I will be going to Team Trials. This is because of the reason that Texas Youth Race Week was a top 25 percent qualifier, and I fell in that category. This was an exciting regatta despite the weather being tough, I am very happy that I participated.