Helen's training week a disaster

My good friend Helen Tom came all the way from Bendigo to spend a few days with me training for the Bay to Bay in May. She is fit (see the cycling photo) but felt she needed to brush up her sailing skills before tackling the Great Sandy Strait. The day she arrived it started to rain and blow and it kept it up all the week. Such a shame.

We practised radio skills from inside the cabin and went through the racing rules, but the wind rarely dropped below 24 knots and mostly much more.

We finally, with the support of John Woods, got 2 hours afloat at Harwood but never put up the main, jib only was plenty. The outboard gave up as well, John's diagnosis was water in the fuel. I was so fed up I didn't even remember to take my usual crew photo!