Weather alters racing

NEWPORT BEACH — No two days are alike, not even with seemingly perfect Southern Californian weather.

The second day of the 43rd annual Governor’s Cup International Junior Match Racing Championship on Thursday was so windy that the Gov Cup race committee had to review how strong the wind had to be before the boats could not use their spinnaker sails.

At 18 knots, the spinnakers on the Governor’s Cup 21, a boat designed by the Commodore of Balboa Yacht Club Alan Andrews, cannot be used. At 23, the racing would’ve been stopped until conditions changed.

But the spinnakers were in use, as the winds stayed below 16 knots, yet still caused spinnaker problems for many teams — including the host team BYC, who won one out of four races.

“The heavy breeze threw us off a bit, that’s when our sets were pretty bad,” BYC middleman Walker Banks said. “Spinnaker got tripped up a lot when the main came out too far [but] we had really good jibes in the heavy breeze and we kept speed most of the day.”

Aside from the winds, BYC also lost a couple races because of themselves.

“We didn’t pay attention to our surroundings,” BYC skipper Caitlyn Ybarra said. “We didn’t pay attention to the course and focused too much on the other teams.”

In BYC’s last race, not paying attention cost them a point, even though it had the lead going into the second leg.

“Oh boy, it was not pretty,” BYC bowman Brandon Wood said. “We started [the first leg] behind and we caught up a lot and came up way ahead ... but we overshot the port layline by a lot and we didn’t realize it. [Royal Yachting Assn.] had it right on, we just sailed a lot of distance and couldn’t catch up.”

After day two, BYC is tied for fourth with RYA, King Harbor Yacht Club and Mission Bay Yacht Club with six points.

Newport Harbor Yacht Club, the two-time defending Gov Cup champions, was tied for seventh going into day two of the Gov Cup, but after winning all four of its races Thursday, NHYC is now tied for second place with Cruising Yacht Club of Australia at seven points.

Mission Bay Yacht Club is third with six points.

“We just worked really well as a team,” NHYC skipper Andrew Mason said. “[Wednesday], in the races we lost, we didn’t have control of our races. Today, we got off the starting line and had control from the get-go.”

However, all teams are still trying to beat the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron of William Tiller, Harry Thurston and Shaun Mason, which remains undefeated through both days and leads with 10 points.

The strong winds proved to be a big factor for San Francisco Yacht Club and the all-female Royal New Zealand team, as both teams failed to win a match Thursday.

With one more race to go in the first round robin, which starts at noon today, the Gov Cup is halfway completed.

After one more round robin, the top four teams with the highest point total will race against each other Sunday to decide the Gov Cup champion.

“Everyday is a new day,” Ybarra said. “You never know what’s going to happen in the race. Things can flip-flop in the matter of seconds.”