What price glory? Well, for Holmes Hole sailors it is a reduction of handicap. Woody Bowman’s catboat, Julia Lee, sailed to yet another victory in the B Division on Thursday. Her previous three consecutive victories cost her 10 seconds per mile for Thursday’s race, but that seemed to make little difference, and with a fourth win, her handicap for the rest of the season will be 20 seconds per mile. Julia Lee is clearly up to the challenge.

A total of 17 enthusiastic sailors lined up for the race on August 6. An equally enthusiastic breeze of 15 knots moderated to a tamer 10 by the finish. Still, it was an exciting race around the harbor on a falling tide. Following Julia Lee in the B Division was Isabella, a Gannon and Benjamin Bella sailed by John and Lisa Stout. In third place was Avanti, a Cape Dory skippered by David Lott.

In the A Division, Artful Dodger, a Tartan 3500 with Mike Powers at the helm, took first place, with Second Wind, a Sonar sailed by Mary Worrell, less than a minute behind. Masquerade, Mike Loberg’s Morris 36, just 13 seconds later on corrected time took the third spot.

On Sunday, August 9, high winds, possible rain and generally nasty conditions caused the cancellation of the run to Robinson’s Hole, and finally of all racing. Commodore Jerry Goodale went sailing anyway, and reported calm water on the Falmouth side, but it would have been a long, wet sail tacking directly into the wind for the return.

The sail to Robinson’s Hole is almost 11 nautical miles each way. A nautical mile is 1.15 land miles (1,852 metres), and equivalent to one minute of latitude around the equator. The ratio to a land mile is almost the same as that of a metre to a yard. A knot is one nautical mile per hour. Knot derives from the 17th century when sailors used a device called a common log to measure the speed of a vessel. The device was a coil of rope with uniformly spaced knots attached to a piece of wood shaped like a wedge of pie. After the piece of wood was lowered from the stern of the vessel, the line was paid out for a specific amount of time. The line was then retrieved, and the number of knots between the ship and the wood was counted.