Anger

On Wednesday the winds were from the west at around 270. The wind seemed to be stronger near shore. The plan was to go right; to take advantage of this apparent stronger wind. JR once again was ahead at the start and stayed ahead unitl the first leeward mark rounding. We had a good spinnaker hoist. Our downwind leg went well. We sailed on a hotter angle and seemed to be able to catch up to JR. At the leeward mark, the plan was to do a windward douse. The douse went well and we were able to take the lead over JR. JR didn't have a good douse. After the race I talked to JR's skipper. They had a problem with one of the spin sheets; they couldn't douse properly and couldn't sail their preferred course on the first downwind leg. Everything went well on the second upwind, until one of our last tacks to the windward mark. We had an override with the Genoa sheet. We had to douse the Genoa to recover control and, with the traffic at the mark, fell badly behind. This made me very angry. We had overtaken JR only to fail with what should be a basic capability: tacking. Anger is an interesting problem. To give into anger only makes things worse. It can appear when you feel completely helpless. I think I kept things under control; but there was no avoiding my 'vibe' of being very unpleased with our performance. I am completely focused on sailing when I am racing and expect other crew members to stayed focused as well. The reality is that problems occur regardless (see JR above). We had a good race to this point. Hmm... my anger was put on simmer. Hopefully I didn't make things worse. We got things back in control and had a good downwind leg to clinch a 3 rd (!) place finish.