Two new family boats - Paul Cronin Studios

Welcome our two new boats in the family. Yes, we are talking model boats. We now have two Dragonflite 95 kit boats we put together on the dinning room table boat shop. It was great fun putting them together, and even more fun sailing/racing.

**Carol holding our boats before the first Sail**

Brad Read started the Newport, RI fleet two years ago, with a lot of help from fleet members. The racing is close, if not at times bumper car close, but still great fun.

**Keel Install night on dinning room table workshop**

The growing fleet races Saturday and Sunday at 9:30 am for 90 minutes and tries for 10 races. We hope to add a Dutch Harbor fleet where we can race an evening during the week in the summer. Just a short walk from the house this would be great, and a few in Jamestown sailors already own boats.

We talked about a purchase when David Reed wrote his article in Sailing World, but the though just faded. Then it came up again over the holidays. Carol contacted Brad, and we went over to try the Sail Newport loaner boat on a practice day in early January during the week. On the way home there was no doubt we would each have a boat. Orders placed we went the next weekend to do race committee, and get a better feel for the racing.

The banter from the thumb sailors ranges from what you would hear on a full size one-design racecourse, to teasing, and always a helpful comment if you ask. It will take us a bit to catch up with the top of the fleet now having sailed them for two years, and we now have three hours. But that is a big part of the fun.

The boats respond to tuning with pretty much everything tunable. Your setup needs to be for lulls, puffs, up & down wind, plus race-to-race if you don’t have time to pull and make adjustments. And adjustments are in the millimeters, loads of great lessons to learn from this system. One fun aspect is you can see the whole course clearly.

Now for tactics, again it is just like a full size one-design fleet. You learn who to stay away from such as (07), and who are fun to race. Just like any fleet, get to the top group, and racing is a great experience.

We look forward to lots of fun times with our DF 95’s, Spidey 341, and Boru 115.

I am very excited, and packing for next when I will be on location with Ted Morgan a friend and great photographer. We have this trip planned and both look forward to diving in. When I am back I will do a post with images and some video clips. Maybe even and episode for the show if I get enough video and great stills.

Have fun, days are getting longer, see you soon. Paul