Honesty is the best Policy.
Honest!
When I awoke Sunday morning feeling lethargic it wasn’t because of a hangover. Honest! Half way to Tuakau I realised the “Trophy” had been left at home, so Den and I decided we wouldn’t mention it till the end of the day. We arrived at Tuakau where all the usual suspects were getting their boats organised for the day’s sprint. P5 has had a complete makeover, losing its yellow sub look, to a spectacular silver and blue regalia, a definite change for the better. Cam was out on the water setting up the buoys. P9 was put in the water, and by the time I’d tied the boat further up the shoreline, Greg took great delight in telling me he knew about the trophy. So much for Den saying I won’t tell anyone hon, honestly!
With briefing out of the way, Ryan and I ran the gauntlet and sorted ourselves out with the recon. Because the weather was good to us, there were a few fizz boats taking advantage of the sunshine, so caution was needed as huge wakes were occasionally thrown through the course.
At one stage Rodger anointed himself with Waikato water, and when Den shouted “Abort! Abort!” Rodger must have thought he said “That buoy, that buoy!” because he soldiered on to complete the run with a boat full of water, and the pair of them were drowned rats when they came ashore. I felt sorry for them though. Honest!
Cam kept losing sight of one of the buoys, but he still eventually managed a top five finish. It was always there, Cam, honest!
Wayne and Steve battled it out all day between themselves, see-sawing their times with each run. Wayne considerately goofed the final to let his sidekick beat him, so Steve took out second place for handicap. Honest!
Sheila, your driving is getting a lot more aggressive and first overall in handicap is only the beginning. Don’t let those two other drivers of the boat deter you - they are beatable. Honest!
Ryan had a little difficulty adjusting to P9, so lets hope we can get P13 back on the water for the next sprint. He’s too good now to be allowed to shoot it out for the Handicap (when you get to over 95%, you’re not eligible any more). Honest!
A well deserved win went to Den, whose times were pretty consistent all day, in spite of his drenching. (Honest I suppose!)
Greg was improving with each run, (having never done a river sprint before) but in the final when he tried an “all out”, he very sportingly gave second to Simon, who managed a superb final run to finally beat Greg in his own boat.
I also very sportingly purposely “fluffed” my final, to let others take some glory. Honest!
I purposely didn’t bring the Overall Trophy, so one of us could take it back home. Honest!
But I didn’t really mean to bring the DoD trophy home as well, even if it was sabotagedly given to Den mainly by the sly Greg and even slyer Cam.
Watch out at the next sprint, guys ‘n’ gals!
Someone else is gonna get the dreaded DoD. Honest!
Again, thanks to Kathy for the timing, and putting on the eats at the end of the day. You didn’t have to go to all that trouble. Honest!
Ree
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