Here’s the boat with the name painted:

Here’s the namesake:

Good news: cup holder installation is in progress!

I raced the Wednesday CU Short Track yesterday. Short track is similar to cyclocross – racers circle a short dirt circuit for a certain amount of time. The first racer to finish the last lap wins. I didn’t get off to a good start and ended up behind a guy who crashed at the very beginning. I spent the rest of the race picking people off. Pretty fun stuff. I was at my cardio max for the entire race. I’ll post the results when they are posted.

Hey good lookin'.

Passing was tough.

The course had some cool banked turns and jumps.

Rest of the pics are here.
Results: I was 17th out of 25.

Great photos by Mindy.

We couldn’t finish in time for the boat festival in Jackson, but we managed to get her out on the North Platte this weekend in Casper, Wyoming. Thanks to my Dad for all of his hard work and thanks to Pdoo for coming up to help get it ready for action.

I’m thrilled with the boat, although the high sides were rough in the Wyoming wind. There’s still a good amount of work to be done, as we have not installed the anchor system yet and we still need to Spar the entire interior (just expoxy right now). The System Three book says to wait two week after the last epoxy coat to start spar varnish. I could not wait that long to get it in the water and test things out. We’ll probably change a few things based on what we learned.

The boat took on a little bit of water, which could be from the drain plugs not sealing well. Over a 5 hour drift, it wasn’t enough to be an issue. I bought the hull unfinished, so who knows if it has a leak elsewhere. Great fun on the Platte though. No fish were harmed/caught on our fishing trip. Apparently, even really cool looking boats don’t attract fish….

The name “Cat O’ Nine Tails” was the name of my Grandfather’s B-17 bomber in WWII. The plane was badly damaged on the “Black Thursday” bombing of ball bearing factories in Germany. Even after being very badly damaged by German flak and fighters, the Cat brought her crew back to England, where they bailed out when landing her was not an option. We had only pencil sketched the name on her before we left for our trip, so you can’t see it in the pics yet. Not sure if it’s good or bad luck to name a boat after a crashed plane, but if my Cat treats me as well as my grandfather’s, we’ll live to fish another day!