Flaca Vero, She Who Brings and Inspires
For those who embrace Puddle Ducking, Flaca Vero is our patron saint. She is an angel who inspires us to solve difficult problems, and provides us that which is difficult to get, but needed so desperatly.
Most often, she exerts gentle influence - allowing them to see the sail hiding in the polytarp, the way to convert a piece of drift plywood into a leeboard, how to help save a sinking Potter 15. When a ducker does the impossible with nothing more than a crazy dream, that is the influence of Flaca Vero.
Sometimes, she casts a spell over others to do her bidding, such as the kid at the building supply store who pointed you towards the PL Premium, the friend who let you use his tablesaw, the wife who just shook her head and let you build.
Ever since the first Puddle Duck Racer was built, we didn't really comprehend who she was or how she worked. In 2007, "EL MONO" who lives in Buenos Aires, Argentina, was building a duck and unable to get any waterproof glues. He searched high and low, asked around to everyone but was unable to find it. Our saint made her first physical appearance when she took the form of an airline stewardess. She heard of his dilema, and on a stop over in a foreign country, she went to a store and purchased some bottles of Titebond II glue, and brought them back for EL MONO. The stewardess's name is: Flaca Vero. She has been part of ducking lore ever since.
When Flaca Vero was revealed to us, Tim Cleary created the picture at the top of the page by modifying an Aquarius Zodiac Fairy. The fairy has been the symbol we use to represent her ever since. Very fitting since Aquarius is the one that supposedly poured the water that we enjoy sailing on. Plus she has a really neat tattoo.
We have a tradition that for every event, we each bring a trophy for the pile. Then after the race, the winner picks his out, then the 2nd place picks theirs etc.
For the 2009 World Championships, Marc Blazer created the trophy which features Flaca Vero on top, holding a minature BucketEars. Just below is a minature of Marc's duck named "Bloody Splinter", which the full size one, is among our best pirate ships.
Seriously, she is real
If you are religous, you may find it offensive that we have Flaca.
I want to seriously explain her, she is not a religous creature, she simply is a way for us to express good fortune relating to puddle ducking.
Have you ever heard of mother nature or lady luck?
Same thing, only instead of saying lady luck helped me figure out a solution to this dilema, we say Flaca Vero helped us.
