260529 KYC Thursday

Creation: 260529 1105 Last Modified: 260529 1105

Crew

Position	Person
Helm	Steve Ellwood
Main	Sue Fraser
Middle	Anik Karimjee
Bow	Howard Whittaker

Course

V0V0V0 - shortened to twice around.

Weather

North wind, which blows across the river making the race course short - between the shores. 9-12 gusting to 15 perhaps (no wind instruments) No chop due to the north breeze. Before the start wind was about 010 and would shift between 350 and 020.
The oscillation pattern was probably figure-out-able, but it seemed to be different on different places on the course owing likely to land effects. Obvious streaks of pressure on the water. And lulls. Picking a side didn’t seem to matter much. It appeared lighter on the west (left) side of the course but Pink boat did well on us when we went to the right. And they took the east side (right) on the way down and while they sat in a lull for a bit they clearly had better pressure than we did.
It was very confusing. At V, right in front of the club, the wind was fickle and very soft. Very soft.

Race Result

Brandon on the Pink boat and our team on Red, 320. Only two boats. We were second by a long shot.

Race Review

Howard and I arrived about 1500 intentionally to have some consideration time with the boat. With Sam, Glenn and Matt’s help we launched and went over to the attenuator. Howard and I rigged thinking CAREFULLY and REPEATEDLY about how to run the sheets, the tack line, the halyards.. We worked with the Vakaros to get some insight about his to use it (more to learn there). We got out on the water with time to work out our processes for the hoist/gybe/takedown of the asym. We even worked out the Vakaros tacking angle and wind shift tracker - but we didn’t get the line pinged right. This preliminary time made the sailing much more enjoyable and less frantic. We will need less prelim time soon but we should never put ourselves in a position where we have to jump on board and race.

We started with PHRF 1, which was the whole fleet. While we needed to fight for clear air and not suffer the blanketing of the larger boats, we really only had one competitor, Pink boat. I decided that sticking to Pink boat and jousting with him was the best learning we could do.
Yes they were a crew of veterans from last year’s program and knew the boat and the conditions way better than we did, it was still I believe the smart thing to do to stay with them and learn. We selected the boat side even though the pin was favoured in order to allow us to clear out air and tack out to port if we were being effected by the larger boats. Pink had the same idea. We attempted to hold them up on the outside of the RC. Shizaru, an Abbott 33, was also angling for the RC boat and was coming in with speed.
When we dropped out of the dial up I headed directly for Shizaru and saw they were going to leave us room at the RC but not much.
Pink had circles and was behind us. With Shizaru’s position I didn’t believe there was enough room for Pink to get a hook. But strangely Shizaru bore away, we went with them - because we were all early - but because Shizaru went down faster than we did, Pink was able to get a hook on us. It was a daring move for Pink to slip between us and Shizaru. Clever. They did hook us, they were close to our aft quarter, their bow to just overlapping our stern. Of course Pink shouted for us to come up - and we did, slowly. They were so close that had I gone up faster the swing of my transom would have contacted their stern - and so we had to go up steadily but not as fast as they would like - their own fault for being so close. Not everyone on board our boat agreed with my recollection.
Nonetheless at bang we were over the line. We found a hole and dropped back, the individual recall came down we turned up and it went back up again - we turned back again and it went down again. The person holding the recall flag looked distracted… Anyway Pink got away and we took off after them heading east side course right. 25% way up the course the RC announced a general recall for our start. Saved by the cluster on the RC - hurray. Second start we again stuck with Pink. More learning to do. This time perhaps gun shy (and lacking an accurate ping of the line on the Varakos) Pink got a better start. They headed on stbd, as soon as we were clear we tacked, hoping that they would be stuck on stbd by a windward boat. They were, but they ducked it and stayed on top of us. I expect they too saw the race as only between them and us. We saw pressure on the right (east) and so we legged it over there. They came with us, covering but they go run over by a J80, and so they tacked away. Taking the left side. We were lifted more or less steadily as we travelled. And we liked the pressure. When we came together with Pink again, they were lower and head. Then they got stuck behind the Olson. It was one of those gleeful ‘aw that’s too bad’ moments for us. Because of that we beat them to the windward mark. We had a slow set - problem with - hmm, I don’t know - reminder from the crew? Pink headed after us but they didn’t stay because another J80 was coming to mess up their day. They gybed away to the right (east) side. They certainly had better pressure than we did it seemed. I have to get in my thick head that lower wind pressure means high angles with an asym for best VMG. When will I be able to move my arm to reflect what my head knows?? At the gate we had chosen the RC, but it turned out the pin was closer - we should have gybed and gone with Pink which rounded the pin. I decided that following them was not a way to beat them, and we saw pressure (I thought) on the right, and so we went RC.
That was the fatal judgment - they made serious gains on the left and the final downwind they were gone. Moral - STAY WITH THE ONLY OTHER BOAT WE ARE CARE ABOUT - we were match racing - a split is Dangerous. Duh. If we had stayed with them, it would have been a boat speed race. My decisions made it a boat speed AND location race. Was it fun? Hell yes. No PHRF parade, we were either in front or we we not. And the boats offer a lot to learn. Oh yes and it wasn’t too cold!