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Lessons in Log Canoe Racing
June 29th, 2009 in Regattas, Monday Morning Tactician.
After more than my fair share of overseas Starboat competition, traveling around the country to match-race, or race on the Melges 32 circuit, I lucked into being in the US during the first Log Canoe race of the season hosted by the Miles River Yacht Club on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. For those who haven’t seen Log Canoes in action this will give you some indication: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPFjZlWnGBs
The boats are essentially 100-year-old, 35-foot canoes that have two 50 foot masts and ridiculous amounts of sail area spread among three upwind sails a spinnaker and a “kite,” demanding up to twelve crew that scramble out removable planks in lieu of trapeze wires. They are international canoes x 10! They are constantly unstable, requiring the crew to run in and out of the boards all the time responding to the call “Weight!” every time a puff or lull hits the boat. Maneuvers are a mission. Every tack and gybe means nine people have to slip down their respective boards into the center as the boat heads into the turn. They have to pull the boards out from under the old leeward rail, throw them across to the new side, stuff them under the new leeward rail and start running out to the end without slipping off, dragging a board in the water, or any delay in order for the boat not to teeter over an capsize.
Capsizing is a race-ending situation. The sails have to come off and the masts have to come out while the boat is turned over. Then the boat has to be righted, bailed out and then the masts have to be put up again. It’s a wild scene to say the least!
Eight boats raced this weekend in St. Michaels on the Miles River. Berry Kurland was at the helm of the Silver Heel this weekend with a crew of former Georgetown sailors, and other DC-ites, but otherwise rookies to the Log Canoe circuit. Berry’s grandfather owns the boat and the regular crew handed over the boards to us for the weekend with a snicker, I’m sure, enjoying every moment of our pain and joy learning the ins and outs of the boat. Needless to say we had three wonderful races. The first race on Saturday afternoon was actually going quite well until our fourth gybe got a little squirrely and the boat went on its ear in a hurry! I think only 4 boats finished of the 9 who started. Wipeouts were abundant, keeping the spectators happy. We had an ugly go in the first race Sunday, thanks to very fickle breeze and a couple of unlucky shifts, and were 6th across the line in the 9 boat fleet. But we pulled off four gybes and more than our fair share of tacks on the 6+ mile course, so we’ll call it a moral victory. On the second race Sunday we decided to mix it up a bit and save ourselves a maneuver by starting on port. The long tack up the first beat was port and I was actually surprised more boats didn’t employ the same strategy, but I could not have been happier with my call when the rest of the fleet had to put two tacks in for our one. We rounded third and were fourth across the line. The boats slow down so much during a tack, it is very much like keel boat sailing in the sense that you need to plan your turns out literally minutes ahead to make sure that a) you’re doing the right thing and b) that your entire crew is on the same page. They a ton of fun to sail. What a weekend! We can’t wait to do it again.
2nd Place Finish at Ficker Cup
June 15th, 2009 in Regattas, Monday Morning Tactician.
I just arrived back in DC after a weekend in Long Beach racing the Catalina 37s for the 2009 Ficker Cup. Six other teams took part in the Grade 3 Match Race regatta held as a qualifier to the Congressional Cup also held at LBYC every year. The format for the three days of racing was three round robins, that’s it. I was calling tactics for Dave Perry in sort of a match race debut, especially in the heavy keelboats. Needless to say, I learned a ton about momentum during the weekend. We came out of the box well winning the first two races in very light air, but finished the first round robin with three bad starts and a couple of careless errors that would come back to haunt us. The rest of the series went quite well. As the sun came out and the breeze filled in, our more experienced crew-work showed to be an advantage going 5-1 on Saturday and winning all three races on Sunday, including a nailbiter with Sally Barkow’s team in the last race. Even with that win, Sally and the girls’ boat sailed a wonderfully consistent series and were able to stay ahead of us in the win column even as we were going on our tear Saturday and Sunday.
Here’s a link to some great photos and a description of the weekend:
http://www.sail-world.com/USA/Barkow-makes-history-at-2009-Ficker-Cup/57887
The game of momentum was the biggest concept that I took away from the weekend. So many of the races were over and done with about 2 minutes to go before the start. Often the first boat up to speed was the boat that won the race, especially in the lighter conditions. In the final race of the regatta, Sally had a better start than us, taking the left and forcing us into traffic, splitting right. By the time we came back to them halfway up the beat, they were 5 lengths ahead thanks to a lefty and more solid pressure. We rounded the windward mark behind and immediately gybed. Instead of conservatively matching us or beating us to the gybe, Sally’s team extended on port toward the starboard layline. The turning point of the race was halfway down the first run when Sally’s boat didn’t pick the layline correctly into the leeward mark. Even with a 5 boatlength lead, the race was immediately in our favor. Here’s why:
When Sally gybed inside of the starboard layline, she was forced to make a crucial decision: 1. Sail normal VMG and risk two quick gybes at the bottom of the leg, or 2. Sail lower than normal and lay the mark at slightly slower speed. She chose to soak low and that bleeding of momentum ultimately cost them the lead one leg later. We crossed her breeze once as she was low and slow already, giving her a touch of bad air, and then gybing on a layline for full speed into the mark. She rounded 4 lengths ahead but did not get up to full speed by the time we got the mark and rolled into a tack. She tacked to cover and we went right back forcing her to make a decision to cover or split. We went tack for tack 5 or 6 times up the beat, each time not letting her get up to full speed before we tacked back out of phase. We were able to put a close duck with Sally’s team about three lengths shy of the starboard tack layline and then got a piece of them on starboard going into the top mark. The race was by no means over, we battled it out, gybing three times and then luffing her before gybing back to the finish line under jib alone to snag a last race victory.
The biggest lesson that I took away from this weekend’s racing, beyond more bow work than I ever knew a tactician had to do… was the effect of consequences of events that happen long before they make an impact. Being downspeed at a leeward mark, if properly antagonized can make a significant impact on the race 6 minutes later at the next mark. One downspeed circle in the pre-start can lose an entire race before it even starts. I’m excited to learn more about the match race game as I get more into it. This regatta turned out to be a great experience in the 37s. Congratulations again to Sally and her team!
Delta Lloyd Regatta Wrap-up
June 2nd, 2009 in Training, Regattas, Monday Morning Tactician.
What a week it turned out to be in Holland! The sun was out and the breeze was on for the last four days of the regatta, a phenomenon that does not often happen in northern Europe. We were treated to some great racing from the Dutch organizers and race committees who are legendary for running on-time races and never letting a boat over early slip past them.
Sunday’s medal race was no different. We watched the Finn and Men’s 470 races from the coach boat, but the course was set up less than 100 yards from the shoreline, so a crowd of locals and sailors alike stood and watched the action. The courses were windward-leeward three times around the smaller than average track for a target time of around 30 minutes, instead of the regular hour and fifteen minute races we had been having all week. The intensity ramps up for these short sprints and you would be amazed at the stuff that happens. We were cheering on the radials during their race on Saturday night and Paige Railey flipped near the top mark after leading the first leg, then the local dutch girl behind her sailed to the finish after only two laps while the fleet rounded the marks to head upwind for the last lap. Ed Wright from England in the Finn class re-started after being over the line and even with the light air, he battled back to be second in the race. His competition Giles Scott was top 5 most of the way around the course and was given a rule 42 penalty near the finish.
Our race was no exception to the fact that wild things can happen. The breeze came up in a big way before our race building to 15 knots and paralleling the Medemblik shoreline only a few hundred feet to the left. Brad and I wanted to start to windward of the group and lined up a bit too early for the committee boat end. Hamish Pepper from New Zealand stuck us head-to-wind for the final thirty seconds or so and pushed us to where we thought we were probably over the line. When we got up to speed and the gun went, we heard the X-flag go up and immediately turned back to clear ourselves. We cleared and the flag still did not go down, meaning somebody else in the fleet was over. At the time we didn’t know it was our American cohorts Mark Mendelblatt and Mark Strube, but the photos don’t lie: 
After clearing ourselves we had to fight to get back into the race. Luckily, there are enough mark roundings during these short races that boats ahead go slow quite often. We knew we had to finish right next to the Croatian boat to beat them overall, and Mark was winning the race so we couldn’t worry about him. We finally caught the fleet at the second leeward marks. The German team tied for the lead rounded just ahead of us on starboard. They didn’t see us so close behind and tacked to port fouling us and were forced to take a penalty after some coaxing from the jury. We were able to catch our New Zealander buddies from the start because Hamish and Craig had broken their jib downhaul and couldn’t get proper jib trim. That left only one boat between us and the Croatians. Regatta leaders Robert Schiedt and Bruno Prada were the only boat to the left, and would prove to be a tough boat to catch on the final run to the finish. Instead of putting out effort into catching Robert and Bruno, we hounded the Croatian team to ensure that the Brazilians passed them. By covering the breeze of the Croatians, Robert was able to sail right around them to take fourth in the race leaving us to take 6th right behind the Croatians and defend our position in the standings. When we crossed the finish line and saw Mark’s number on the board we knew that we had moved up the leaderboard to take 5th overall in the regatta! After clawing back from being on the course side of the line at the start, we couldn’t have been happier with the result and it just goes to show that you can never give up in tough situations. We really did create our own luck in this week’s medal race.
Next on the agenda for Brad and me is to plan out and go to Kiel regatta in the star boat. This transition into the new class has gone much better than either of us could have imagined. I had high expectations, and am very pleased with how the progress is going. We need to sort out some upwind boatspeed, our downwind speed is where we’re really making our gains. But without help from some continued and new sponsorships, we wouldn’t be able to continue. With support from US Sailing Team Alphagraphics and our continued relationships with Sperry Top-sider, Kaenon Polarized and now Z-blok, as well as a number of private donors, we have been able to make a strong push into a new realm in the sport.
Full results at: deltalloydregatta.org
You can follow the medal race track here taken from the GPS systems on board for the final day.
Photos and more from: deltalloydregatta.org/2009
Revenge of the Squareboats
March 18th, 2009 in Monday Morning Tactician.
Just got back from taking a classic east coast route up I-95 with one Laser left on the roof and a Star in tow. Its a testament to the strength of the sport that there were about fifty Snipes on Biscayne Bay as we finished our last race of the Bacardi Cup with sixty Stars. But while driving I saw at least a dozen Lightnings passing me in the other direction as well as a Viper or two headed north with me. There has to be something going on when all the boats except the Viper are hard-chined square-bottom boats, but I guess we’ll put that up to some pram complex that we’re all trying to outlive. Between the Star regattas in Miami, the Snipe and Lightnings also have their respective circuits, the sport seems to be doing remarkably well albeit slightly down in numbers the good ol’ classes are still running strong. Now I just sound like a politician “The fundamentals of our sport are strong…” Here’s a look at the sailing that went on this past week, Etchells Jaguar Series with Dr Steve Horowitz on Biscayne Bay, followed by a day off, then Acura Miami Race Week, overlapping with the Star Bacardi Cup. Doesn’t get much better than that:
Follow-up to Key West Protest.
January 27th, 2009 in Monday Morning Tactician.
I’m totally astounded and impressed by the outpouring of responses from so many people. While I certainly have my own opinions about the incident, I was most happy to hear one response: “Isn’t it interesting that so many people can look at the same incident on film and still have different opinions of right and wrong?” Juries do have a hard time deciphering when two people talk about an incident that happened hours before. Even when there is photo or video evidence, the truth might not always come out.
What I think is most relevant from our conversation is that sailors really need to make sure that they make the right choices when approaching close situations. In our position, coming in from two to three boatlengths shy of the port tack layline to the pin, we did have a few options from 200 yards out. We could have:
a. ducked both starboard tackers
b. lee-bowed and risked a foul and not lay the finishing line anchor chain
c. close cross
A duck of that magnitude from our perspective would have been out of the question. We were an entire boatlength ahead of the other two boats, and would have had to start planning for the duck before Red had lee-bowed Bitipi in the final approach for the finish.
A lee-bow would have been a viable option and as you might see in the video our tactician called for the lee-bow and dropped our jib trimmer off the rail, until I told him we were crossing and sent him back out for a final hike.
The close cross was ultimately the call we chose to make.
The rules for keeping clear and avoiding contact are always very difficult ones to get around. I feel that we did keep clear. Red felt that they did avoid contact, those were facts found in the protest hearing. The rule protects the right-of-way boat, and leaves the onus squarely on the shoulders of the keep-clear boat to prove themselves innocent. The question that people need to ask themselves for their every-day boatracing is “How much distance do I consider enough to be keeping clear?” I am well aware that for some that may be 10 feet. I will point out that if we had ducked and missed those boats by 6 inches, they would not have protested us for “not keeping clear.” However in match racing a boat is keeping clear even if its bow swings over top of the other boat’s transom (check out Match Racing Call Ump7, page 17). There is a case where the boats are overlapped, taking up the same water and still keeping clear of one and other. In order to all be on the same page it might be worth having this discussion amongst your local fleet so that you’re clear with one and other and the racing can be fair and good.
I’m happy to continue the discussion in the forum of reply-posts on the site, but please keep the personal bashing out of it. Last week I wrote about how people shouldn’t take protests so seriously. There are no personal vendettas out there. Sometimes races come down to inches and need to be decided with a refresher from the rulebook. Boatracing wouldn’t be fun if we didn’t make it close every once in a while.
Anybody interested in Miami OCR can check out this link. We’ve had two days of really nice breeze. I’m fresh into the Star class, going on two hands for the number of days in the boat and really loving it, learning a heck of a lot as well.
Close Cross… You make the call!
January 25th, 2009 in Monday Morning Tactician.
After a fantastic week of sailing in Key West, I’m left wanting for more great Melges 32 racing, but with a decidedly bitter taste in my mouth about an incident for which our team was thrown out on the last race Thursday. Regardless of reputation, SailingAnarchy may prove to vindicate us from a tough protest at the finish line of a race this past weekend thanks to some video shot from their on-the-water studio. In the spirit of sailboat racing, we’ll have you take a look at the video and then have you keep reading to see what happened in the room (I’d recommend turning down the volume for any innocent ears). We were on board Ninkasi, the incident occurs about 30 seconds into the video.
Alright, now that you’ve seen the video… (more…)
Protest!… What’s the big deal? -or- A Case for Arbitration
January 13th, 2009 in Monday Morning Tactician, General.
In the game of basketball, players commit fouls all the time. Even in a non-contact sport, infractions are going to happen. It would be ridiculous to throw a basketball player out of the game in the first quarter as soon as he committed one minor foul. Then why in sailing is it reasonable to penalize a boat with a DSQ for a penalty that happened in the pre-start of a race? What if that incident happened and the other boat didn’t want to have to throw that boat out, should the incident be simply overlooked? If we were talking about basketball the play would not be overlooked. Play would be whistled dead, the player would be singled out, the reason for the call would be briefly explained, the player would have a foul added to his five-foul limit and play would resume.
Last week we saw a letter posted in Scuttlebutt from a senior judge obviously bothered by the recent protest activities in the Volvo Ocean Race:
Ted Beier, Senior Judge: (re, Volvo Ocean Race story in #2755) Shame on
the jury for allowing Telefonica Blue to withdraw their protest for reasons of
scores. If Blue felt that a foul had been committed at the time she should go
through with the protest regardless of other considerations. That’s how the game
is supposed to be played. Using a protest or not following through with a
protest as a strategic tool for score considerations is NOT how the game should
be played.
While I agree with Mr Beier’s assessment that if there was a rule broken, then a penalty should be imposed, I think this is a great example of a problem in the sport of sailing. The discrepancy between taking a penalty turn on the water and the DSQ penalty is too large for the culture of the sport to properly police itself. The stigma of having to take another team into a protest is simply too aggressive for most sailors to follow through, relative the foul that may have occurred. So the foul goes unresolved.
The sport of sailing inherently entails a lot of give and take between sailors both on and off the water. Sailing advertises itself as a “self-policing sport,” for the most part. That said, match racing, team racing, medal races, and most dinghy fleet races all have some form of on-the-water umpires or judges on the water for their top and mid-level events. It has been a great equalizer in the game as on the water judging has become more common for the policing of rule 42 especially, but for cutting down on the level of protests at team race and match race events as well. The legendary stories of team race events being decided after midnight in a dimly lit room are so easily avoided now with merely the presence of an umpire on the water to prevent frivolous fouls, or make a cut and dry call that would previously have taken a ten minute hearing to sort out.
While things are improving, the vast majority of boatracing still falls under the self-policing mentality even when there is jury on the water. The biggest issue holding sailing back from a viable self-policing atmosphere is the gap between taking a 720 and risking going to the room. The stigma around sitting in a protest room lingers from those hearings that lasted until midnight in the days of yore. People are nervous in the protest room. You go into a room with a panel of judges to talk about time and distances that happened hours earlier. If you were on trial for a felony you would only have one judge to deal with, but if you lightly brush your spinnaker against a leeward boat, you have to face a panel of three!
Often fouls go unresolved such as in the recent situation with Telefonica in the VOR. Incidents happen on the water where two boats disagree on whether or not there has been a foul. They take place all the time. But, if the incident wasn’t egregious, then there are two courses of action, two boats will opt to blow it off and say “You owe me one.” The stigma of going into a hearing is such that people would just as soon avoid it. The worst part of the cultural structure often evident in sailing is that the social capital used up by taking somebody to the protest room is more important to most people than avoiding the protest room altogether and vowing to never let it happen again. Not to make a judgment about people in the sport… I know for a fact that sailors are good people, but I’m with Ted Beier when he is irritated by Telefonica backing out of a protest when an obvious foul occurs. If you know a foul occurs, it is your responsibility to protest. If you are not comfortable with protesting… then we need to change the system so that the protest hearing has less of a stigma surrounding it.
The system of arbitration is the direction in which the protest hearing should evolve. Collegiate teamracing had a “three-minute justice” protest system for a while that cleaned up lengthy hearings. Arbitration can do the same thing. What usually happens in arbitration is the two parties get together with a member of the jury not on the potential protest committee. Each party gives a quick story about what they thought happened and then the jury member gives his opinion about who he thinks is likely to be thrown out and take a DSQ if the parties went to a protest hearing. If the losing party understands the judge’s quick response, then he can take an arbitration penalty which is usually 20%, or something far less than a DSQ (100% penalty). In most arbitration systems the protesting party can still take it to a protest and file for full DSQ or risk being thrown out themselves. Sometime the protest room is necessary to clean up cases of damage or when there are multiple boats involved, but often times they take too much time and are too formal for the minor nature of many incidents in the rules. How is it that somebody taking too much room at a mark can earn the same penalty as two boats crashing into each other port v starboard?
By taking capital punishment off the table, on the water fouls are more likely to be resolved in a matter where a) sailors learn the rules through discourse with a member of the jury and b) penalties are given out when fouls occur. Lying in the protest room stops. Procedural hang-ups for egregious fouls stop. Intimidation in the boatpark aimed to prevent people from filing protests stop. Avoiding the protest room stops. The stigma ends. I would argue that if there were an arbitration system in every regatta this year, there would be more protests and more penalties given out at first, but would lead to an improved quality of sailing in the long-term. As it stands the number of infractions that occur far outnumber the number of protests filed. There are entire days at the Laser World Championships I’ve raced in where 150 boats sailed 15 mark roundings, two thirds of the fleet getting there in a minute or less and not a single protest got filed. It is absurd to think that every incident gets resolved properly, but the stigma of the current protest system remains.
Arbitration could get us away from that cultural faux pas that is the protest room. Have a discussion with your planning committee next time you’re going to host a regatta. Ask yourselves whether arbitration is a better option. To learn more: ISAF’s Guidelines for Arbitration
Agree to Disagree… Tactical Minds at Odds
December 18th, 2008 in Monday Morning Tactician.
In an attempt to regroup after the campaign, I’ve neglected writing on the site, watched the readership dwindle as I’ve tried to recharge my batteries. The posts I’ve made have reflected the sailing that I’ve been doing. The Melges 24 dominated my fall schedule sailing a number of weekends with Stu McNay and Vincent Porter. We did some teamrace training with the Silver Panda team to help prepare for their upcoming world championships. The Melges 32 season has kicked into gear and I’m happy to be involved with the Ninkasi team and John Taylor. I’ve started writing some for Sailing World magazine, adapting some of the columns written for this site. I’ve started work at the Georgetown athletic department writing donor reports and helping with the advancement and fundraising department. The next move will be to get my energy focused. I’ve put the lasers up for charter and ultimately up for sale in an attempt to race in the star class at this winter’s Miami OCR and Bacardi Cup. I’m looking into the possibility of getting involved in some match racing starting with Dave Perry’s open clinic in January. There is certainly plenty on the docket, but it never seems like as much going on when you’re not sailboat racing 9-5 during an Olympic campaign. Without a doubt I’m jealous of the guys in Melbourne right now racing the first of the new World Cup Series.
The best part about this fall has been the heavy dose of learning material I’ve submitted myself to. Taking notes about Melges 24 tuning, or trimming a Melges 32 mainsail are skills I certainly wasn’t picking up in the Laser. And being able to translate my tactical game from Laser sailing into a crewed environment has been as rewarding as I knew it would be. Perhaps the most interesting part about sailing with a few different people and not having the tiller in my hand has been developing an understanding about how sailors’ mindsets differ so greatly. Sailing with Stu McNay on his new-to-him 24-footer was an insight into how different two successful sailing strategies can be. We had a lengthy discussion on the way in about a disagreement we had during the a race the day we picked up that man-overboard in Annapolis. He couldn’t figure out for the life of him what I was thinking, purely based on the numbers and the fact that we were lifted when I had called for a tack. Does the helmsman always have perfect information because he is staring at the compass numbers and it is clear whether we’re lifted or headed? Or does the helmsman have imperfect information because he cannot focus on the traffic around him enough to develop a necessary tactical advantage. I called for the tack because, regardless of whether we were lifted, threat of the fleet gaining leverage to the other side of us demanded our action. In my head, I knew that if the we followed the fleet, staying between it and the mark, we would be able to plant ourselves directly ahead going into the mark removing the effect of any further shift up the race course. I felt strongly that we had the opportunity to take the single scariest factor in boatracing out of the equation: the windshift. Stu’s argument was irritatingly valid: if we were on the lifted tack, and the fleet was on the headed tack gaining leverage the wrong direction… then all we needed to do was continue on until we got the next header and in doing so increase our lead. Well, doesn’t that just sound like a piece of cake! If it were always that easy.
We laughed our way through the options we had at that point in the race. As shown in the fact that Stu listened to his tactician and tacked when asked and argued afterwards, we were capable of having a valuable conversation. At the center of our disagreement was the essence of sailing tactics and strategy: 1. add risk and increase your lead and cushion any boatspeed or boadhandling mistakes, or 2. eliminate risk and take a slight loss knowing that you can keep a lead in close quarters. I was willing to take a potential slight loss in distance (by tacking off a header) in order to ensure lead position going around the next mark. Stu was willing to take a small risk (say risk potentially ten percent of gains made that race) in order to create an insurmountable lead thanks to a possible windshift. Both attitudes have the same strategy and endgame: to put our boat in a controlling, leading position for the next leg. We just had two different tactical ideas about how to make that happen. Oddly both strategies would have likely worked. Both of our strategies would have beaten the fleet to the next mark. His with the ten percent risk that we didn’t get the next shift and mine with the five percent risk that we would have two terrible tacks… Agree to disagree?
Good luck to Team USA in Melbourne.
Monday Morning Tactician: 29 September 2008
September 29th, 2008 in Monday Morning Tactician.
I made it back on the water this weekend on Long Island Sound racing aboard Rima2 a Reichel/Pugh 55 based out of Stamford, CT. Having spent some time on boats of that size, I certainly knew what to expect, but in reality it was one of the first times I had been given total responsibility for tactical decisions and no more. Not having to worry about helming thanks to owner John Brim, and not having to worry about navigation and timing thanks to Ed Cesare and Molly Baxter, I was able to just put my head into the tactical challenge of getting a boat faster than the rest of the fleet through slower traffic.
The 55-footer was slightly bigger and better equipped than most of the boats in our class, so we spent much of the weekend racing against the clock, which is certainly a concept I’m not all that accustomed to. Getting off the starting line very well twice and clearing nicely in the third race, I was quite pleased with the fact that we got the boat pointed in the direction we planned to go each of the three first beats. The difficult part of racing is then to get the crew and the boat re-focused on getting into the speed groove, minimizing the number of turns, and staying out of traffic as much as possible so that we could maximize our time spent at full-speed. In one-design racing, tactical decision-making is so often focused on positioning and boat to boat interaction. Both of those ideas balanced with a focus on boatspeed make one-design racing the multifaceted sport that we love. IRC and PHRF racing is an entirely different animal where ratings become such a large part of the mentality that it can be hard to switch the rounded tactical mindset into one centered on positioning the boat in places where it’s speed can be maximized. It took me a few legs to realize that was the biggest factor.
The breeze was light as we headed out and quickly built to about fifteen knots ahead of forecasted rain. Unfortunately, the boat’s mast was tuned for the forecasted range of 4-8 knots and in the first couple races I think we were slightly slow because of the complacency to stay with that setting instead of hurrying to fix it. Regardless, we got off the line well in the first race, pulled out to leeward of the group, tacked, crossed and centered up on the racecourse ultimately making a commitment to fewer tacks and the upper right side of the racecourse. Unsure of the layline capabilities of the boat, I let Ed call the first couple laylines and tried my best to confirm his calls. A small left in the last few hundred yards to the mark really left us pinching into the first top mark. We sailed the starboard tack header down the run and ultimately gybed a bit shy of the port tack layline and had to sail deeper than optimal for the last bit of that leg as well. We corrected the mistake for the next lap, but overall had great boathandling from the group allowing me to make calls through the traffic of the other two fleets and finish very close to the next two boats on time. I learned very quickly how sailing those less-than-optimal angles for any amount of time can be detrimental in the IRC/PHRF formats. For the rest of the day I felt the need to be a bit more conservative and go a little deeper before committing to tacking. Ultimately, sailing fatter into marks was a better play for the boat, but learning that nuance took a racing context to really understand.
One of the big lessons I learned by simply being in the tactician role was to be louder and more vocal to the rest of the crew as necessary. On board our boat, the helmsman’s role was one to make the boat go straight and make its maneuvers as quickly and smoothly as possible. There was very little need for any coaching through the turns, even in traffic. But once I had thought the next few moves through in my head, consulted the navigator, and talked over the helmsman’s shoulder so he could start visualizing what was going to happen, it was then my role to relay those plans to the rest of the ten guys forward so that they could have time to work out their next move, ask questions if necessary and properly prepare for the upcoming maneuver. We had a choice at one point to go with a flatter reaching sail for a triangle course that the race committee set for us instead of the regular windward-leewards. In the only boat-handling issue of the day, that sail went up with only the head and tack attached leaving the sheets slack on the deck and the clew whipping out to leeward as we burned off our speed down the first reach. Knowing that I had to be in a more vocal role, it was my position on the boat to call the mast man to “Hold” before dropping the jib, allowing us to at least have two sails up for the rest of the time down the leg before we could pull up the bigger spinnaker.
We had a couple of classic, tactician v. helmsman conversations through the weekend where I asked him to put the boat through a gap that he wasn’t sure we could shoot, or tacking across a boat he wasn’t sure we could cross, but all in all it was a very satisfying experience where the boat went where I knew the boat could go. One situation in particular impressed me. We were approaching the windward mark in the midst of a J122 clump. We were on the port layline with the leader of their group, just ahead on the starboard layline. Making the call that we could not lee-bow effectively, I pushed the team to hold on port, and follow the transom of the J boat into a tack. As soon as we tacked, I snuck down to leeward to get a view of the afterguard of the boat ahead. With about 200 yards left into the mark, he motioned to me that he wanted us to go through them to leeward so that we wouldn’t roll them or be hoisting directly on top of their breeze as we both turned down the run. Considering he was leading his group, I would have wanted the same thing. I love when rational people can successfully communicate with each other with one wave of the hand. When I came back up to the rail and let our helmsman know the next play, he took a double take and asked me if I was serious. I let our jib man know we were going to crack of and foot to leeward of the boat ahead. We broke through their bad air in about a boatlength’s time, and rounded the mark just bow-ahead.
In another case, we had been sailing on starboard for quite some time and two slower J44s were going to cross us from the left side of the racecourse. From a long distance out, I could see that they would be in play, but that their crosses would be close. The last thing I wanted was a short lee-bow from a J44, the last thing the driver of the J44 wanted was to have to leebow a 55-footer and get rolled, or be forced to take a massive duck. To ease his tensions about the close situation, I made eye contact from a few hundred feet out and waved them across. Only at that point did I tell our helmsman that there were a couple boats coming across our bow. There was never any need for change of course on either boat, but often hyper-tension at the wheel leads to irrational action. The boats crossed without trouble and we were able to keep the boat going upwind at optimum VMG.
Monday Morning Tactician Says: It’s always good to have a bit of conversation going between competitors around the racecourse. Often sailboats only talk to each other when there is a foul or in some tense situation. I find that most of the time its worthwhile to have the other boat know your intentions, more often than not they are parallel to your competitor’s.
The quick summary of the weekend is that I was impressed by the cohesiveness and fluidity of the crew onboard Rima2. I think the group was well rehearsed and well prepared for the situations that we got into, and in that sense it was great to be able to step into the tactician’s seat. There were some communication items that we overcame as well as some improved understanding of the rating-style of sailing, but all in all a good experience for me. I’m really looking forward to more sailing like it, next step is finding somebody who’ll have me on board.
Photo from this weekend
(I’m behind the helmsman with the brown hat)
Next on the agenda is the move up the hill here in Washington DC to a slightly bigger place. Next week the entire US Olympic Team has been invited to attend a reception at the White House, I guess now that Mr Bush has submitted his version of the market-recovery-plan, he’s just going to host the team for the next couple of months until he’s out of office. Looming on the horizon is the Melges 24 North Americans to be held in Annapolis at the Eastport Yacht Club. Can’t wait to get racing there.
Holland Wrap-up & Full Medal Race Report
May 27th, 2008 in Regattas, Monday Morning Tactician.
Photo: Delta Lloyd Regatta. Thanks to: Sperry Top-Sider, Magic Marine, Kaenon Polarized
(note: the GPS attached to the lower mast, see bottom for race link)
First Impressions: Sailing a great qualifier series followed by an ugly day of gold fleet racing at Delta Lloyd Holland Regatta this past week was almost an opposite image of the Hyeres regatta scores that I put up a few weeks earlier (where I had a tough qualifier series and a stellar couple of days in gold fleet to end the series). The big difference in Medemblik this week was the overall positioning going into the last day being vastly different. After five days of racing in Hyeres I was only able to come back to 15th or so, whereas in Holland I fell only three spots from my high-point in the regatta and was able to enter the medal race in 8th place.
Gold Fleet: The Gold fleet day of our event was a fair amount breezier than the previous three, but the results stumble cannot be attributed to simply different conditions, but instead to just having a tough day on the water in terms of picking first beats. Where I was able to get off the line and into the first pressure about 80% of the time earlier in the week, I missed on all three first beats of the Gold fleet day leaving me in positions where I had to scramble to come back in order to maintain my top ten standing in the regatta.
The Medal Race:
The medal race day was significantly windier… (more…)