A bit fresh

Yesterday we only went out for quite a short practice, because the breeze was pretty fresh - somewhere around 20 knots, probably, with gusts up in the high twenties. Certainly not conditions we can't cope with if we have to, but more than we wanted to go out in and risk breaking anything so soon before the regatta. What made it a bit unusual, from what we understand of the normal weather here, is that this was basically wind from a weather system rather than a strong sea breeze, so it was blowing along the shore from the west southwest rather than the usual southerly that we see in the afternoons here.

The sea conditions were quite testing: the waves were only about a metre high but they were quite short, not too different from the six metre length of the boat. The effect of that is that it's very easy to drive off the top of one wave down and into the face of the next one. The bow of the boat dips under the water and a few bucketfuls of water slide back over the foredeck and hit the wooden wave guide. When things work well, the water all splashes off to the sides and none gets back into the cockpit. However, it's all too common for some of the water to splash up over the guide and into the cockpit (and into the faces of the crew and helm). We do have self-bailers in the bottom of the boat so we shouldn't fill up, but they don't work well when the boat is constantly being slowed down by the waves, so in those conditions the boat tends to fill up with water and get slower and slower. This is one area where Ffirst Offspring loses out in comparison with the more modern boats, which are flatter and therefore have a bit more bouyancy forward of the mast. In very light conditions we have an advantage sailing upwind, but when it gets choppy that bouyancy helps keep them out of the waves and going fast.

Having said that, more important than the shape is how hard the crew and helm work to keep the boat level. In conditions like yesterday, it's especially important to hike hard. We're not allowed a trapeze in the flying fifteen, so to project your weight out from the side of the boat you've got to put your feet under the hiking straps, lean back and support your own weight. It's times like this that I wish I'd somehow found a bit more time to get to the gym! The hiking straps are the black straps in this photo. They are adjustable - you can see the yellow line with black flecks - and with the straps let out as far as they will go you can sit with just your ankles inside the cockpit, your knees at the gunwhale and the rest of your body outside the boat. Some guys in the fleet are fit and strong enough to be able to sail like that, but I find I can only maintain that for a few minutes. So I'll be hoping for conditions more like the previous two days and less like yesterday for the regatta.

How the Worlds works

Yesterday I promised an explanation of the different events and how qualification works.

The big event we're all here for is the Flying Fifteen World Championship, which runs from 10th to 15th January. It's a seven race series, so there should be one race a day for most days and two races on one day (or more, if we miss any races because of bad weather). However, not all the boats in Melbourne will be able to compete in this event. There are 116 boats entered, but at most 79 will be allowed to compete in the World Championship itself. Most of the overseas boats have already qualified to represent their nation: each national association has a number of representatives based on the number of registered boats in their fleet. So the UK has over twenty representatives, whereas NZ has only six. However, there won't be 79 spaces used up by these representatives, and any remaining spaces are available to the highest placed finishers in the Australian National Championship, which is raced from 4th to 7th January. In the past these simply used to go to the highest placed finishers regardless of nationality, but they have recently changed this rule so that at least six of the extra spaces are available to overseas boats and at least four are available to boats of the host nation.

At the same time as the World Championship there will be three other events running, for Classics (boats with sail numbers up to 2700), Silvers (boats with sail numbers from 2701 to 3200) and an Open division for boats which did not qualify for the Worlds.

At 3088, Ffirst Offspring is in the Silver fleet. However, we're hoping to do well enough in the Nationals to get into the World Championship proper. We'll just have to see how well we get on come Monday, when the preparation is over and the racing proper begins...

For both series, there are seven races, with the low points scoring system (1 point for first, 2 points for second and so on), with all races to count if 4 or fewer races are completed and with the worst score discarded if 5 or more races are completed.

Its beak can hold more than its bellycan ...

Preparations are continuing here. We went out for another practice sail yesterday, in slightly lighter conditions than the day before. The sea breeze is very tricky to sail in, constantly changing in pressure and direction, and it's easy to find yourself with the sails and mast set for the wind as it was 30 seconds ago rather than as it is now.


Meanwhile, Wendy and Teresa went out exploring and discovering the local wildlife...

The racing (for the Nationals) starts on Sunday 4th, so we've still got a few days to get ready. There are still quite a few people who haven't arrived yet, by the looks of things. The UK team's containers are not here, which has caused a bit of consternation, but the latest rumour is that they actually arrived in Melbourne three weeks ago and were too early to be able to be moved to the club, so they are sitting and waiting somewhere nearby and all will be ready in time for them. All the New Zealand containers have now been opened up and the boats are all safe and well - most of the other sailors arrive tomorrow so soon we'll have big fleets out practicing.

OK, I'd better get back to the club now, time for another practice sail. We've got more wind and maybe even some rain showers today - so thoughtful of the Aussies to make us kiwis feel at home!

Tomorrow I'll explain a bit more fully how the competition works, with qualification from the Nationals to race in either the Worlds or the Silver Fleet Regatta.

Welcome to Port Phillip Bay

Yesterday we had our first sail on Port Phillip Bay.

First thing in the morning we came down to put on another coat of varnish and sand down the filler on the keelbolts. Then I went and found an internet cafe, which was why I was able to finally post the last few updates which were all posted together. And then back to the club to go for a sail.


The breeze was a good bit lighter than the day before, with hardly any whitecaps - perfect for shaking out the cobwebs. The weather's supposed to be a bit cooler for the next few days, and then the sunshine (and strong sea breezes) should be back when the racing starts next week.

Unwrapping Time

Saturday morning and time to go down to the yacht club and open up the container. First things first though (or should that be ffirst things ffirst?) – we had to find some coffee! We found a cafe which we'd been told served good breakfasts, but it wasn't open. In fact, none of the cafes were open in that area, though bizarrely enough we would have had a choice of hairdressers who were open before 9am on a Saturday morning during the Christmas Holidays. Only essential services, then …

A bit more exploring and we found a Chocolate Restaurant, which was very tempting, but temptation was resisted and we searched further still. At last we found somewhere serving coffee and breakfast. A couple of long blacks and some bacon and eggs later, we were ready to face the world.

And so to to the yacht club, where we found the container and opened up. Sure enough, everything was still there and more or less as we'd left it …






There was a little bit of shifting around en voyage, which didn't do us any damage but did leave some scratches in the paint of Iff. Nothing too major though – Sally and Neil got on with touching up their paintwork while Fred and I repaired a few spots of varnish that had got knocked off somewhere along the way, and put filler on the keelbolts (which needs doing every time the keel is taken off). So we didn't get to go for a sail today, but we'll pop down first thing in the morning to put another coat of varnish on and then the plan is to go for a sail in the afternoon.

If today is anything to go by then it should be quite a breezy regatta. The forecast on Windguru a few days ago was that today would only have very light winds, but today's newspaper was predicting a sea breeze rising to 15 knots in the afternoon. Sure enough, a southerly breeze built up during the day and by the afternoon it was definitely pretty fresh, with plenty of whitecaps and what looked like quite a chop. The next few days are forecast to be fairly overcast so perhaps we'll not see that seabreeze kicking in, but days like today will make for lively conditions and some testing racing. I can hardly wait!

We Made It!

Another one I wrote earlier... This was written on Boxing Day.

We're here in Melbourne, at last. We picked up our hire car at the airport – a Holden Commodore station wagon with such a capacious luggage area that we didn't even need to stack up the suitcases in the back to fit them all in – and drove out to our accommodation. We've booked in to The Guesthouse, and it's lovely; a nice big old house with wonderful high ceilings and décor to match the character of the house. The only down side is that we don't have any internet access here, so I won't actually get to post this until I can get wireless access at the yacht club, which might take a while to get organised.

When we got off the plane we found a text from one of the other people with a boat in our container to tell us that the container had arrived safely and she'd checked that it was all OK – the only slight problem was that getting to the container required climbing through a hole in the fence next to the Police Station. Hopefully we'll come up with a more respectable arrangement once the yacht club opens up tomorrow...

Are you excited yet?

Hmmmmmm this is a bit of a fake post. I was all set to post this on Christmas Day, the day before we flew out to Melbourne, to say about how excited we were to be so close to leaving, having one last relaxed day at home before we travelled. I even took this photo to show just how relaxed both cats were (look carefully and you can see them both, or at least you can see where they both are …)

Sadly, however, I was too relaxed myself to get round to posting this on Christmas Day itself, and then come Boxing Day we were running round in circles getting everything ready to leave, so I didn't find time to post it then either. Worse still, when we arrived in our accommodation we found that it had no internet access so I couldn't even post it then. So, by the time this finally gets posted we'll be all settled in and have found our way around and sorted things out.

But I was really excited about the trip, on Christmas Day, really …

Preparations over the winter ...

My boat is Ffirst Offspring. Yes, with the double F, because it's a Flying Fifteen. It's one of the older boats in the fleet, built in 1987, so although it doesn't qualify as a "Classic" it's still eligible to race in the Silver Fleet.

Fred and I have spent a good bit of time and effort over the winter doing our best to get the boat up to speed. The biggest job was repainting the hull, which we did in May in the gap between the end of the Summer Series and the start of winter racing. Originally we'd thought we would just sand it down and then get a car painting shop to spray the paint on, but we found that the paint we chose is designed to be applied with a roller and then smoothed off with a brush, so we did it that way. It certainly came out a lot whiter and shinier than before!

With that done, we needed to replace the boat's name on the transom. Chris did a wonderful job on that, but sadly, I didn't get round to taking a nice photo showing off how good the artwork is before we packed up the boat to go away. The best I have is this photo taken on a rainy Thursday evening while we were getting ready.

The other kind of preparation, of course, is time on the water. We managed to get in quite a few races through the year, even if we didn't quite manage as many evening practices as we fancifully imagined we might at the start of the year! Unfortunately, most of the others were also putting the effort in, so found the whole fleet getting faster as we did. Still, in a week or so we'll find out how we get on against the other fleets. I can't wait ...

We're all going on a Summer Holiday

Well, we're just about all set for our big adventure - going to race in the Flying Fifteen World Championships in Melbourne.

I thought I'd start a blog for the trip, so we can post our news and photos and results. I'll put some more interesting stuff up soon, but for now this is just a placeholder so I can send out the address.