That's All, Folks!

Well, the adventure is over now. Last night was the prizegiving for the event. One of the New Zealand Silver boats, Steve and Megan in Different Priorities, had been very close to us during the Nationals. They hadn't opted to use the Nationals to qualify for the Worlds, so they sailed in the Silver fleet and scored a perfect six points to win the series. In the Worlds itself there was a very popular home victory for No Bull, sailed by Grant Alderson and Dean McAullay.


This morning, we've packed up the boats into the containers, and now all that's left is a day of sightseeing and then it's back home on Sunday and back to work on Monday morning. I'll put some more photos up and link to them from here, when I get home and back to a nice stable internet connection.

Worlds, Race Day 6 - ending on a high note

Race Day 5 was abandoned due to the poor weather forecast, so the last race was as originally scheduled, 11am on the Thursday. By then the southwesterly wind was back, and we sailed out to the race area in good breeze. We had to find some new landmarks on the shore, because this was the furthest to the right that we had seen the breeze. In the first attempt we finally hit a perfect start, on the line at speed. We got a good clear view of our transit over the stern of the committee boat with just over ten seconds to go, so we had the confidence to drive hard at the line and we managed to roll the boat to leeward of us. There was a good gap to leeward of that boat, and we had good boatspeed relative to the boat to windward which was well behind our hip, so it should have been perfect. What's more, we were well placed to head out to the left side of the course because we were expecting a windshift to the left. Sadly, the race committee once again couldn't identify the boats who were over the start line, so we got called back. During the next attempted start, that big windshift we were hoping for arrived, and the start got postponed. It had also got very light, and didn't settle in to a stable breeze for a long time. Apart from a few hopeful moments when the boats would move to new locations and look as though they were about to go for a start, we just had to hang around and wait for the race committee to be happy to try again. In the end it was about 2pm that we finally got back into a start sequence.

We had another decent start, not as great as the first one of the day but still good enough to let us sail our own race. We tried to work the shifts to be always sailing on the lifted tack, but although we were reasonably well placed halfway up the beat, we ended up having to sail a bit too far among the procession of boats on the starboard tack layline, and we ended up near the back of the fleet at the top mark for the first time. On the first run we managed our usual trick of driving down deeper than the boats around us at the start of the run, getting into clear air between the boats which gybed onto port right at the top mark and the ones that went wide on starboard. We picked up a few places and found ourselves among the boats who were just behind us on the points table. We'd started the race in 66th overall, with quite a large gap to the boats ahead but with a number of boats just behind us and easily able to overtake us in the final race. One of these, Demon III, rounded the bottom mark not far ahead of us but then took a different route to the top mark and we lost track of them.

After a steady beat we found ourselves at the top mark with Demon III still ahead of us and with three boats in between. We chased them hard on the two reaches, but didn't manage to find any passing lanes and they were still there at the bottom of the reaches. During the third beat we lost sight of them but did catch up with Sally and Neil in Iff, another of the New Zealand Silver boats. They were the one we had a tangle with in the Nationals, though since then they'd had a much more substantial collision with a leading boat which had resulted in them losing a big chunk of wood from the side of their boat, including the bit we put a tiny dent in. We rounded the top mark behind them but our strategy on the run paid off again and we got into a position to round the bottom mark inside and ahead of them. We had to give inside room to another boat, though, which meant we rounded right behind the inside boat. We were never going to get decent wind where we were placed so we tacked onto starboard shortly after rounding the mark, forcing Iff to do the same. With the two of us sailing up the course on starboard we met a few of the boats still on their way down on port, including Demon III, so we were now pretty confident of holding off their challenge at least. We didn't want to get into a pointing match with Iff, knowing that they've been able to sail higher than us in the past, so we split off to the right following the windshifts again. We did a better job of staying in the middle and taking all the lifts than in some previous races. We also handled the waves, which were starting to have quite an effect, keeping the boat dry and keeping moving well. We were delighted to find ourselves converging on Iff again when we approached the finish boats and find them in the same relative position as at the bottom of the beat, a couple of boatlengths behind us. We crossed the line feeling that we'd done better, but could only count 14 boats behind us. However, we later found that there were a couple of non-starters, plus there must have been another group of 8 boats we didn't see, because we'd finished in 56th place, one of our best finishes of the fortnight's racing, and good enough to hold on to 66th overall.

We then had one last wild ride home, surfing down the waves and enjoying the conditions. It's been a fantastic regatta, with testing conditions and the completely new experience of racing among so many boats. Altogether an unforgettable three weeks of sailing. Now all I have to do is find a way to get to Hayling Island for the Worlds in July 2011!

Worlds Day 4 - Did you buy your lottery ticket?

As we anticipated, the strong northerly wind yesterday was cancelled out by a strong sea breeze, and we actually went ahead with a race in quite light winds. One problem with that situation is that there are very big wind shifts when two strong winds are nearly cancelling one another out - we often found ourselves sailing directly up the middle of the course towards the top mark.

We started very near the committee boat, in the second row of boats. The front row of boats were soon a good five boatlengths ahead - it's really crucial to be among those leading boats, but on the other hand the huge bias meant that we were better off being 30 metres behind the leading boats at the right end of the line rather than in the front of the boats at the wrong end. Once we were able to work our way out into clear air, we had a good beat, making the most of the wind shifts to find ourselves mid-fleet at the top mark. The first run went well, too, as we sailed deep to get into clear air in the middle of the course and then worked ourselves into a good spot to be able to round the port rounding mark of the gate. Unfortunately this turned out to be a bad choice: there was a big left-hand shift during the second beat which meant that everyone who went left was at the top mark ahead of everyone who went right. As we were in the latter group we were back with the back markers again.

The reaches were more successful in pulling back some places. We got to the wing mark with a few boats inside us so we ended up taking quite a wide rounding and doing the second reach well downwind of most of the other boats, who were all fighting one another and and forcing one another higher and higher. We were able to sail in clear air directly for the mark, and picked up a number of places. After rounding the bottom mark we made a short hitch up on starboard and then tacked onto port. By this stage the wind had gone so far to the left that we were sailing directly up the course for most of the beat. Towards the top mark it started to go to the right, but then things went to pieces. The wind dropped out completely, and came back from a different direction: for a while we were sailing with spinnakers to get to the top mark! At the mark rounding itself there was a fair bit of mayhem with barely enough breeze for steerage way, which made keeping clear of boats with inside rights very tricky. Of course, there was no risk of damage in any resulting knocks, as the boats were moving so slowly. Fortunately the breeze did come back and we were able to reach across to the offset mark and use kites to get down the run. Again, we made decent time on the run and were well-placed at the bottom mark.

At the bottom mark they signalled a change in course direction, 45 degrees to the right. Again, this meant we were able to sail directly up the course for quite a bit of the beat. However, when we got to the last few hundred metres it became an absolute lottery, with light winds in very variable directions and some lethal holes to fall into. At one point a boat in front of us tacked onto port and were stuck, dead in the water with us sailing slowly towards them on starboard. They had to scull with the rudder to get out of our way, but it seemed churlish to protest them when their actions had allowed us to sail past them to get to the only finger of breeze we could see and reach. Sadly, that finger of wind didn't get us all the way to the finish, and we ended up stranded just short of the finish line watching that boat and half a dozen others on either side of us sailing up to the finish while we waited for the breeze to reach us. In the end we finished in 70th, but we must have been 20 places higher at times during the last beat, and come to that we could easily have been stuck in that hole near the finish for even longer and watched half a dozen more boats pass us.

Today's weather is similar to yesterday's, but this time they have decided to postpone the race, using up the one race we got ahead of schedule so we will finish as originally planned with an early-starting race tomorrow. And then it will all be over bar the prizegiving and the boat packing ...

Worlds, Race Day 3 - a long day

Monday was always scheduled to have a 1200 hours start time so that we could get two races in. The weather was similar to the day before, with a layer of cloud in the morning and very little wind. Although there was enough to sail out to the racecourse this time, there just wasn't enough to start a race on time. After a few attempts to get things underway, we didn't actually start the first race of the day until later than the 1400 scheduled time of the other days. We still had two races, both with the shorter version of the course which only includes three beats rather than four.

The first race was all too similar to the second race of the day before. Once again, we had a fantastic start which was subject to a general recall and a much less successful start in the one which was allowed to continue. Once again, we did poorly in the beats, finding ourselves near the back of the fleet at the top mark each time and then made gains on each of the downwind legs. Unfortunately, this time we didn't even have the consolation of a number of disqualified boats for starting early, so we finished with our worst score yet, a 74.

The second race was rather better. By that stage the breeze had started to pick up a bit and the waves had become an issue. This time, however, we managed to balance the boat better to keep the bow up to stop the waves from getting into the boat, which also has the effect of getting the bailers working more effectively. This is a skill we just don't have to use in Auckland, at least not often enough to have mastered it: the bailers are set a fair way back in the boat, which means that when we sail the boat level they are not at the lowest part of the boat. However, if we sit a long way back in the boat to keep the bow up for the waves then they are in the lowest part after all and they become effective at keeping the boat dry. Today, for the first time, we really got that working and we managed to keep the boat fairly dry even going upwind. This really makes a difference, as we were able to hold on to the places we'd gained on the downwind legs to take a respectable 64th in the race.



We've now got five races completed, so we can drop our worst score. At the moment we're sitting in 66th place.

The forecast for today was for extremely hot weather and very strong winds from the northeast. Of course, the hot weather should give a strong sea breeze to cancel those strong winds, so maybe we will be able to race after all. We're going down to the club shortly to get the verdict of whether we will race this afternoon or get a day off to rest our aching limbs and/or do some sightseeing in Melbourne ...

Worlds, Race Day 2 - Front page news to also ran

The race committee have looked at the weather forecasts for the next few days and decided to get ahead of the schedule, because it looks as though we'll lose a day's racing later in the week. So they changed the scheduled start of Race 2 from 2pm to noon, allowing us to have two races. The weather yesterday was lighter than the day before, so we had to paddle a reasonable part of the journey out to the course, with a little help from the sails. There was a thick cover of cloud all morning so the sea breeze was very slow to develop, but the cloud did burn off by the early afternoon.

At last a breeze arrived and we were able to get away not long after noon. We picked a good spot in the start line and managed to get ourselves a good position in the fleet on the first beat. We didn't go to either extreme of the course, just stayed in the middle and tried to get in phase with the wind shifts so we could be always on the favoured tack. This worked well for us and we got to the top mark in the middle of the fleet. We couldn't lay down to the bottom mark in one go, like we did the day before, but we did find a good lane to go down with clear air from the boats behind us, and ended up crossing ahead of the boats which had rounded the top mark before us but then sailed higher and gybed earlier than us. This did leave us out on the right hand side going down so we had to come in to the starboard rounding mark of the gate on port gybe and do a gybe and drop at the mark - a trickier drop than the one we usually do, as most of our racing at home only uses a single port rounding mark at the bottom instead of a gate which allows the choice of which one to round. Still, we have practiced that manouevre a few times and it went smoothly.

The second beat went well, too, and we arrived at the top mark on the starboard tack layline. A couple of boats tried to get through on port tack ahead of us: one got through, but the other, a Spanish boat, could not find a gap and had to bear away hard to sail back down the stream of boats we were in to try to find a slot. During the two reaching legs we had a really good tussle with the boats just ahead of us, trying to find a way through first above and then below them. Unfortunately we couldn't get past them and reached the bottom mark with them both inside us, meaning that we had to give them room at the mark. Rather than going round the outside of both, we chose to drop our kite early to slow down and follow them round, with the intention of getting a tighter rounding and finishing up inside their line on the following beat. However, the Spanish boat behind us ignored our tactical manouevre and charged in behind the boats we were following as if we weren't there, so we protested them. They came in with a very late kite drop and a wide rounding whereas we'd been intending to do a tight rounding, so we ended up quite badly positioned relative to the boats ahead of us. We shook our way out of there and sailed a clean last beat to get to the finish in 48th place, our best finish since the invitation race for the Nationals, and just good enough to get onto the front page of the printed results.

Sadly, the second race was nowhere near as successful. The wind was still light, and the waves hadn't really risen to the point of being a problem for us, but we had real trouble sailing as high as the other boats around us when we were sailing upwind. We had a fantastic start, on the front row and with clear air for the first time in the regatta, but unfortunately that start had a general recall and in the one that followed we were back behind a few boats as usual. Worse, although we got the end of the line we wanted, it turned out to have been the wrong end, because we held the right side of the course whereas all the boats which went out hard left seemed to come out ahead. We felt that we'd done poorly, but it was only when we got to the top mark that it became clear just how badly, when we saw only three or four boats behind us. We picked up several places on the run, but lost most of them again in the second beat. The reaches and final beat were the same story: quicker than the boats around us downwind but slower upwind. In the end there were only half a dozen boats behind us, but when we got home we learned that there had also been several boats disqualified for being over the line under the black flag, so in the end our result was 69th.

Once we got home we filed our protest against the Spanish boat for the incident at the bottom mark. This time the jury agreed with my version of events and they were disqualified from that race.

So, a day of mixed fortunes. Hopefully we'll work out what it was that we were doing right in the first race and wrong in the second, so we can have more like the former and less like the latter from now on!

Worlds, Race Day One

We had another beautiful sailing day for the first day of the Worlds. Because the schedule is for only one race a day for most of the days, we have a later start time so we were able to have a nice relaxed morning before heading down to the boats in time for the team photo at eleven.



We launched in light winds and sailed round to the race area with a little over an hour before the start. We used that time to track the wind shifts and to make sure we'd put everything back together properly. Of course, there's a limit in how useful the wind-tracking can be when we knew full well that the sea breeze would build between the time we arrived and the time we started, but it's good to feel that you are doing all you can to be as prepared as possible. Sure enough, the sea breeze filled in about a quarter of an hour before the start, and at that point the wind went further to the right than it had been during our preparations.

In an effort to combat the bunching we'd seen in earlier races, taking so many attempts to get a clean start, the race committee set the line with five degrees of bias to the pin end. This was a good theory but unfortunately the wind was still swinging to the right a little so by the time of the start there was actually a bias at the boat end instead. As in last week's starts, we decided to go with the better end of the line even if it meant not being quite in the front row. We got away with reasonable speed and were able to find a lane to tack over onto port and get clear air not long after the start. After a good steady beat, keeping in the middle and taking as much advantage of the wind shifts as we could, we were mid-fleet and felt that things were going well. The first run was particularly fun, with the waves just big enough to catch and surf with a little (legal) pumping the sails to help. We found ourselves able to run down to the gate marks at the bottom without gybing at all. In many modern boats it's faster sailing downwind to sail at an angle to the wind to generate some apparent wind, but the Flying Fifteen seems to do best when you sail it as deep as possible, at least when there is a decent breeze. So we rode the wind and waves to the bottom marks, picking up a few places on the way.

During the second beat we discovered that we were up with several of the modern New Zealand boats who would normally be well ahead of us, so we thought we must be doing pretty well. The two reaches both went quite well, with no mishaps at the wing mark this time. By this stage the waves were starting to build up, and we thought we might suffer upwind, but the third beat still went quite well and we kept the boat dry enough to be sailing fast. The third run was much faster than the first - it was very easy to catch the waves and surf them, though no doubt the more expert crews would hold them for longer and stretch out their lead on us.

By the final beat to the finish though we were starting to struggle with the waves. Things started badly when the tie at the bottom of the jib came undone so I had to slide up over the foredeck to retie it. That didn't seem like a particularly good thing to be doing during a race, but I stayed aboard and got it tied quite quickly, so we didn't end up losing all that much time. However, from then on we just couldn't quite keep the boat sitting with its bow high enough to clear the waves, and we steadily took in more and more water. We were still very close to four of the modern boats who we knew should be in the top half of the fleet, so we thought we couldn't be doing too badly, but as we got fuller we got slower and, despite having crossed in front of one of them on the bottom part of that final beat we just couldn't hold onto that lead. Still, we felt that we had done well to be that close, and must have a good position. Rounding the finish boat we looked back, expecting to see plenty of boats behind us, but we were startled to see only nine! Of course, in this race there were only 80 starters rather than 106 in last week's races, but even so we thought we had gone backwards rather than forwards. It wasn't till we got home and read the results that we discovered that in fact there were seven more boats who didn't finish, plus one of the boats just in front of us retired after finishing (having broken a rule, presumably - we didn't find out why). So our final finishing position in Race 1 was 63rd - a solid start to the series, but we will hope to do better. And we will certainly hope to avoid having meetings of so many of the New Zealand boats down in the bottom half of the fleet!

Licking our wounds

We've made the most of the two rest days to recover from four days of hard racing and fix up a few minor things with the boat. One of our team mates, Steve, who is sailing on Skinffull, scraped his shin quite badly before the regatta started helping one of the other boats to launch, and he finally decided it was time to see a doctor as it was infected and swollen. Two days' rest and some antibiotics should see him much better to face today's race. Meanwhile on our boat we intended to adjust the rake of the mast back to a more upright position, and discovered that in the course of our two scrapes we'd managed to bend both sidestay fittings. Nothing dangerous, but enough to make it hard work to undo the fittings to adjust them, so we spent a little while straightening those up again before moving the mast back to the more upright position. With that, and a few spots of filler and some sanding, we're all set for the main event, which starts this afternoon.

It's a lovely day here, light cloud cover which will hopefully keep the sea breeze from filling in too soon. Three and a half hours from now we'll be racing! Time for me to post this and get out on the water.

End of Part One

The Pre-Worlds, aka the Australian National Championships, are now over, and we're in a two-day break before the Worlds begin. As I said in my previous post, we have qualified to race in the Worlds itself rather than in the Silver regatta. As it turns out, that was easier than we expected because the rules now guarantee that at least six places will be available to overseas boats who haven't already qualified for their national teams, and there were only four of us competing for those six places. But our position of 70th was ten places higher than the cut off for qualification without that bonus, so we can say we are there on merit.

The final day's racing was the first with lots of cloud. We set off in very light wind, paddling out towards the race area, but the breeze had arrived by the time the spectator boat with Teresa and Wendy on board came past us. As the time for the first start got close, it had risen to a decent strength and we got ready for a start. Once again, though, the wind shifted after the course had been set so everyone was at one end of the line - the pin end this time. After a couple of attempts, the race committee decided that it was not going to work, and they shifted the course 20 degrees to the left. Unfortunately, the wind then chose to shift back to the original direction, meaning that the course was now heavily biased to the committee boat end. In the end, we managed to get a start away even with the bias. We managed to be in the middle of the crowd at the committee boat - not on the front row, but close enough and at the right end so that most of the boats above us tacked away ane we were able to find reasonable air with a short hitch on port. At that stage we were pretty well placed in the fleet. Unfortunately we found ourselves stuck on starboard with another boat just to windward and behind us, making it very hard to tack. Also, we were hoping for the wind shift back to the left, so we wanted to get to the left side of the course. Somewhere in the process we lost track of the lay lines and found ourselves too far over to the left when the wind shift finally arrived. We ended up having to reach back to get to the marks, and then thread our way between the leading boats who had just rounded both marks (there are two marks at the top of the course, about 50 metres apart, to keep the boats approaching the top mark clear of the ones who have just rounded). By that stage we had dropped back to the very crowded part of the fleet, all charging up the starboard tack lay line. We had to duck down until we found a spot and tacked into it. Then, to finally spoil things, another NZ boat tacked in our face and we had to lose speed to give way to them. This left us with just not quite enough way on to clear the mark, so we ended up touching it and having to find a way out of the procession of boats so we could do a penalty turn for touching the mark. So much for our great start! In the end, we dropped back to 69th place, pipped on the finish line by one of the other NZ Silvers.

Shortly before the second race, the last of the series, the wind really kicked up strongly. This wasn't the usual sea breeze arriving in the afternoon - the cloud cover was pretty well complete - but a front passing through. The wind was up to about 22 knots and the sea was pretty choppy. We had another decent start, at the favoured committee boat end again, and this time we managed to hold our height above the boats around us and get decent breeze. Despite the big waves we coped quite well with the conditions and got to the top mark reasonably well placed. The first run went quite well, great fun surging down the waves with the kite up. After a solid second beat we had the two reaching legs to do. We did have a bit of a drama at the wing mark, where we rushed the gybe because of other boats around us and ended up getting the kite sheets tangled together. I'm still not quite clear on how that happened, but the effect was that we had to drop the kite and do the second reach under mainsail and jib. In the end, that probably didn't cost us too badly - it certainly felt pretty quick even without the spinnaker up - and we got out and onto the final beat. By this stage the front had passed through and the breeze dropped to mid teens, though still with the big waves. Considering how little sailing we've done in those conditions, I thought we went quite well, and we ended up with our best result of the series, 52nd.

So now we have a couple of days to rest weary limbs and wash sailing gear, and then it's back into action when the Worlds start on Saturday. Oh, and I think it's time to retire this pair of sailing gloves...

A (mostly) better day

I'm sorry for the lack of posts for the last couple of days - things have been busy getting towards the end of the Nationals. Today is the first of two rest days between the Nationals and the Worlds. We've qualified for the Worlds, which will start on Saturday. I'll post more about that later, but first here's my report on Tuesday's racing, which I wrote but didn't have time to post yesterday.

Tuesday was another sunny day with light winds. We got a replacement for the frayed forestay wire, which was well worth doing - the chances are that the old one would have held for the regatta without problems, but the consequences if it had failed while we were racing would have been serious - at least we'd be out of the race in question but there'd be a good chance of breaking the mast in the process. So it is good not to have to take any chances there.

The first race again took several attempts to get under way. The main problem was that there had been a 20 degree wind shift to the right between the time they set the course and the time we were due to start. There's always going to be one end of the line which is a little better than the other to be, but when there's that much difference in a start line that's half a mile long, you're talking about being 300 metres behind the leaders if you start at the wrong end, so it's totally hopeless to be anywhere but at the right end of the line. So, instead of having a reasonable spread along the line, the whole fleet was hovering around the committee boat trying to start at that end, with the inevitable consequence that some boats ended up over the line. At the second attempt, which was under a black flag, they realised the problem and postponed before the start so they could re-lay the line to be square to the wind. After that we were able to get away, with the fleet spread much better along the line. We still didn't manage to be among the boats at the very front but we were close enough to be able to sail reasonably and work our way out to the left side and into clear air. As the breeze came back to the left this turned into a good place to be, and we ended up fairly well placed in the fleet. We held a position in mid-fleet for the rest of the race, to get our best position yet in the series: 53rd and 3rd Silver.

The second race started after 2:30pm when we'd expected the sea breeze to have kicked in. However, even though there was a noticable increase in the wind it was still not strong enough to kick up the big waves we've been struggling with on earlier days. We finally managed to pull off a start in which, even if we weren't in the very front row, we at least had clear air coming onto our sails, and we were going quite nicely for the first two legs. Unfortunately after passing through the gate at the bottom of the first downwind leg we decided to sail back through the remaining boats coming downwind, to get clear air from the other boats which had rounded. Although we cleared the boats coming downwind without problems, we didn't spot another boat coming through having rounded the other gate mark, and we ended up having to crash tack. Even with that, we couldn't avoid a slight crunch with them. We were at fault, so we did our two penalty turns which dropped us a fair few places. Fortunately there were no ill feelings from the boat we hit, as they are our friends who we are parked next to and who we travelled in the container with our boat on top of theirs ...

As we approached the top mark for the third time we were confused to see that the boats ahead of us were reaching across the top of the course instead of heading back downwind towards us. When we got closer we realised that they had shortened the course at the top mark, cutting out the last run downwind and beat back to windward. At the time this seemed like an odd decision, as the wind was getting a little fresh but not at all outside our normal range for racing. However, as we headed home it became apparent that they'd seen some strong wind coming. and we were chased home by a rapidly building breeze that gave everyone an exciting and wild ride home, and caused some gear damage too from what we heard afterwards.

Even with our mishap with the port/starboard incident, we had a reasonable result, in the high sixties, and with the progress we've made in coping with the huge fleet on the start line things are looking good for next week in the Worlds.

I'm afraid I don't yet have any photos from out on the water yet - Teresa and Wendy are coming out on a spectator boat today, so we should have some photos of today's racing. In the meantime, here's some a of our makeshift workshop and storage in the container.

Fun and games on the course and in the room

Yesterday saw very similar weather to the day before, with light winds and flat water in the first race and about 15 to 18 knots in the second with seas that built up to a metre or so.

Unfortunately, despite the conditions in the first race favouring us, we were badly buried by other boats at the start and could never recover from a position near the back of the fleet. We had great racing with the boats around us, particularly in the final beat where we had a series of crosses with the teenagers in the Classic boat Ffiesty and managed to edge them out at the finish, but we just couldn't do anything to catch up the ones that had got ahead of us on the first beat.

The second race took a long time to get under way, with the fleet pushing over the line early time after time. Even with the black flag in use, the race committee had to either postpone before the start or give a general recall three times before we finally got away. Sadly they didn't disqualify as many boats as it would have taken to get the fleet under control, so I suspect the starts won't get any easier for them or for us.

We ended up close to the front row but not actually in it, not wanting to take chances under a black flag with no sight of our transits in the seconds leading up to the start signal. Still, it was a reasonable position and we were about mid-fleet when we got towards the top mark. There was some drama there: we were approaching the mark on starboard with another boat to leeward, when a third boat tried to cross in front on port tack and tack over to head to the mark. They didn't see us at first, and then tacked right in front of us, forcing us to avoid them. We protested, but they didn't do any penalty turns. As the race continued we slipped back a little in the fleet and ended up in the high sixties: not a great result but better than the first race of the day. Once again we found the waves hard work and ended up carrying a fair bit of water ballast, which doesn't do much for the boat speed!

When we got ashore, I lodged a protest against the boat which had tacked in front of us. The procedure when rules are allegedly broken is that a panel of rules experts listen to both sides of the story and then determine whether or not a rule has been broken. The penalty for breaking a rule is normally disqualification from the race, whereas the rule-breaker does have the option of taking a penalty on the water at the time of the incident by sailing clear of the other boats and turning two full turns. So, when someone does break a rule there's a gamble between taking the penalty and definitely dropping a number of places or taking your chance on being able to convince the jury of your innocence. The protest itself is like a trial in court, with the protestor presenting their case, and being questioned by first the protestee and then the jury, and then the protestee presenting their case and being questioned by the protestor and the jury. Then witnesses can be called, asked to describe their version of what happened and then questioned by both parties and the jury, followed by summing-up by protestor and protestee. I've been involved in a few protests over the years, but I evidently still have some learning to do, as I didn't manage to present my case in a way to convince the jury, and they decided that no rule had been broken. Still, it was all good experience and I will try not to make the same mistake again.

Racing Has Started

At last all the preparation is over and the racing itself has started.

Yesterday got off to a slightly iffy start when we discovered that the wire which holds the forestay was frayed. It will be alright to sail with for a day or two but we won't want to leave it long, so this morning I will be finding a rigger to see how soon they can make a replacement.

Apart from that, though, everything went smoothly and we were all off to the races in very light winds. Some were more anxious than others to actually make it out to the race area - racing started at eleven and in the light winds we wanted to allow an hour to get there, so we set off at about 9:15 and had plenty of time once we got there to try to find transits for the start line and judge the wind direction carefully. Others decided to take more time relaxing before getting going, as it was going to be a long day.

The first race was in light winds and flat water, the conditions which suit us best. It took three attempts to get the fleet away to a good start - for the first two there were too many boats over the line at the start signal, so they used the black flag for the third start. That's a very severe way to stop people from pushing over the line: anyone who starts early is disqualified without any way to return to the correct side to fix their error. Suddenly everyone found it easier to figure where the line was! There were still three boats which were disqualified for being over the line - in a fleet that size it's very tricky to sight the committee boats at either end of the line, let alone spot the transit (the nice visible landmark which should be behind the committee boat when you are on the line which you use to tell whether you are over it or not). We got off to a decent start but didn't accelerate as well as some others around us, so after a minute or so we had to tack away onto port, which meant most of the boats around us had right of way over us. Luckily we managed to find a way through the fleet, crossing close behind or close ahead of many other boats to get out to the right hand side of the course. That was definitely the place to be, as the wind shifted to the right, as forecast, and we found ourselves on the inside of the shift and well placed in the fleet. We made a first-timer's error at the top mark, though, approaching the mark on a line which would have been good in the absence of the other boats around us instead of going out further to be in the stream of boats "too far" to windward. That stream of boats took our wind and, though we did make it round the mark, several of them overtook us at that point. Lesson learned, we'll make sure we're in the "fast lane" from now on when we get to that position. From there on we sailed a good steady race, holding our position near the top third of the fleet with many newer boats around us. We ended up in 37th place, with only one Silver boat ahead of us.

For the second race the wind had picked up a little, and the waves with them. Again, there was a general recall at the first attemted start, but this time the race officer used an I flag instead of a black flag. That's an interesting choice - it means that the penalty isn't actually disqualificiation, but you have to go round the end of the line instead of dipping back behind it if you're early. In a half-mile start line, that might as well be disqualification for the boats in the middle, but it's not really a very severe penalty for the boats near the ends. I guess they don't use the Z flag here as often as we do at home ...

We didn't get such a good start the second time - we found a decent spot but we had another boat above us spoiling our air and this time when we tried to get away on port we had to tack several times to work our way through the fleet. By the middle of the first beat we'd fallen back to about the bottom third of the fleet, in amongst a number of Classics and Silvers (and still a good few modern boats, which is some consolation). There were a number of good tussles with various boats on the way - mostly legal involving getting onto the right side to have right of way and force the other boat to tack away, and one little crunch at the bottom mark when someone snuck inside us where they weren't entitled to be and then didn't stay out of our way as they were obliged to. At least, that's our version of the story and I'm sure we'd have persuaded the jury of our rightness if they had put in their protest ... No damage done and most satisfyingly we managed to pull back the place they'd taken by sneaking in there during the following beat to the finish! In the end, we finshed in 67th place - nothing famous but we were close behind the leading NZ Silver boats so we are not too disappointed.

So, all in all a great day's racing with some good lessons learned and one good result to go with one that is at least solid and something to build on. As I type this it's just after 8am and the sky is blue and the morning is already starting to get hot, so I think we can expect more of the same weather with perhaps stronger sea breezes as the afternoon goes on.

Regruntled

Well, all the disgruntled sailors are now appeased, because the Classics and Silvers will now be racing in with the Open fleet in the Nationals after all.

Yesterday we gave the hull one last sand down and polish, and made a few final adjustments in the light of what we've learned in the last few days' sailing in these conditions. Then we took off to the Yarra Valley for lunch and a visit to koalas, tasmanian devils and other assorted native wildlife. Unfortunately, there wasn't time to visit any wineries before heading back for the welcome function at the yacht club in the evening - that will have to wait to another rest day ...

And so now the big day has dawned. I'm not sure if I will get to post this before we sail, but as I write this we're just finishing getting set to go down to the club for the first races, at last.

Postscript: we've got home from our first two races today - we did well in the first one but less well int he second, and I'll post more fully on it later this evening.

All Legal

Yesterday only a few brave souls went out in the strong winds. We weren't among them: we just gave the hull one last sand down and then went home for the day. In the late afternoon we went back to strip the boat down ready to be weighed today.

First thing this morning we wheeled the boat into the warehouse which has been turned into a measuring shed for the event. First the boat had to be weighed, with the rudder, mast and sheets removed. Then we had to get the sails checked and marked as approved for the event. Finally we had the mast and boom checked. This all went very quickly and easily, and we thought we were almost ready to be signed off as legal to race.. However, when it came to checking the position of the mast in the boat, we and two of the other Silver boats from New Zealand had problems with the mast being allowed too far back (or the sidestays being fixed too far forward, depending which way you look at it). So half a dozen of us spent some time making chocks for the back of the mast gates, and then fixing them into the boats, before we could get the all-important measurer's tick of approval. It took all morning, but at last we have our bow number and we're allowed to race.

After all that we went for a couple of hours' sail in the afternoon. This was an interesting experience because the waves were much bigger than we would ever sail in in Auckland - to get 1.5 metre seas we'd probably have to have winds well over 30 knots, which would be too strong for us to sail Fifteens in. Here, on the other hand, we had waves of 1 to 1.5 metres with a wind strength of only 15 knots or so. For the most part they weren't getting into the boat: in fact, it was not the biggest waves that caused the problems, but the occasional pair of waves which were not so big but were close enough together that the stern was still on the peak of the first while the bow was burying into the second. On the whole the bailers were doing their job, more or less keeping up with whatever water got in from the occasional wave over the bow, and of course as soon as we turned downwind they sucked out any remaining water in very short order.

Tomorrow we'll have a rest day, and go and see some sights. Then the racing starts on Sunday with the Invitation Race (which is not actually part of the championship) and then race one of the Nationals. We've just learned that they're going to split the fleet for the Nationals between Silvers/Classics on one course and Open on the other. We'll have to sail in the Open fleet to be eligible to qualify for the Worlds the following week. It remains to be seen how many of the other Silvers and Classics decide to do the same - there was a fair bit of grumbling around the containers when the news was spread...

Happy New Year

Yesterday, New Year's Eve, we all took the train into central Melbourne to have breakfast watching the Yarra River roll past, and then took a tram to see some of the sights before heading back down the Yarra in a ferry. We originally planned to take a 10:30 ferry but when we spoke to the operators, they said that that one might not be running because the tide was too high. At the time that didn't make much sense, but once we finally took the trip at 11:30 it became apparent what they had been talking about ...

Our sail in the afternoon seemed in danger of being a complete waste of time, as there was so little breeze that we could barely move. We wouldn't be able to race in those conditions - the competition rules require a 1.25 mile beat for the first leg, and also require the race to be abandoned if the leading boat doesn't complete that distance within 25 minutes. However, patience was rewarded as a strong breeze built up and we had a great three-sail reach to get back home. We were sailing more or less square to the breeze so we had the spinnaker pole a long way forward, just a few inches off the forestay, and we had the jib unfurled and working too. In those conditions it's important to hike hard to keep the boat level, because if it heels too much then the rudder can get up too close to the surface and then it decavitates and loses its control on the boat. When that happens, the boat will suddenly round up into the wind, more than likely dunking both sailors in the sea while the sails flap everywhere. Not a good look. So we were both leaning out as far as possible from the boat, with the spray flying out and past our ears. Which was all fine except at those moments where I let the spinnaker collapse, letting the boat tip and dropping us lower so that the flying water was suddenly hitting me instead of passing below me, knocking me back against Fred and trying to wash my hat and sunglasses off ... All in all, great fun - it's a good thing the water is nice and warm here at this time of year!