BLUSTERY WARM EVENING
TUESDAY AUGUST 26,
2014
On my way to the harbor, my first glimpse of the bay showed
no apparent white caps, but the wind sure seemed to be blowing in the harbor.
We saw at least one boat putting a reef in while in the harbor. As we left the harbor, I could not believe the number of boats
already out. Ultimately there were 15
boats out for the excitement and fun.
With the wind blowing between 15 and 20 knots roughly from
the northwest, we selected course 2 with a start time of 6:10. I tried a new technique on blowing the
horn. One single blast at 5 minutes to
start, this way everyone can sync their watches. On Pair A Dice we decided to
attempt a port tack start. Normally you
can find a break in the stream of starboard tackers to cut through, but not
tonight as we had to dip every boat in the line before we were able to harden
up and head for our first mark: wharf.
We were the furthest in of all the port tackers, with Homer coming up
behind us and just to windward. We were
able to pinch up until we could finally tack out for better wind. Meanwhile, all of the starboard tackers
tacked over toward the wharf. Since the
wind was lighter in there, we thought they were sailing toward a
disadvantage. We thought wrong though,
because as we rounded wharf, Diver Down had a healthy lead on us and then the
other boats followed us around wharf. We
were still quite a ways behind at Mile.
On the way to Gov, Pacific Spirit and Blue Ribbon got a little mixed up
with each other in a luffing battle. We
love seeing boats in these conflicts, because it usually slows both of them
down!
We rounded Gov with Diver Down way out in front. We did our best to catch them, but they
ultimately crossed the line a good 4 minutes ahead of us. Well done Diver Down! After Diver Down, Pair A Dice was second,
followed by Pacific Spirit, Blue ribbon, Emeritus, Makani, Iris and Aeolian.
We had a wonderful barbecue at the yacht club with everyone
recapping the fun they had on the water. Cheers to Stuart Pearce on Makani
whose crew did not show up and he came out by himself, coming in sixth in the
fleet. Great job! Stuart racing and sailing by himself!
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Catch a wave:
I was talking to a top sailor at the yacht club one night
when I opined “you know, what you do with waves in Monterey Bay is EVERYTHING!”. He agreed wholeheartedly. So what do YOU do with waves as a
helmsperson?
Years ago we were competing on a Tuesday night and found
ourselves in a transition zone (what’s new?).
We had the boat pointed straight toward our next mark as the waves swept
under our boat from the side. The boat
was tipping side to side as each wave passed under us, sails flapping in the
lack of wind. I instructed the
helmsperson to steer the boat so the waves took us from the stern making the
boat rock fore to aft. It seemed that
every time a wave hit us and the mast whipped forward, we made forward
momentum. Before long we were out of the
transition and sailing toward the mark.
I jokingly called it the “Keeler effect”!
This is only one example.
I witnessed the same sailor I talked to at the yacht club sailing to
windward with waves coming from behind.
He never lost speed as he caught waves and fell off on the wind to keep
speed up.
Sailing downwind is another challenge with the waves coming
behind. In the recent BBBS regatta, by catching
wave after wave, I was able to keep the boat speed between 6.5 and 7+ knots on
our way to SC3. It is difficult to
explain this technique. With sails perfectly trimmed for maximum speed, wait
for a wave which you can feel as the stern rises. When I “feel” a wave coming from behind, I
will turn the wheel quickly so the wave pushes the rudder, then straighten out
for the ride down the face of the wave. At the trough I like to head up to
maintain speed in anticipation of the next wave. Experiment and find you own way to steer
through waves, keeping an eye on your GPS speed since speed through the water
is not relavent at this point.
One great barbecue! You can almost smell it now.
See you next Tuesday!
Barry Keeler
Sailing Pair A Dice
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