#j109

I was able to sneak out for a night of sailing. The conditions were calm and the wind was light. I promised my husband that I wouldn’t trim any sails or do anything risky for the baby, so I got his approval to hop on board and take a low-key ride.

The breeze was from the N at around 6 kts. Low tide was 18:29, which was just before our race was scheduled to begin. The race committee sent us on a 4.56 NM course (club marks: G-C), with a port rounding. There were three of us on the line for the spinnaker division.

The Start: With relatively light winds, we tried to stay as close to the committee boat as possible, as did the other boats in our division, since this was the favored end of the line. 

With about one minute to the start, we tacked onto starboard tack to make our way towards the starting line. One of the other boats in our division tacked at the same time as us and decided to go below us, using that to their advantage to push us upwind & make it impossible for us to clear the committee boat and cross the line (more about this in the Notes section).  We tacked away, and, as a result, started about 30s late.

Note: The rhumb line to our first mark is highlighted yellow in the image below.

The Race: Even though we started late, we were able to catch up to the two other boats in our division. We initially stayed with them, but by doing so, we were heading farther and farther away from our rhumb line. We ultimately decided to tack, heading back towards the rhumb line and towards the harbor’s breakwater. 

The wind began to die and we didn’t want to get stuck too close to the breakwater, so we tacked again. Some puffs of wind came and went, giving us a nice lift so that we were eventually able to travel parallel to the rhumb line. Near the end of the last visible puff of wind, we decided to tack so that we could stay within that puff for as long as possible.

When we were about 0.4 NM from mark G, the race committee made an announcement over VHF that the race was abandoned.

The Finish: N/A

Notes: It took us about 45 minutes to sail 1.55 NM at an average speed of 1.9 kts. One of the boats in our division gave up and returned to shore before the race was abandoned and the other one continued to race until the abandonment.

Regarding our mixup at the start, the other boat came from behind, sailed below us, and pushed us upwind so that we would not be able to clear the committee boat. We headed up, but they were being aggressive, getting very close to us, and not leaving us any room for our stern to swing while we attempted to steer clear of them.  

On the one hand, because we had an overlap, they had every right to push us up. 

11. ON THE SAME TACK, OVERLAPPED When boats are on the same tack and overlapped, a windward boat shall keep clear of a leeward boat.  (https://www.racingrulesofsailing.org/rules?part_id=33)

On the other hand, we did not initially have an overlap--they came from behind us and eventually created an overlap. Because of that, they failed to follow the racing rules of sailing that says: 

12. ON THE SAME TACK, NOT OVERLAPPED When boats are on the same tack and not overlapped, a boat clear astern shall keep clear of a boat clear ahead.(https://www.racingrulesofsailing.org/rules?part_id=33). 

Moreover, one of the fundamental rules of boating is to avoid contact/collision regardless of the situation. We asked for room in order to avoid contact while trying to head up/tack away and the other boat told us that they did not have to give us room. Yes, the leeward boat does have rights and doesn’t have to give us room, but when the windward boat is actively trying to move out of the way and a collision will occur because the other boat is not giving the windward boat room to maneuver, then the leeward, “right of way boat” is in the wrong:

15. ACQUIRING RIGHT OF WAY When a boat acquires right of way, she shall initially give the other boat room to keep clear, unless she acquires right of way because of the other boat's actions.  (https://www.racingrulesofsailing.org/rules?page=2&part_id=33)

Last night was the perfect night for my last Wednesday night of racing for the season. For anyone who does not know, I’m now 30 weeks pregnant, and have been slowly doing less and less onboard, in terms of pulling lines and running around the deck. This means that there will probably not be any more updates from me this sailing season.

As previously mentioned, conditions were great! The breeze was from the S at 7.8-11.7 kts, with gusts to 13.6 kts, and an incoming tide. The race committee gave us, the spinnaker division, a long 7.86 nm course (club marks: S-Z-K), with a starboard rounding. Including us, there were three boats in our division.

The Start: We reached the line a little early, and instead of doing a circle or zig-zagging to waste time, we decided to run the line on starboard tack. We made it about 2/3 of the way down the line when the final gun went off. Because the pin end was favored, we decided to tack right away--in order to get out into the harbor & stay close to our rhumb line--and duck behind the other boats that started with us and who were on starboard tack.

The Race: After tacking out into the harbor just after the start, we tacked again to stay with the fleet. Overall, these two tacks were advantageous for us, as it put us windward of the fleet, but also, ultimately, put us much closer to our first mark. One final tack put us on course for rounding mark S.

We put up our chute without any problem and had a straight shot to our second mark, Z.

We gybed around mark Z, and had an almost straight shot to our final mark, K. About 1.5 nm away from mark K, we noticed that the wind was lightening up, and because we were approaching land, the wind was also getting a little squirrelly. We gybed once so that we could sail for speed, and then gybed once more to be able to douse and round the mark.  The image below shows the final moments of our downwind leg highlighted in yellow.

After rounding mark K, we talked tactics and decided that our best bet was to stay as true to our rhumb line as possible; this meant tacking fairly often—11 times in total—and hugging the coast. We watched the other two boats in our fleet for a bit, and it appeared that instead of hugging the coast, they went further out into the harbor, possibly hoping to catch a push from the incoming tide. They tacked fewer times than us, but ultimately sailed a longer course on this leg.

The Finish: For us, the finish was uneventful. We were well ahead of the two other boats in our division, so there was no need to try and make every second count (although we always try to do that anyways). There was a Beneteau Oceanis 46.1 near the finish line with us, but they were in one of the non-spin divisions, and we stayed away from each other.

The finish is highlighted in yellow in the image below.

Notes: It took us 1:30:04, corrected to 1:20:02 to sail the 7.86 nm-long course. We traveled roughly 10.5 nm on the race course, at an average speed of 6.3 kts. The two other boats in our division finished after us, with the second place boat finishing in 1:37:50, corrected to 1:26:11, and the third boat finishing in 1:49:16, corrected to 1:33:36.

A storm passed through around 1700h, which in our little harbor, means we’ll either be able to get a race off afterwards or we won’t, depending on the wind. Fortunately, the wind began to build back up in time for our 1900h race. The building breeze came from the S, starting around 5-6 kts and building to almost 10 kts by the end of the race/night--gusts were between 7.8- 13.6 kts. There was an outgoing tide. Because of the light wind at the start of the night, the race committee set up a 2.54 nm course (club marks: M-Z) that boats in both the spin and non-spin divisions followed, rounding each mark to starboard.

The Start:

We had just passed the committee boat when the 1st gun went off, and it took us about 3-½ minutes to run the line past the pin. During this time, we debated which end of the line was favored and how we wanted to start. The line, although not perfect, put the pin end out into the harbor, which to me, was more favored for a start on starboard tack, as we would be able to stay relatively close to our rhumb line. The boat end was slightly closer to the mark (maybe 1-2 boat lengths max), but in my view, after continuing course on starboard into the mooring field, the added distance that you’d eventually travel to get back towards the rhumb line was wasteful, especially since the wind in that part of the mooring field can get squirrelly and there was plenty of wind in the middle of the harbor. We decided that the pin end was the best spot on the line for us.

With a little over a minute left until our start, we gybed onto a starboard tack and made our way towards the line. There weren’t any boats in our way, and our only true competition, the J/70, was far enough away from us that they couldn’t try to push us over or away from the line. We started maybe 5-10 seconds late (as did the other boats sharing our start), windward of the J/70 at the pin end of the line.

The Race:

We travelled upwind towards the mooring field. A powerboat in the channel crossed our path, giving us their wake, and we decided to tack shortly after in order to head out into the harbor to clear breeze and avoid the squirrelly wind in the mooring field.  

We watched the wind closely. We were in a nice puff, but there wasn’t much wind beyond our puff on the western part of the harbor. We chose to sail through our current puff and into a second puff before tacking. This gave us a solid path of wind towards our 1st mark, without the risk of running into any large lulls.

We intentionally overshot our layline to mark M, so that the current from the outgoing tide wouldn’t push us into the mark and also so that we could prepare to hoist our spin. The spin went up on the starboard side, and had a small twist in it which came out quickly and easily. Because of the wind direction and the fact that the breeze was now filling in much more, we were pretty much able to stay on our rhumb line to the next mark, mark Z. We gybed around mark Z and did a gybe douse of the spin. 

As with the previous leg from marks M to Z, our last leg was a straight shot to the pin end of the finish line. 

The Finish:

All boats were well behind us at this point, so the finish was uneventful. 

The image below shows the start/finish line. I highlighted our finish in yellow, as well as the beginning of our after-race cruise around the harbor.

Notes:

It took us 34:36, corrected to 31:31 to sail the 2.54 nm-long course. We traveled roughly 3.3 nm on the racecourse, at an average speed of 4.9 kts.

Tonight was a little different from other, recent, nights on the water because the wind was out of the WNW! Wind speeds averaged 7.8-10 kts, with gusts to 15.5 kts. Our course was 6.05 nm long (club marks: C-Y-S) with starboard roundings. Low tide was scheduled for 20:22, so we mostly raced in an outgoing tide.

The Start:

The starting line was angled perpendicular to the wind (zoomed map in “the finish” section), but the boat end was clearly favored for the start. I think that most everyone figured this out as we all tried to crowd that end of the line before the gun. As a result, the start was very competitive with 12 boats from both divisions (2 spin, 10 non-spin) on the line. 

Although I said that the boat end was favored, there was some debate onboard over where to start: would it be more advantageous to start closer to the pin with clean air? I believe that this was our skipper’s plan and he was trying to execute it.

With a little over a minute until the gun, we ran the line on port tack towards the boat. As we approached the boat end of the line, we also approached close to 10 boats coming our way on starboard tack. Our skipper wanted to gybe in front of the first of these boats, but I told him not to because I didn’t think he had enough room for this maneuver without creating a collision. He went above them instead and was forced to hold course for several boat lengths. 

With about 40 seconds to the gun, we passed the RC boat and found an opening to gybe. Because we gybed, we went lower than the boat that was coming our way & now overtaking us as we built up speed, becoming the leeward boat. As the leeward boat and because of our proximity to the RC boat, we told this upwind boat not to go between us & the committee boat, since we did not owe them any room. They went there anyways, and as a result, they possibly crossed the line early. I was more focused on our boat, so I’m not really sure what happened with them, but I believe the turned back to the line to recross.

The Race:

After an eventful start, the race itself was much more relaxing. After about 5-10 boat lengths, we tacked onto port tack so that we could head out of the harbor on the first of several longish legs. We continued for a while until we started to get pushed in the wrong direction towards the wrong side of the harbor, so we tacked to starboard tack in order to get closer to our rhumb line. We repeated this several more times, only tacking when the wind started to shift and push us the wrong way. 

We over-stood our first mark (mark: C) so that we had time to get our pole out, set the tack, pre-feed the sheet, and hoist the spin. This went relatively seamlessly, except for the twist in the spin. I have to look back and try to figure out why we had a twist--the spin had been washed/rolled over the winter, but I taped the spin 3x in full tonight while setting everything up to try to avoid a twist or any other issues. Fortunately, the twist came out on its own soon thereafter.

We continued on port tack for the duration of this leg, sailing high of our mark, which gave us added boat speed. It was on this leg that we started to walk away from the other boats in the fleet.  

As we neared our next mark (mark: Y), we realized that we were too far away from the mark to head down to it and, instead, needed to gybe. Our gybe went flawlessly and we planned for a leeward takedown of the spin. With the wind angle and our proximity to mark Y, we could not afford to head down too much, so there was some added pressure in the spin, making it a little difficult for our bowman to douse. Regardless, the spin came down easily and we were ready to continue on to the last mark (mark: S).

This leg of the race, between marks Y and S was uneventful. We hit a pocket of air where the wind lightened up and shifted about 20 degrees to our port, but we sailed through this pocket with ease and continued on to our mark. 

We casually rounded mark S, and made our way back to the finish line.

The Finish:

Because the pin end of the start/finish line changes depending on the wind direction, the RC boat is always marked in our chart. I highlighted the approximate location of tonight’s line in orange so that you can see how favored the pin end was for the finish (and also how favored the RC boat end was for the start). As we approached the pin, we rounded up to get our bow across the line faster--not that a few seconds would matter tonight, but it’s a good habit to maintain. Overall, this was an uneventful finish, since there were no other boats near us.

Notes:

In all, it took us 01:12:33 to sail the 6.05 nm-long course. Our time was corrected to 01:05:02 (TOD). We traveled roughly 8 nm on the racecourse, at an average speed of 5.9 kts.

The other boat in the spinnaker division, a J/70, finished in 01:27:40, corrected to 01:15:56 (TOD)--from what I heard back at the club, this boat and a non-spin boat decided to play some games with each other on the course, which may have negatively affected their time. The first place boat in the non-spin division finished in 01:27:52, corrected to 01:13:07 (TOD).

Overall, I believe that we did a lot of things right tonight. We didn’t foul anyone at the start, and took advantage of an opportunity to get a good place on the starting line, therefore having a clean start that was clear of bad air. We watched our heading on our upwind leg and tacked when we were pushed in the wrong direction--this saved us on distance and on time. Despite the twist in our spin, I believe that we were efficient in our hoist and, later, with our douse. Our sail trim was good, and our tacks/gybes were clean and efficient as well. 

Tonight was the second Friday night Champagne race, and, yes, there was champagne. Ok, ok, real champagne comes from France....so, no, there was no champagne, but there was Prosecco. The breeze was steady out of the SSW, averaging 11.7 kts, with gusts to 15.5 kts, and with an incoming tide. Our course was 5.29 nm long (club marks: M-Y-M) with port roundings.

The Start:

This was a pursuit race, meaning that each both starts at a different time based on their handicap/rating. Because we have a low handicap, we started 13m 50s after the gun at 19:13:50. The benefit of a pursuit start is that the line is virtually empty and you have the opportunity to start on port or starboard tack without worrying about fouling someone. We were a few seconds (~30s) late to the our start and approached the boat (favored) end of the line on starboard tack. Because of the wind’s angle and because it was the preferred route to get to our first mark, we crossed the line while tacking around the RC boat.

The Race:

Most of the other racers chose to head away from the mooring field and into the harbor, which is also what we did. 

Our first tack was uneventful, as we were nowhere near any of our competitors. The rest of our upwind leg was also fairly uneventful, except that we didn’t know which way to round the mark. We tried watching the boats ahead of us to see which way they rounded, but we couldn’t see them clearly. It looked to me like they did a port rounding, but no one onboard was certain. We decided that there were still a few boats ahead of us who we could watch to get a definitive answer. (Un)Fortunately, we ended up passing them and had to go with our best guess (port rounding). Several boats behind us also rounded with the mark on port, so we were fairly certain that we made the right decision, especially since none of them hailed us on the VHF to tell us that we needed to do a 360 penalty turn.

Our downwind leg was also uneventful. Tonight’s race was not a spin race, so we were at the mercy of our jib. We let off some halyard tension, gybed our main and jib a few times, depending on the wind angle and our few attempts to go wing on wing. We were fortunate to stay fast during this leg, and we were getting closer to the boats at the front of the fleet. Because of this, we were able to watch how they rounded to reconfirm that we rounded the first mark properly: port rounding! 

We retensioned our halyards and gybed the sails over to the starboard side just before rounding mark Y. Because of the wind direction and incoming tide, we again decided to go towards the middle of the harbor, so all we needed to do was harden up.

We had an uneventful first tack and kept an eye on one of the boats that stayed closer to shore, a Colgate 26. They were ahead of us on port tack and crossed our bow by about 5 boat lengths--we could catch them. 

Although tacking can slow you down, our tactics during this race and this upwind leg in particular were to stay near the rhumb line. Therefore, we continued on starboard towards the shore. We eventually tacked so as not to go too close to shore and the boats anchored in the vicinity, and were now on port tack and on a potential collision course with the Colgate 26. We were prepared to tack to avoid a collision, but we chose to wait and see instead of acting prematurely. This decision paid off for us because we were able to safely cross in front of them. There was now only 1 boat to catch up with and pass--a Hunter.

We tacked four more times before coming close to the Hunter. Again, we found ourselves on port tack and our competition was approaching on Starboard tack. This time, there was enough distance between us where we were able to cross paths without altering course. We crossed behind them and tacked after a couple of boat lengths to ensure clear air, but this put us well past the layline to our last mark (mark M) and we had to head off the wind a little--I think this allowed for us to go faster and helped us gain more ground on that Hunter.

We tacked around our last mark about 5 boat lengths behind the Hunter. They immediately gybed to port tack, while we stayed on starboard tack. Although we were sailing by the lee, we were both going in the same direction and we were able to catch up to them and create an overlap. They tried heading up a little, but because of our different tacks, they were forced to bear off and give us room. Their next bet was to gybe their main over so that they were also on starboard tack--they did that and headed us up, but we were able to pull ahead of them. Next, they tried to position themselves in a way so as to cover/block our wind. I believe that they were successful in slowing us down a little, but we were able to maintain our position in front of them.  

The Finish:

We crossed the line about 1-2 boat lengths ahead of the Hunter, making for a great, close race.

Notes:

In all, it took us 01:04:54 to sail the 5.29 nm-long course. We traveled roughly 7 nm on the racecourse, at an average speed of 6.2 kts.

Tonight was the second Wednesday race of the season, but because of Covid-19, it was the first official race for Wednesday racers. The breeze was steady out of the SSW, averaging 7-9.5 kts, with gusts to 11 kts, and with an incoming tide. The race committee set up a 3.61 nm course (club marks: M-Z-G) that boats in both the spin and non-spin divisions followed.

The Start:

There were 10 boats (2 spin, 8 non-spin) on the line for the start. Although we all paced back and forth along the line for a majority of the 5-minute starting sequence, by the 1 minute mark, most boats were waiting near the pin end of the line for their cue to run down the line and start on starboard tack. We tacked  (gybed?) in front of this group of boats, reached the line a little early, and as a result, were one of the first boats to cross at the gun, albeit closer to the boat end of the line instead of at the favored end. There was one boat on port tack that crossed the line just behind us at the boat-end, while everyone else fought to cross on starboard tack near the pin-end.

The Race:

After the gun, we continued on starboard tack into the mooring field. We thought about tacking sooner rather than later, but there were boats on starboard tack who we would have fouled if we tacked , so we were forced to wait. Fortunately, due to the wind direction and the rumb line to mark M, delaying our tack did not hurt us. 

We approached mark M, ready for a starboard rounding and ready to hoist our spin as soon as we rounded the mark (starboard hoist). With fewer crew members than normal, setting the spin went much smoother than anticipated and we fortunately did not have any twists to contend with.  Since the J/109 uses an asymmetric spin, it took us 2 gybes to get to our next mark--these gybes also went smoothly with our skeleton crew. 

We gybed around mark Z (our 3rd downwind gybe), and were able to head directly to our last mark, mark G. As we approached the mark, we headed a bit deeper so that we could douse the spin: our jib came out on port and we pulled the spin down from the leeward side of the jib. We didn’t plan our takedown soon enough, so we overshot the mark by about 2-3 boat lengths, but hardened up as soon as we were clear to do so. 

With the incoming tide pushing us towards our finish line, it made sense for us to stay in the middle of the harbor for as long as possible. We used the opportunity to clean up the deck a bit from leftover lines from our downwind leg, and to make sure that none of the spinnaker lines (halyard, sheet, & tack) were fouling the foot of our jib. Once done, we tacked over and made our way back into the harbor towards the finish line. As we neared the layline to the finish, the wind lifted us, forcing us to wait a little longer before tacking over. When we finally tacked over, I anticipated that the wind would shift again, this time lifting us towards the line so that we could cross without another tack. I was wrong in my assumption and we needed to tack one last time. 

The Finish:

As with our Friday night race, the finish was uneventful. We crossed near the pin/favored end of the line, and were the only boat near the line at the time. The J/70, our competition for the evening, was trailing us by 4:34 (elapsed time), and the rest of the fleet (non-spin) was even further behind us. 

Notes:

In all, it took us 47:16, corrected to 42:40 (TOD, time on distance) or 56:12 (TOT, time on time) to sail the 3.61 nm-long course. We traveled roughly 5 nm on the racecourse, at an average speed of 5.8 kts. 

When Ireland’s Eye … is Shining …..

Last week I spent a wonderful day exploring a part of #Ireland I haven’t seen in a long time – Irelands Eye, Lambay Island, Howth – Just beautiful to see on a sunny day from the sea.

We forget sometimes, how beautiful this country is.  Take some time out to enjoy the outdoors, and the sea, and if you get the chance, take a different perspective.