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Blindly racing through the night...

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Prospector
Master Marine Consultant

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Canada
3159 Posts

Initially Posted - 08/18/2008 : 09:16:29

Have you ever been planning for something where the unknown and the excitement made you tingle with anticipation? Where the wonder of it made you feel like a teenager on prom night knowing great things were just ahead, but one wrong move would make you crash and burn? That’s how I felt in the lead up to this past weekend.

Planning for a weekend away that included moving the boat across the lake and provisioning for a family day aboard, and then a night race was interesting. It mean making sure I could get away from the for the day on Friday, keeping family commitments and dialing in a crew to work together and perform well. It meant loading the boat as a cruiser, then stripping it down to bareboat for the race, and not losing anything that would be essential to the crew’s safety and enjoyment. With the help of Leslie, and Dave, an understanding boss, and an amazing new crewmember; Patti, we pulled it off.

On Friday morning Iris was loaded up and sailed across to Barrie. Leslie, the baby and I arrived early in the afternoon, got a slip, did a little shopping, and settled in for the night. Barrie’s municipal marina is quite nice, backing onto a park with hydro and water at every slip. We charged the batteries, had dinner and I started inventorying the boat. The baby even went to bed on time. Saturday we woke up early, and I tried to be not excited. It was race day. I was fidgety. I needed stuff to do. Dave was supposed to come in Leslie’s van, and we would send her back to Georgina “the easy way” while we raced the boat.

Leslie gave me the baby so I would have to sit still, and we started to strip the boat down. If it wasn’t essential and wasn’t bolted down it went. Later we would regret a few things that were packed off the boat (a knife would have been handy, and so would have glasses been), but it was OK. I packed everything onto the shore, and waited for Dave to arrive in Leslie’s van. Then decided Dave was taking too long, and maybe the traffic on Hwy 400 was too much. I started repacking the boat. Leslie sent me for a walk. “You need to calm down” was her admonition.

While I walked I phoned Dave. He said he was an hour away. I wondered if he’d make it in time. The tingling set in. about 20 minutes later Dave pulled up with the van. We loaded it, waved goodbye to Leslie, and motored over to Barrie yacht Club where the race was to start.

Parking the boat in Barrie was something of a rodeo, and in the process I screwed up the throttle on the outboard (again), but since it is a chronic failure, I was able to fix it with a screwdriver and swearwords, and we were fine. I got the GPS waypoints for the shoals (we didn’t want to hit them again), and met Patti, and her friend Denis Potvin (no relation – we checked), and a few other familiar faces from the racing circuit. Then came the skippers meeting. The race was being run in the reverse direction of the printed instructions. It would be a downwind run for Kempenfelt Bay (K-Bay), then a reach to Fox Island, around the Island and a rech up to the weather buoy. Round the weather buoy, and fight your way upwind through K-bay and back to Barrie Yacht club for the finish. May the best man win, we all remember “Harris what’s his name”, he was a great guy, and this is a memorial race, so remember him.

Part of the honoring Harris Routine was that no one was to raise their genoa before the 5 minute gun, so the pre-race was all done on main sail alone, which was weird and funky, but OK, Harris (whoever he was) sounded like a pretty cool guy. When we did raise our genoa, the boat took off. The wind was quite powerful for the start, and the boat was really dancing. It felt great to be on the water. We watched the spinnaker fleet head down the lake, and an explosion of colour happened as they hoisted spin as soon as they crossed the start line. Now it was our turn.

The white sail fleet (JAM fleet) filled in the starting area. We stayed close to the front of the box, but this was our first downwind start and we were keeping a close eye on the other boats. Dave counted down to the start. At 2 ½ minutes to start we were running the line. I pulled the boat into a spin, and we circled 360 degrees. That burned up 45 seconds. We sailed down the line a little further and slightly upwind. With a minute to start we pulled into a second spin and burned another 45 seconds. We came out of the spin on a broad reach, headed for the line. Dave counted down the seconds; the rest of the fleet was behind us as we accelerated toward the line. At the horn, we were on the line with speed, and were accelerating. I looked around, and we were first over.

On the run up K-bay, we watched faster boats pull ahead of us, and tried to follow their course. We did well, but by the end of the bay, more of the fleet was ahead of us than behind. We did battle with Newfie Screach all the way to the top of K-bay. By the time we were in Lake Simcoe, he was ahead of us, and there were only 2 or 3 boats behind us. The other 8 or 90 boats in the JAM fleet were in a pack with us and Newfie trailing behind. Way behind us was 2 other boats. I don’t know who they were. They seemed to be keeping up with each other.

We held our distance between us and Newfie all the way down to Fox Island. The wind was fresh and strong, and blew us along nicely. We adjusted small things for big gains, and tinkered here and there, but we were mostly at hull speed, and riding down big waves just barely above it, and were content with that. Behind fox island we ate, and then coming around the island, we started gaining on Newfie in earnest. Along the reach to the weather buoy, we finally caught up to him, and passed him. It was such a gradual gain, and he was so far over from us, that it was almost a non event, but nevertheless, as the sun set in a blazing fury of reds and pinks, and the moon rose as bloody red orb, we were firmly ahead of Newfie.

The sunset was amazing. It lead to conversation on board about what the best moments in sailing are. Sailing away from quite anchorages, having a bay all to yourself, and spider webs soaked in dew in the morning all made the list. The one event I failed to list was that moment when a limp sail fills with wind – you hear a satisfying “Whump” and the boat suddenly jumps forward as it finds its feet. It was a great night.

We rounded the weather buoy, and switched on the nav lights as the night deepened. Other boats also turned on their lights. Soon we couldn’t see boats anymore, just a red, green, or white light moving through the night. Navigation was limited to lining up on lights on shore, or following the lights on other boats. The moon provided magnificent light on the lake, but not enough to see the other boats, and the shore lights often hid the boats ahead. Out of the darkness we would sometimes see a sail suddenly appear, cross ahead of or behind us, and then silently disappear into the night. Usually the sails were Newfie Screach. Sometimes they weren’t. I think we were in a group of about 4 boats as we moved down K-bay towar the finish line. I am still not sure, and I don’t even know where we were on the lake since the GPS erased our tracklog before I was able to review it.

We tacked down K-bay toward the finish, crossing paths with Newfi – now behind him, now ahead, now behind, now ahead. Then we crossed his path and he was sailing directly into the wind. We were far ahead of him, and I figured he was up to something. He had traded off huge amounts of speed for the heading he was on. On our next tack, he was ahead of us, just barely, and on our third, he was far enough ahead that I knew we couldn’t catch him. He had traded velocity made good (speed to a point) for boatspeed (the speed the boat is actually traveling). You see, while we were moving quickly back and forth across the bay, he was moving slowly in a straight line toward the finish. His tactic worked well, and I will have to remember it for next time. Eventually we would try this as well, but by then it was too late.

As we moved down K-bay, we used lights as navigation aids. Lining up on lights worked well to help keep our heading as we short-tacked our way toward the finish, but sometimes as we were lined up on a light, people would turn them off, or they would get list in the background of the city. Eventually we switched to navigating by stars as enough people turned out their dock lights and porch lights. Eventually, we saw the flashing light of the Barrie Yacht Club’s lighthouse, and lined ourselves up with it. Although we could see the lighthouse, we couldn’t see the buoy that marked the other end of the finish line. A handful of short tacks (like super short) brought us across the line at about 1:30 AM. We finished behind Newfie, but before at least 2 other boats. I am sure we will have a couple others we finished ahead of once the times are corrected to handicap.

Lessons learned on this race:
• Think outside the box – if we had traded off boatspeed for movement toward the mark, we would have done much better.
• Don’t pack away stuff you might need – we really missed drinking glass, a knife, and sleeping bags.
• We can have amazing starts if we keep a cool head, and watch the clock and not try to get fancy
• Having someone calling trim makes a world of difference
• There is nothing scary about the night. Especially with good friends to share it with.

"Iris"
1984 FK/SR #4040
http://frosthaus.blogspot.com/

Take a minute to register your boat with the association!!
http://www.catalina-capri-25s.org/owner_questionnaire.htm

Edited by - on

Prospector
Master Marine Consultant

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Canada
3159 Posts

Response Posted - 08/18/2008 : 16:05:30

Newfie Screach is a Tanzer 22, and is my nemesis. He is out of our club, and always finds a way to beat me after I think I've got him right where I want him. (Rubbing hands together with squirrely eyes here...)

Edited by - on

Prospector
Master Marine Consultant

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Canada
3159 Posts

Response Posted - 08/19/2008 : 06:31:35

Results were just posted - we came in 4th out of the 7 boats in our division - exactly middle of the pack!

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Champipple
Master Marine Consultant

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USA
6855 Posts

Response Posted - 08/19/2008 : 07:23:58

Great writeup. Night racing can be some of the most fun racing you can do. You might want to look to the instructions for your GPS settings for future races. Most will allow you to put VMG on the screen next to your Boat speed. You can work between the two to maximize your speed to the next mark the entire time and Newfie won't be able to catch you next time let alone pass you.

Edited by - on

Prospector
Master Marine Consultant

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Canada
3159 Posts

Response Posted - 08/19/2008 : 08:17:34

I'll look for that next time I switch on the GPS - right now its at home so I may tinker with its settings tonight.

A friend emailed this writeup to a friend who passed it on to a magazine editor. I may have to delete the post. Sorry guys.

Edited by - Prospector on 08/19/2008 08:18:23

Prospector
Master Marine Consultant

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Canada
3159 Posts

Response Posted - 08/19/2008 : 09:37:21

But I can edit!~ :P

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Champipple
Master Marine Consultant

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USA
6855 Posts

Response Posted - 08/19/2008 : 12:54:08

Just tell the editor that it was posted to a closed forum prior to submission. You should be okay with one time limited use

Edited by - on

Prospector
Master Marine Consultant

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Canada
3159 Posts

Response Posted - 08/19/2008 : 13:09:24

Mr Bristle, If and when I edit the original post, I am hoping you will be so accomodating as to edit your and provide the same link I do...

See this is where I think I should learn to just keep my mouth shut.

Edited by - on

SailCO26
Captain

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USA
457 Posts

Response Posted - 08/19/2008 : 14:41:40

VMG is typically a more valuable tool downwind (the speed curve is flatter downwind), but it does still apply upwind. The trouble with GPS VMG is that the GPS doesnt know about wind shifts. Also, remember that a GPS doesnt tell you what your DOING, it's tells you what you've DONE!

That said, watching the telltales (trim for speed, then sail in the groove) and your strategy (are we headed toward the mark?) will get you darn near as far at this level of sailing.

Based on the description in the post, now post(S), about different boat speeds it sounds like NS was sailing a more close-hauled course while you were footed too far off (more speed, but less upwind ground). Or you were out of phase with the wind shifts and he was sailing the lifted tack, but I would expect somewhat similar boatspeeds (compared to what you were seeing from NS before, not to your boat's speed). It would have been interesting to view your GPS track, or even better to compare yours and NS. Alas, the cost of perfect information...

A question, tho:
"Then we crossed his path and he was sailing directly into the wind" - Luffing? Yep, he'd definitely be slower. ;) However, if you were footed off too far and comparing his course to your apparent wind indications, then I could see where it might look like NS was going "into the wind". Were his sails trimmed and drawing wind? Were yours trimmed all the way to close hauled and the telltales flowing?

Footing off for speed (or sacrificing speed to pinch) is a great short-term tactic to deal with another boat, but shouldnt be used to fetch a mark - UNLESS you've overstood the layline and are confident that the wind wont shift BACK (of course the only reason you overstood is because of a windshift, right?

)

"Lining up on lights worked well to help keep our heading as we short-tacked our way toward the finish, but sometimes as we were lined up on a light, people would turn them off, or they would get list in the background of the city. Eventually we switched to navigating by stars as enough people turned out their dock lights and porch lights." - sounds like a good excuse to put a compass on board!

Jim
[Edit: typos!]

Edited by - SailCO26 on 08/19/2008 14:47:13

SailCO26
Captain

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USA
457 Posts

Response Posted - 08/19/2008 : 14:54:53

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by SailCO26
 Footing off for speed (or sacrificing speed to pinch) is a great short-term tactic to deal with another boat, but shouldnt be used to fetch a mark - UNLESS you've overstood the layline and are confident that the wind wont shift BACK (of course the only reason you overstood is because of a windshift, right?

)<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">Let me clarify something here - yes, you'd use a pinch to fetch a mark if you were just a hair below the layline and trying to shoot it; but I was referring to boathandling across several tacks, as in this situation.

And now, back to your regularly scheduled program...

Edited by - on

Prospector
Master Marine Consultant

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Canada
3159 Posts

Response Posted - 08/19/2008 : 16:15:17

NS was still drawing air, and when we tried his approach (much too late) our speed dropped from 6 to about 2.5 - 3 kts. Yes, we tried to keep our tell-tales streaming right up until we caught on to what NS was doing.

This link :[url="http://www.byc.on.ca/communication/pdf/racing/lsis7a.bmp"]K-Bay chart[/url] Shows the chart for K-bay. The wind was coming directly down the bay, but was noticeably stronger on the north shore. We shortened our tacks to stay in the good air, but NS stayed on the north side, pointing much higher.

I never noticed much in the way of wind shifts, except that whenever we crossed to the south side of the bay, we lost wind, and had to work much harder to get back into good air.

We did notice that on NS's last approach to the mark, he sailed directly north to the mark, and then tacked around the marker. I think your description is about what he did. Pinch up to get clear of us, then go back to tacking.

By Pinching he passed not only us, but one other boat, which we nearly caught when we pinched as well. We beat them on PHRF, but could have beat them on straight time if we had followed NS's lead.

The final results are posted here ([url="http://www.byc.on.ca/results/2008/lsis/whitehi05.html"]if you are interested[/url]) our PHRF has been adjusted to 243, so our times aren't as pretty as they look, but the change won't affect our standings.

While out that night, I found out that none of my gauges are backlit - maybe a reason to spend more money... I dunno, but yes a backlit compass would have been nice. All we had for light in the cockpit was a headlamp that we left turned on in one of the coaming boxes. It cast a cheery glow, but wasn't so strong as to ruin our night vision.

Edited by - Prospector on 08/19/2008 16:21:56

Steve Milby
Past Commodore

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USA
5909 Posts

Response Posted - 08/20/2008 : 09:17:02

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by Champipple
 Great writeup. Night racing can be some of the most fun racing you can do. You might want to look to the instructions for your GPS settings for future races. Most will allow you to put VMG on the screen next to your Boat speed. You can work between the two to maximize your speed to the next mark the entire time and Newfie won't be able to catch you next time let alone pass you.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">Thanks for the great tip Duane! I just checked my GPS (a Garmin 276C), and it has a setting for VMG. I'm looking forward to playing with it, and learning it's uses and limitations.

On the matter of pinching, I am firmly convinced that pinching is seldom helpful. When you pinch, the boat loses speed, and that causes the apparent wind to move aft, and the boat won't point as high when the wind moves aft. If you pinch even more, you lose even more speed, and your situation goes from bad to worse.

The best racing books tell you to "foot off to point." The only time I believe pinching is useful is in the following situation: If you're approaching a windward mark and are short of the layline, bear off enough to keep the sails full and driving. Then steer a scalloping course to windward, alternately bearing off to maximize your speed, and then steering the boat so that it is pinching slightly to windward, and then bearing off again to bring the boat back up to it's maximum speed. Repeat that cycle until you gain as much ground to windward as needed to fetch the mark. This method works best in smoother waters, where the waves don't slow the boat so much during the pinching phase.

If you are approaching a mark and can't quite fetch it, the best way to get around it is to "shoot the mark." As you approach the mark, do the opposite of what your instincts are telling you to do - bear off even more to leeward, to keep the sails full and driving, and to maximize boatspeed. When you're nearly to leeward of it, steer the boat head-to-wind and let the boat coast to windward, until you think you can bear off around it. Let the jib fill first, so that the wind pulls the bow to leeward, around the mark. If you're sailing in a heavy chop, or against a tidal current, then you can't shoot to windward from very far off the wind. But, if the water is smooth, or if the current is behind you, you can shoot the mark from as much as a boat length and a half to leeward of it. Shooting the mark is a valuable skill that you should practice until you're good at it, because it will frequently help you avoid taking two tacks to get around a mark when you've tacked slightly shy of the layline.

But remember, if you're in either of these situations, it's because you misjudged the layline. It's usually best to overstand the layline enough to give yourself a little extra insurance that you can fetch it, even if the boat sails into a header as it approaches the mark.

Edited by - on

Dave Bristle
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Djibouti
10005 Posts

Response Posted - 08/20/2008 : 10:02:06

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by Prospector
 Mr Bristle... this is where I think I should learn to just keep my mouth shut.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">Duly shut.

Edited by - on

Prospector
Master Marine Consultant

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Canada
3159 Posts

Response Posted - 09/02/2008 : 08:11:48

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by Steve Milby

If you are approaching a mark and can't quite fetch it, the best way to get around it is to "shoot the mark." As you approach the mark, do the opposite of what your instincts are telling you to do - bear off even more to leeward, to keep the sails full and driving, and to maximize boatspeed. When you're nearly to leeward of it, steer the boat head-to-wind and let the boat coast to windward, until you think you can bear off around it. Let the jib fill first, so that the wind pulls the bow to leeward, around the mark. If you're sailing in a heavy chop, or against a tidal current, then you can't shoot to windward from very far off the wind. But, if the water is smooth, or if the current is behind you, you can shoot the mark from as much as a boat length and a half to leeward of it. Shooting the mark is a valuable skill that you should practice until you're good at it, because it will frequently help you avoid taking two tacks to get around a mark when you've tacked slightly shy of the layline.

<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

Thanks for this hot tip - I used it to great effect on our last race this weekend - without having used it I don't think we would have gotten our 3rd place flag! A wind shift close to the mark brought us off course, but I did as you said, building speed, then coasting to the mark, and filling the sails as I rounded. Even though we lost a great deal of boat speed in doing it that way, we avoided 2 extra tacks.

Edited by - on

Steve Milby
Past Commodore

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USA
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Response Posted - 09/03/2008 : 08:43:57

I'm glad it worked for you. I used it often on the small inland lake where I used to race, because I didn't have to be perfect in estimating the layline. If I tacked a little short of the layline, I knew I could still shoot the mark. Buoyed by that knowledge, I didn't have to overstand the mark, to ensure that the boat could get around it, and that saves time.

There's one fine point that might help. When you steer head-to wind, ease the mainsheet substantially. As you start to steer the boat around the mark, you want the jib to fill and start driving the boat first. You don't want the mainsail to start driving the boat. The reason is because, as the jib fills, it'll pull the bow to leeward. When that happens, the stern of the boat will rotate to windward, away from the mark. By rotating the stern away from the mark, you give yourself a little extra room to get around the mark without drifting down on it and hitting it. If the mainsail starts to drive the boat too soon, it won't allow the stern to rotate in that manner, and the boat might drift into the mark.

Edited by - on

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