B&G Simrad 100

[Communique5437 0]

Communique SIMRAD 100 2012

A mild day with a pleasant NW to the start while we sipped on an instant cappuccino. The forecast had plenty of action and I was pleased to see course 2 displayed. I think a slog into the NW to Little Barrier would have been a test we were not ready for.

A nice start at the committee boat and this time the #2 headie was just the sail. Along the Rangi shore initially while thinking of the time to cross the tide to the bays. A good look at the Mairangi Bay beach and we were rewarded with a small shift to the left. Kept close until Torbay and made a long port tack to the Tiri shore. I fear exploiting the left a little more might have been preferable.

A long board to Motuora. Quite surprised to see the Y88s with a reef and with full main seemed very similar both going a little better than us. Over stood slightly before tacking and laid easily the northern tip of the island and then reached to Flat Rock in the building wind and sea. An unpleasant leg, not really well balanced and not feeling fast. More than a little grumpy that our neighbours, the F9.2 Hot Gossip, had done a good number on us from Mairangi Bay onwards and now we could not distinguish them in the fleet ahead. Our old friend Justin and Romany 2 had similarly rumbled off into the murk.

It proved a bit of a handful just bearing away at Flat Rock and we managed to round up a couple of times just reaching with the headie. Wind of 25 gusting maybe 35, tired and sore in the mid-afternoon we were two seriously grumpy old men. “Stew there is nothing more we can do it has to be the kite”. The chicken chute it was, a couple of broaches and we were off. In the general direction of Waiheke we were in a world of our own. Bursts of 18 plus knots and long surfs in the 14-15 knot range replaced our aches and pains with fear. At our peak speeds we would fall down the face of the largest swells with the kite collapsing as the apparent wind went forward. On one of these swells we fell forward in as near to a “face plant” as I ever wish to see on this cruising boat. Not since I retired from competitive Laser sailing 30 years ago have I seen such a nose dive.

For the chicken chute it was all a bit much and after some more very dramatic bursts of speed it all let go with a pop, a sort of audible whimper really, as it all fell into the sea, the head had torn off. Fortunately one of the luff tapes (an earlier repair by Rick) remained attached and we bought the halyard down to the deck. To make this soggy chaos of shredded nylon and tangled spinnaker gear really cute, the westerly front arrived with a major wind change. I looked up to realise we were still running square to the wind but our course had rotated more than 60 degrees. Bother, time to gybe and get the big kite out, a decision now made easier by the previous brave pill and the reduction in our choice of spinnakers by one.

A less eventful sail to Tarahiko followed. We were more than a little surprised to see Hot Gossip emerge from seaward out of the murk behind us. This posed a fresh problem, in two successive races we have established that Hot Gossip is now faster than us to windward under the #2. Only one choice, take the other brave pill and change up to the #1. This proved to be a good choice and in the 10-15 knot wind that prevailed through the night to the finish we sailed away. On approaching the finish we heard Wandering Star calling the Coastguard on CH82 with an hour to finish. For Stew this gave bragging rights with a crewmate from Outrageous Fortune.

Congratulations to Wandering Star who must win the series and to Hot Gossip who must be in second place overall.

[Guest]

A few snippets from lessons used for the race, relearnt during the race, and decision processes applied during the race. With apologies to Rod Davis (I enjoy his blog).

First - you have to be in to win. As long as you start every race, you can be eligible for series points.

Second - There's no harm in retiring to be ready to fight another day. I've been on a hairy multihull ride for the last Simrad where the skipper said, my focus is on the Coastal, this is too risky. So we dnfed.

Third - Different boats have different strengths - apply them, and minimise your weaknesses. We are strong on the wind, but our boat was not having fun in that wind angle and swell pattern. The narrower stern boats like the Farr 1020 and 9.2 or the Stewarts could keep the rudder in the water, and the planing boats could power up.

Fourth - It sometimes isn't how fast you are going, but how slow you are not going. No point going fast the wrong way. The people who pulled the gybes or minimised breakages made the gains on the runs. Similarly the boats who had a nice beat home from Shag would have made gains outweighing losses elswhere.

Fifth - Experience does count.

Sixth - Keep fed, watered and dry. The Pros can live wet and work through life on the edge. The weekend warriors amongst us, aren't as fit, and have other things on our minds. Therefore it was important to keep energy levels up and warm to stay alert on a very changeable day

Seven - The downwind ride is a formula of budget, equipment, crew skills and design. Repect that or be prepared to do damage.

Eight - I bet most crews experienced a wide range of emotions thoughout the day. I know I was a bit apprehensive at one stage. But you need to respect the conditions but still be prepared to send it when the opportunity presents itself. And we had some very enjoyable rides and sailing, on all legs of the course.

Nine - Love thy partner. They need to know the boat and your strengths as much as you know theirs

Ten - We do this for fun. So do the organisers. And the organisers have usually been and done what we do and then some.

[smithy09 50]

And Why do sailmakers place the reef rings 3/5mm to short to get on the horns. We tied the cunningham to the secound reef point, worked a treat and meant we didn't have to drop any slides. another question for the sailmakers, leach line cleats, are there any that auctually work. A sail tie did the trick with a few puchases back to the boom.

 

Matty read your dads aviation med book, then give me a call and i'll take you up in the glider. the body is an amazing thing but will also fool you into differnt things ( motion sickness especially ) very quickly if you let it. In the inner ear are 3 little tubes called the otoliths i think, these have fluid in them that give us balance. If there not doing what the eyes see and mind thinks the body goes a little haywire, you get hot, sweaty, stomach churned and before you know it ....... Quite often if you do feel sick you are better to releive the pressure early with a finger assisted purge before adrenilin kicks in hard and turns you upside doown so to speak.

In a glider because of the way you are seated and strapped in this can be deminstrated very easily, with a you look over there at that, then I do a sudden different manover, and generrally you will leave you stomach and head behind. but then do the same manover with you being told whats happening and you following the path visually you should be sweet.

Interesting post there fng. Gary, my crew was badly seasick just after Gannet and couldn't even hold down water. I was a bit worried and several times thought about turning back, but he was responsive and able to handle the jib winches during the tacks OK, so we carried on. Gary was purplexed about the seasickness as he doesn't usually suffer, but he had just caught a bit of a cold and was well blocked up, so your post made interesting reading!

On the reefing, we had the same issue on the Marshall, so we rigged a snatch block on the cunningham. When we reef, we simply unhook it from the cunningham and hook it onto the first reef point, ensuring the cunningham line runs behind the gooseneck horn so that the mast slide doesn't take all the outhaul strain. I don't know if this is a "pukka" set up, but it is fast and seems to work for us!

[Guest]

Brilliant day thanks SSANZ, not sure how they managed to dial up the big puffs for the runs and lighter for the beats for those of us doing shorthaul, but exceptional work!

Owe the guy from Ocean Photography a ctn for finding our lifebouy & light and catching us up with it. Thanks eh.

[Guest]

Outside assistance?

[TimW 1]

Timberwolfs Simrad 58 (out of 100)

 

Was a huge surprise when they sent us on the full course bearing in mind the forecast and also that they amended the rules and text'd us to allow them to shorten the multi course without shortening the rest.

We got a bloody terrible start paying too much attention to the fantastic start by 888 and scouring the committee boat for code flag "S" which it turned out wasn't being flown.

 

But it turned out we had the boat going nicely and by Rangi light we were second behind 888.

 

It was a great thrill to have gapped Taeping and almost caught Wired by Gannet and we had a really good beat in very nasty stuff to Channel putting over 15 minutes on Wired and 20 on Taeping. 888 had slowly gotten away but everything was going pretty well.

The Single reef in the main and self tacker was ideal in the approx 30 knots we were mostly seeing but it was too much sail in the 40 knot gusts but while we were making good VMG it was still ok albeit very hard to tack.

The waves at Channel and across to Barrier were just heinous, every now and then we would drop off a big wave with a massive thudding landing, but we were certainly trying to minimise that by steering sharply up the wave faces.

 

As expected we didn't finish as the centreboard broke and we damaged the main beam (due to the pounding) and it was somewhat heartening that no one else did either because I think we did as well as we could in those conditions but could have used our second reef and storm jib earlier to nurse the boat a bit more.

 

All in all its been a great series, Well done to Voom for the handicap win and Taeping for the series win on line.

 

Thanks very much to SSANZ, I am fully hooked on the 2 handed now.

[Kaihe Atamai 2]

SIMRAD 100 report for Revolution Blues...

 

Before the race, crew Hayden made the comment, "It's gonna come down to boat handling and seamanship." How true!

 

A bit late to the line, we stayed high to get clear air and out of the tide. It was a piedy start, with one of 'em pushing us above our course successfully so we tacked out and got back on track a bit closer to Rangitoto. That was the first surprising piedy interaction of the race.

 

The upwind was going pretty well on full main and #3 (digging the sail, Josh - many thanks for the rush build!). We were up with the fast upwind boats and followed FX toward Rangitoto above the channel mark, noted that they were reefing but did not see them tack out, decided to reef ourselves and as s**t happens when you get distracted we got mixed up with FX in the confusion, they protested, we cleared on the water with turns (as noted by Norseman II it seems!) but had issues with runners, etc and ended up near last in the fleet and completely out of sorts.

 

Back to the beat - decided to cross the channel, put a reef in, had to wait for the ship to pass, but finally got moving and headed up the Bays. GPS track show some good lifts along the shore and made up ground on many in the smallboat fleet. Passed a different piedy (Rat Catcher) on the beat but could not shake them even as we were passing others! Second surprising piedy interaction of the race - that Rat Catcher is one fast little boat! Rounded Tiry navy just after Faster Coyote, Rat Catcher, some 40ft cruiser, with Fine Entry close behind.

 

The wind had not yet perked up. The angle was marginal for it but we tried anyway with the Jibtop but could not get surfing. Meanwhile we were slipping down track and that peidy was actually putting time on us and the cruiser twice its length! Down with the only extras effort for the race and up with the #3 again.

 

At some point the seas really started building, 3-4m and steep with some breaking. This finally slowed the piedy and we got trucking, with some great surfs. By the time we rounded Gannet we were truly honking along, passing Candela and Bays Flyer and a good chunk of the cruising fleet. Pott Black must have been in there as well. FC had taken off but we were closing on FX.

 

During the run we were sitting on 15, the previous RB boat speed record for long stretches, and hit 17.1 knots a few times, launched off of a wave for the first time. The boat was more or less loving the conditions but not enough for extras in my estimation. The crew was loving it as well though with some idea lurking of the grim possibilities. It was BIG and SCARY and FUN.

 

We watched FX gybe and apparently it went badly as they headed straight into the channel without rounding Tarakihi Island (Shag Rk). We gybed as well, with no issues other than a huge round up and spent a good deal of time on our side trying to get back on track, close to 2 minutes according to the GPS, however it felt more like 15s. I was stuck below the tiller, trying to convince Hayden to take over so I could enjoy my swim more, alas.

 

When we got the boat righted we were off again and rounded Shag, decided to risk no reef for the leg to Pakatoa and pulled it off with a full main and #3. The rig was shaking violently at times and in hindsight we got lucky as we made the lee of Waiheke before the most violent squalls came through. During the worst winds we were enjoying the calmer waters in the channel, surfing and cranking the stereo, glad to be back in the race after a beautiful run.

 

The last of the heavy wind hit us at the bottom end and we decided to put in a reef. However, the rest of the beat up Tamaki Straight was a continual lessening of the wind with us always a bit behind in sail area. Reef and #3. Reef and #2. Full main and #2. Only got the #1 out by Motuihe, a bit late and both Bays Flyer and Pott Black got ahead. We closed a bit by the end and finished 4th, good enough for 2nd on HC and likely the series win as a result of Norseman II slotting in +2. FC had another deserved line win.

 

Back to Hayden's comment on handling and seamanship - our two big mistakes of the race cost us 5 min, more than enough to cover the HC win. In the end it's no matter and Bays Flyer deserved their placing to be sure.

 

Many thanks to SSANZ for the challenging racing and to Hayden for the great crew-work. I look forward to seeing other small-boaters at the prizegiving to hear your stories.

[B00B00 310]

 

Rattle N RUM Simrad 100 report

 

With Richie the owner of the good ship Rattle away in Noumea doing the Groupama race I had managed to get Damon as crew for the last race. Damon also owns an SR and we have sailed together a huge amount on all types of boats so I was confident we had a good shot at it.

With the forecast looking like we may get some puff at some stage we decided that taking the small cruising main might be the best idea as the big one only has one reef and is rather large.... Its also Richies regatta main so without him there I didn’t want to give it a huge flogging. I think it turned out to be a pretty good idea.

We got off to a reasonable start, 2nd row at the boat end but this is where we wanted to be. We started with full main and #2 jib, a combination that we ended up using for the whole race and proved to go pretty well.

We kept hard right into Rangi light, I wanted to make full use of the tidal back eddie so we plugged back in there 2 or 3 times to come out right on Rangi light house. After that we tacked quickly to get back out of the tide along the Rangi shore. There was a big split in the fleet here with about half our fleet sailing along the bays and the other half out with us.

We chucked a few tacks in on some smaller shifts through the middle of the course and worked our way up towards Tiri with the breeze around 15kt, maybe gusting 20 at times. Pepe was the first of the left hand boats to come back and we had made solid gains to be a couple of hundred meters ahead. It was good to be first boat on the water upwind after 2 hrs of racing!

Slowly they clawed it back and passed us just before Tiri. A few of the boats that had hung out the far left had done OK but no one from our division so I was happy. We went through Tiri in good shape with just pepe in front and with a few Y88s and a 1020. The 1020 (L’Avante) slowly rolled us on the lay through to Motuora. Quite a few boats sailed low here while we stayed high and we seemed to make some big gains.

The next leg sucked for us, it was a tight reach to flat rock, we watched Pepe sail off into the distance and Fast Company smoking up to us. It was a good time for me to pull out my ace card, 6 piping frankfurters in a thermos and nicely prepared long rolls with cheese, mustard, onion and t sauce, spectacular to have freshly made hot dogs on the rail of an SR26!

Once clear of Kawau about 2 nm from Flat rock the seas really built and the wind slowly crept up to 20-25kts, we had the masthead gennaker on deck ready for the hoon down to Shag island but after getting knocked down by a sizable wave we decided to play it safe and go with the fractional. At this stage it was actually quite lumpy and the waves were breaking so we got our lifejackets and harnesses on for the run. We set the gennaker at flat rock and took off. We had set up a martin breaker for the tack line so we could blow it if it turned to sh*t. Unfortunately it let go on us and so Damon had to go forward and reset the tackline. This was about our only down time for the whole day but it took a few minutes to get sorted and rolling again. Gradually the pressure built a bit and we were doing some good speeds, stereo cranking and having fun. There were big bullets coming down and really pressing the boat down, we were sending it hard into the backs of the waves with walls of water coming back right over the cabintop. We ploughed into the back of one so hard that we both slid right forward so Damon had to brace us both with his foot against the primary winch. We were locked in and pretty cosy, a bit of a ‘manlove’ moment. At that's stage a wipeout would have been quite heinous. The best thing to do in those conditions is to avoid the waves altogether, you seldom wipeout at speed, it’s the downspeed moments on the backs of the waves that cause the grief so we sailed high keeping the speed on. Its also much higher average speeds to just avoid the waves unless you have to and always to bail out high before you lose the speed on the backside.

We knew the front was due over sometime soonish so were keeping a good eye on it. Once we saw the cloud coming we listened to the nowcasting which had a TWA of 270 degrees at Tiri so we knew we needed to gybe ASAP. At that stage it was reasonably fresh and pretty marginal for gybing a gennaker, it was going to have to be a ‘Nam’ gybe!

The perfect set of waves appeared right on cue so we gybed the gennaker first, goose winged it, then cleated the sheet and Damon pulled the main across. We did it all on the same wave and came out of it still doing 18kts. It was pretty good timing as the wind had already started shifting and it was now raining hard. We were actually steering under Shag rock and the sea state was pretty awkward but we were still hauling so we hung in with the gennaker. I thought that the westerly might just be right in behind the rain line and then it would swing back slightly to the NW, I think this was right as we ended up making it right down to Shag rock with the gennaker.

Not a single wipeout for the whole run, it wasn’t until after the race that we heard how windy it actually was. We don’t have any wind gear so had no idea, just held on and put our balls were our brains used to be. Cam recorded 38kts from the hard labour and I heard other reports of 40+. All I know is that we found terminal velocity for an SR26.

Pepe had come in from a long way out to sea to be about 10min behind us at the rock, but with a 25nm beat to go I was pretty worried they would pass us. The breeze was down to around 10-15kts and we contemplated changing to the #1 genoa but we were still making good numbers so we stuck with it.. We chucked a few tack into hooks bay and tacked right on a lay along Waiheke shore. Out came the final few hot dogs which were still nicely hot, hot food seems to make a big difference and it gave me a good perk up. Changed the ipod play list, had a beer and felt as fresh as new.

Pepe carried on for quite a while and this cost them quite a bit as we layed right through to the bottom of rakino and they had to bear away to go below the reef pretty much back down to our line. We saw another boat coming at us quickly and actually thought it was Pepe, this made us work hard to not get passed and we tacked on a few good shifts but they were still coming at us quickly. On the 2 sail down to Rangi light they eventually rolled through and we could see that it wasn’t Pepe but instead House of Elliott. No wonder we couldn’t hold them!

We hoisted the masthead gennaker at Rangi light and had quite a nice sail to the finish sitting on 8-12kts we still know if we were actually the first boat but I really couldn’t see how anyone had got through us. Sure enough there was a gun at the finish and we were pretty sure it would be a handicap win as well. That put our score card at 3,1,1 and gave us the line and handicap series win.

I fear we may have ruined our PHRF handicap for good this time....

Well done to Pepe, the young fella has got it going well and they are real contenders.

Thanks to SSANZ for letting us all have a go in those conditions. We were well prepared for it and would have been hugely disappointed if they had given us the short course. The boat is just so well setup and has one of the best sail inventories on the harbour. Full credit to Richie for running a tight program.

Bring on next year.

Cheers

Josh

 

 

A video of our race (if anyone can embed it then go for it) edit- got it

 

[Wannabe 0]

Semi-Unofficial report from Hanse Off - The boss & the cat sailor on one of them cruisers...

 

Our adventure started the night before... during the rum race we managed to tear our jib just after the top mark. We raced back to the marina calling anyone who would answer. The boss was on a mission and took off with the torn Jib while the cat sailor went up the mast to see what was up there and to fetch the jib halyard.

Thanks to a few good men, and particularly to Josh at North Sails, we quickly had everything fixed and ready for the morning and even had time for a rum at the squadron.

 

The cat sailor woke up feeling sick, so prayed that the breakfast bagel would stay down for the day. Aside from that, it was looking like a promising day!

 

It all started well with a nice breeze, a reasonable start, and some friendly sailing. It took us an hour to get everything into balance, but we finally found our groove and set chase to Navy Buoy, overtaking a few of those sports boats on the way... . After rounding, the cat sailor took the helm for the reach to Ganet rock, and set sights on the 40's. It was an enjoyable challenge with a pretty good swell on the beam, and a building wind with gusts that told us our first reef was probably overdue.

With a small failure in the reefing system, the boss took back the helm, and the cat sailor clambered about the mast while sorting out the sail. Climbing this, and pulling that, and clinging on... great fun!!

 

The leg to Tarahiki was an experience with the wind right behind us, and our 37 foot Hanse surfing down the waves at over 15kts (15.5 - a new speed record for our cruiser).

The boss did well to keep the boom on the right side of the boat.

 

Whilst preparing for the gybe at Tarahiki Island, we caught a gust, rounded up, and thanks to the boss's quick thinking, executed a reasonbly nice unplaned tack (I guess thats the Nana tack).

 

The second reef went in more smoothly, and was completed in the 'lee' of Tarahiki - just in time for some serious wind and a tight skate to Pakatoa...

 

The rest in behind waiheke was welcomed - somehow still pulling 10kts in the flat water. However, resting on our laurells left us too close to the shore, and bobbing about in fickle wind. We subsequently debated the forecast for too long before eventually shaking out the reefs, and cranking up the main.

Northbound - a Farr 11.6 that we had long ago left behind was now gaining at an alarming rate. After some more average sailing we finally finished several seconds behind that confounded boat that had once been long out of sight! (Well done to you Northbound).

 

 

The mood was a little sombre, but the rum was poured, and we took stock...

We had broken a safety line, two zips, a reefing block and the bottle of soy sauce that went flying about downstairs. We had lost a life ring, but gained a new speed record.

The boss and his cat sailing companion had surfed the sea, and made it home to regale our wives with tales...

 

 

 

 

Thanks Captn Devious, and thanks again SSANZ for the series - I am no longer a short handed virgin, and whilst still a little stiff & sore, I will be back for more.

 

 

I've put a very crudely spliced together piece of video below...

(It runs a little faster than real time due to some technical issues)

[Guest]

 

 

 

 

 

My don't those sails look nice.

[Guest]

[Guest]

can someone make that youtube video work?

[Absolution 7]

You need to delete the '&' and everything after it....

 

[Guest]

Thanks fineline!

[Wannabe 0]

Sorry to hear about your broken bits Moneyshot - but very nice work on the video.

What camera are you using? You dont typically get audio that good with a waterproof case on...

[Guest]

its one of those waterproof fujimfilm XP30 jobbys

[col j 0]

gutted man. we would have been in the same situation (probably worse) if we had gybed, hence the tack. in ways im glad we had the light weight boom on, if we had the heavy indestructable one on we would have maybe considered a gybe and the rig would have gone im guessing.

 

where did infiltrator pull the pin?

 

QP

 

 

im still wondering what speeds we would have got if we got out a genniker or zero on that run (and the rig stayed up). gps had us in the 20s... probably a free fall down the face of a wave

[Richard2249 5]

Great video Moneyshot. Was sorry for you guys having to motor all the way home from Pakatoa. It was the fear of busting something important that made us tack rather than gybe on the approach to Shag, even with our smaller main. If we had a reef in I 'spose we might have chanced it, or if we could get the boat to plane on a wave. Hope the boom is reasonably easily fixed.

[Guest]

Cheers guys! Yeah it shouldnt be to hard a one to fix, my guess is the gooseneck acted like a fuse, and if that didnt break then the mast probably would have come down at deck level!

 

Ah we saw Infiltrator pull out about half an hour after Navy Bouy and it looked like they were in a hurry to get home before the bad weather closed in!

[B00B00 310]

Yup you would have gone fast!

Although maybe just higher averages rather that outright top speed as the waves were so steep that once you were on them it didn't really mater how much sail area you had up.