RPNYC ran its two handed series today - a 17 miler around the cans in Wellington Harbour. Forecast was dubiously big from the Metservice and didn't align with Windfinder, Windguru, Metvuw etc. Started off with gentle zephyrs and blew 20s for some of the course.
We learnt the boat really fast today, including deploying the code zero, having a couple of great upwind legs, and using the A6 for a speedie run past Somes Island to Days Bay. On the way back past Somes Island, the breeze had built and we tucked in a reef. Lesson number 1 - don't assume the reef line has been run and check it at the dock! Running a reef line took ages and cost us speed and distance on the fleet. A good reach home and to our relief, we didn't embarrass ourselves by not coming first across the line.
Next challenge was pulling down that huge main two handed while it was blowing pretty hard by then and the gusts in the inner harbour were not helpful.
A great first sail - lots to learn. She is a dream to drive and well behaved. We didn't make her go as fast as she is used to fully crewed but we held a steady course to have a great day on the water in decent breeze. She is running beautifully - canting properly and easily from the wheels. Some two handed systems to sort out but that is easy.
Great first two handed day out - many more to come!
19 October 2013
15 October 2013
The first few races...
... over the last couple of weekends
Race 1 (actually race 2 of the RPNYC spring series) was a _very_ short windward-leeward, wouldn't have been a long Optimist dingy course. At that time we still had a keel controller that occasionally misbehaved and a battery management system that was behaving erratically sometimes. Our first tack with a temporarily bewildered keel controller took us down to 2 knots for about 30 seconds ( just slightly below our estimated polar of 8.3-ish!), followed shortly after by the lovely opportunity to dip the whole Div1 fleet.
We gybe-set, and then the downwind run and the next upwind beat were uneventful, but with the short course we were quick enough back upwind that we re-rounded the top mark with the kite still being packed. Not fast. We ended up 4th on line, but predictably last on handicap.
Race 2 for us was a far-more-suitable harbour course, which included the most amusing part of the day. After the first upwind mark (Ngauranga) on the way towards the harbour entrance … we rounded and put up the A2 in light air which gradually built, started having trouble keeping ahead of Wedgetail, even thought they might roll us at one point and wondering if we would clear the other end of Kau bay without having to drop the kite. This went on for almost 1/3 of the leg, until the eureka moment when we remembered we had a canting keel. Once we put that out to windward we were much faster (!), steering was much easier and height wasn't a problem any more.
Even better we found that could hold our lead on Wedgie upwind, they are a really well sailed boat that points quite high. We were first on line, first on club handicap, and 2nd on PHRF.
Race 3 last Saturday, in sunny nice if cool weather, 6-13 knot southerly. Mike Perry couldn't come out with us because he has his work-life balance all wrong, poor chap, but did pop out to the shore to take the pics (the ones from off the boat). Llewellyn from McRaes Global who had fixed a minor programming issue for the keel's brain the night before came out for the race too, and took all the nice pics from on the boat. The keel behaved impeccably - and no doubt will always from here on. Not only that, but the Shaun from Tasman Auto Electric who have been helping customise the Lithionics Battery installation helped make them work nicely too. So no interesting moments from the keel or battery perspective.
In terms of our competition, we'd probably have preferred more or less breeze, we weren't changing gear as well as we might have, and somehow we seemed to be in the wrong part of the course too many times -- we watched other boats around us hook into spectacular lifts that we didn't see much of. Our boatspeed and angles were OK, but I suspect not as good as they are going to be once we are used to extracting full performance from Blink. Meric on Wedgetail (Welbourne 42) did a spectacular job of sailing around us on the last upwind leg, and Ran Tan II, the 50-foot Elliot canter spent most of the race ahead, so we were 3rd on line.
I'm about to upload a time-lapse video of the last race. This lasts about 30 mins (I ran out of time to edit) so scrubbing/jumping through some bits probably a good idea.
Race 1 (actually race 2 of the RPNYC spring series) was a _very_ short windward-leeward, wouldn't have been a long Optimist dingy course. At that time we still had a keel controller that occasionally misbehaved and a battery management system that was behaving erratically sometimes. Our first tack with a temporarily bewildered keel controller took us down to 2 knots for about 30 seconds ( just slightly below our estimated polar of 8.3-ish!), followed shortly after by the lovely opportunity to dip the whole Div1 fleet.
We gybe-set, and then the downwind run and the next upwind beat were uneventful, but with the short course we were quick enough back upwind that we re-rounded the top mark with the kite still being packed. Not fast. We ended up 4th on line, but predictably last on handicap.
Race 2 for us was a far-more-suitable harbour course, which included the most amusing part of the day. After the first upwind mark (Ngauranga) on the way towards the harbour entrance … we rounded and put up the A2 in light air which gradually built, started having trouble keeping ahead of Wedgetail, even thought they might roll us at one point and wondering if we would clear the other end of Kau bay without having to drop the kite. This went on for almost 1/3 of the leg, until the eureka moment when we remembered we had a canting keel. Once we put that out to windward we were much faster (!), steering was much easier and height wasn't a problem any more.
Even better we found that could hold our lead on Wedgie upwind, they are a really well sailed boat that points quite high. We were first on line, first on club handicap, and 2nd on PHRF.
Race 3 last Saturday, in sunny nice if cool weather, 6-13 knot southerly. Mike Perry couldn't come out with us because he has his work-life balance all wrong, poor chap, but did pop out to the shore to take the pics (the ones from off the boat). Llewellyn from McRaes Global who had fixed a minor programming issue for the keel's brain the night before came out for the race too, and took all the nice pics from on the boat. The keel behaved impeccably - and no doubt will always from here on. Not only that, but the Shaun from Tasman Auto Electric who have been helping customise the Lithionics Battery installation helped make them work nicely too. So no interesting moments from the keel or battery perspective.
In terms of our competition, we'd probably have preferred more or less breeze, we weren't changing gear as well as we might have, and somehow we seemed to be in the wrong part of the course too many times -- we watched other boats around us hook into spectacular lifts that we didn't see much of. Our boatspeed and angles were OK, but I suspect not as good as they are going to be once we are used to extracting full performance from Blink. Meric on Wedgetail (Welbourne 42) did a spectacular job of sailing around us on the last upwind leg, and Ran Tan II, the 50-foot Elliot canter spent most of the race ahead, so we were 3rd on line.
I'm about to upload a time-lapse video of the last race. This lasts about 30 mins (I ran out of time to edit) so scrubbing/jumping through some bits probably a good idea.