Weak Wednesday

I'll admit it, I haven't been trying that hard in our Wednesday night race instead treating them as a good way to build some crew skills. We've had fun but just made outrageous mistakes through lack of application (not knowing the course, being late to the start etc). With this race though we went in with a strong crew and I decided to try properly thinking we'd have a good chance of challenging for the lead. At the end of the day we were significantly behind Shamen and the following are some notes on where I think we were losing out.

• Start - lost a couple of boat lengths right away. Should have been more aggresive about keeping position, less early. Starting on the second row would have been just as good as where we did start. 3 boat lengths, and lack of tacKtical initiative.
• Tacking - I was too aggressive going into tacks. Tighten main, loosen headsail slightly, let boat round into tack without forcing rudder. Try to steal distance to windward. Maybe half a boat length per tack, 4 boat lengths total.
• Post tack - Acceleration wasn't great despite a solid breeze. Trimmers need to use a power position and then trim more consistently.
• Gybing - need to smoothly move the spinnaker around the boat. Turn will follow the spinnaker. Keep it moving until we're on the other side - we can't complete the turn until the sail is around the boat and it gets the guy closer to the bow for pole attachment. Might have lost 2 boat lengths.
• Bottom mark - pole down a little earlier, spinnaker down faster (start it coming down even before the gybe). Fore deck was right they wanted this. In wider out closer so we have a bit of time to power up into the beat. 1 boat length.
• Shifts - Wind likely very similar this Saturday, it was oscillating in about a 10 degree range and we weren't tacking on it. Limit tacks to two per short leg, four per long leg but try and get the shifts. Boat lengths? Unknown... a few. Let's say 4 but it could be more.
• Bottom - no-one likes a dirty bottom. It'll be clean for the weekend - Boat lengths - 1.
• Pole - Need to be more aggressive moving pole and pole height. We saw significant increases on speed when we did actually adjust it. Boat lengths - 2.

17 boat lengths ~ 500 ft. Could have been the difference to first place.

So  - before the regatta this weekend we'll have a little team talk.

Main - Tacking - when tacking we're going to tighten up slightly and we're going to loosen the jib an inch right after.
Helm - going to drift into the tack, then chase the telltales to keep driving to windward as long as possible.
Trim - Tacking, Power position first, then trim in as speed builds.
Main -Tacking, Power position first, then trim in as speed builds.
Trim - Gybing - Sail needs to move smoothly from one side to another, we shouldn't be waiting to get into good positions to see the sail, and we have to have it trimmed to the new side faster so we can rotate the boat under it.
Pit / Mast - Pole height needs to be considered right after setting the spinnaker and right after each gybe - it may vary on each side. Look up at the sail and see where the break is, it should be center or slightly above center if it isn't push the pole height the opposite way you want the break to move (up if the break is too high, down if it is too low).
Tactician - Wind shifts and pressure! Also in the start make sure we a) know our course, b) know the favored end and c) give the other boats a hard time!
Tuning - check and adjust rig for conditions at start of every race.

Let's follow our Weak Wednesday with a Strong Saturday!