2009 San Francisco Yacht Club IRC Invitational - Race Notes

The Team Scorpio entered the SFYC IRC Regatta with some confidence having demonstrated that Soozal was beatable.  The boat was ready, the crew was ready and we were enthusiastic.  Doug had delivered the boat to the SFYC late Friday and we arrived there by Protector Saturday morning in time to load the sails and battens, and get to the Berkeley Pier starting area.  There were only seven boats participating in the IRC division.  We arrived too late to get in any serious warm up, but in plenty of time to make the start. 

Some Scenes While Heading to the Starting Area

Race 1 - Course 2:  Wp, Lp, Wp, Downwind Finish

After a decent start near the pin (on a very short starting line), we sailed a pretty good race. It blew from 12-18 during race 1; generally 16-18.  Expecting a building breeze we set the 3+.  We went left to leeward of Soozal for about five minutes, tacked to port, tacked again before Point Blunt and headed for the port layline.  There was better breeze on the left side of the course.  We set the .75 and sailed very deep.  We hoisted the 3+ near the bottom mark, doused to windward and gybed around the mark.  It was basically the same story for the second and third legs.  We had setup the rig in our light configuration, but with the mast step .15mm forward of it's normal position.

Despite sailing a pretty good race, we finished 37 seconds behind Soozal.  Our hoists and douses were fine, but the boat didn't feel great.

Race 1 IRC Differential Results

Race 2 – Course 4:  Point Bonita, Lp, Upwind Finish

The wind had freshened before the start of race 2 so we changed to our medium air configuration adding 1/4' to mast step.  We were five seconds late for the start, but found a nice opening near the pin.  We tacked to port after a bit and sailed upwind playing the center of the Bay.  We saw from 8-23 knots of breeze during the race.  It became light as we got outside the gate, and we peeled to the L3.  We rounded Bonita behind Soozal and Astra and set the Akyte.  We sailed toward Baker Beach before gybing toward the center of the bridge.  We gybed back to starboard at the bridge and gybed once again near Alcatraz.  The wind picked up to 20+ and the boat was more of a handful to control with the Akyte.  We sailed very deep to the leeward mark, set the 3+, rounded to port and sailed to the finish. 

Again, we thought we sailed ok, but we were crushed by Soozal whose crew felt we sailed too much extra distance when the headed toward Baker Beach.  Oh well, two "seconds" isn't the end of the world.

Race 2 IRC Differential Results

Race 3 – Course 2:  Wp, Lp, Wp, Downwind Finish

We again arrived somewhat late to the starting area as we motored up to take a look at our newly altered .85 kite.  Nevertheless, we won the start at the pin.  We played the left side of the course with the 3+.  It blew from 12-19 and the boat felt better.  We set the .75 and sailed rhumbline.  We changed to the M3 at the leeward mark.  We had pointing problems and noted too much slack in the leeward capshroud.  Our foreguy shackle opened downwind and we used the lazy sheet as a foreguy.  We gybed and fixed the foreguy problem.  We felt very fast downwind trailing Soozal and Astra.

It turned out to be an amazingly close race - three seconds separated the top four boats.  Unfortunately, we ended up fourth.  Yes, we can think of a few ways we could have made up four seconds.

Race 3 IRC Differential Results

Race 4 – Course 2:  Wp, Lp, Wp, Downwind Finish

Going into the final race, we felt pretty good about things.  We thought there was a good chance we had beaten Soozal in race 3 which would put us no worse than one point behind.  The wind built to 18-24 and we nailed the start with Soozal well behind.  We sailed a great beat and felt we were well ahead of Soozal at the windward.  Then, we set the .85 spinnaker. 

It went up in a strange way.  On reflection it seems we had lots of lazy guy down below and the head came out of the hatch behind the guy.  In any case, it went up with a twist and it looked like a bad one.  We gybed the main to try to clear it, but it actually made it worse.  Then we noticed that the foreguy was tangled around the kite and headstay.  We couldn't even lower it to fix it.  At this point it was blowing 22 and after five minutes it became clear we weren't going to fix the problem easily.  So, we sailed away from the race course behind Angel Island seeking some shelter from the growing breeze.  We were done racing

It turns out we had to sail nearly to Raccoon Strait to find a dead spot.  Once there, we hoisted Matt up the rig and he began a 10 minute disentanglement task. 

Race 4 IRC Differential Results

It was a very disappointing ending to an otherwise decent regatta.  We stripped the boat, flaked the sails and Toby and I escorted Doug to KKMI by Protector.  It seems he had a plane to catch and had to be in San Diego at 2100 to help deliver a J122 to San Francisco this week.  Toby and I returned Doug to the SFYC and we spent some enjoyable bar time and contemplated with Bren and George what we might do to remedy our spinnaker wraps.  We even discussed the possibility of reverting to deck (rather than hatch) launches.

On Monday morning we had KKMI remove the headstay and check for hairline cracks after our wrap a the associated flogging.  I related our story to Ken Keefe, a principal there and a very experienced sailor (Americas Cup, Money Penny, Stars, etc.).  I told Ken about our considering going to deck launches and while he doesn't especially have a problem with that (as I do), he also doesn't believe that's been our problem.    He reminded me that spinnakers must fill from bottom to top to prevent wraps and suggested that we must tightly "stop" the top second, and to make sure the kite doesn't hide behind the jib too long.  His simple remedy is to delay our hoists until we're actually heading downwind.

It occurs to me that one thing that's changed in the past two years (when we began having wrap problems) is that we've been more aggressive in hoisting  while we're approaching the windward mark so that the kite is at the top as we round.  The solution to our problem may simply be to delay the hoist for five seconds.  We'll find out at our practice before Big Boat Series.

For the Big Boat Series, we'll have crew caps, a longer spinnaker pole, a new bow pulpit, and a new cuban fiber 3+.

See you all then.

Comment from Toby:

It seems to some of the crew that if the wind is moderate (12 – 14) and the water is choppy, the light mast plate may not be right.  Our speed was good but our point seemed to suffer in Race 1 and 3 which were moderate air/choppy water conditions, and both times we had the light plate under the mast.  If the water is flat, the light plate seems right and the boat speed improves.

Response from JAS:

Following is a table showing various rig positions this year.

Comment from JAS:

I had a conversation with Norman Davant on another topic.  He asked what happened to us on Sunday and I related our spinnaker wrap story and he corroborated Ken Keefe's suggestion.  He mentioned that while racing Farr 40s as a pro several years ago, they all hatch launched and he learned that it was critical to hoist after the bow was already turned down.  He offered that the physics of the actual turn itself twirls the banded kite and causes the dreaded wrap.  I'm beginning to believe that we may have a solution and we can put this issue behind us.  We'll see on Wednesday, 9/9.