Castle Harbor Sailing held a series of five races on Saturday November 30th on beautiful Biscayne Bay in their evenly-matched Harbor 20's… winds were NE at 10-13 knots…A Triangle-Windward-Leeward course was set up and four boats raced…
VIOLET had consistently good starts every race and won for the day because of this and because they covered the competition well once they took the lead. Many times "the race is won at the start" so it is well-worth practicing and perfecting your starts. In gusty winds over 10 knots, boats often underestimate "leeward set" and also get entangled in (what I call) "starting line duels" which force them down the line (faster than normal) and it opens up big holes next to the Race Committee boat…so if that end is favored, you can often find yourself with a perfect start (like VIOLET did) next to the RC boat by hanging out about 20 yards away on a beam reach course to the RC boat with 20-30 seconds to go. Then you approach on a "hot angle" (beam reach or broad reach) and swoop in at the last moment with full speed to win the start. Use "S" turns to slow down if you are early...VIOLET used a "Vanderbilt timed approach" in most cases to set up this very effective strategy ….
The video of racing with commentary is at the following link…be sure to watch on "full screen mode"…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?edit=vd&v=bcZcWl_4mdE
Results were:
1. VIOLET (Dave, Don, Luis) 2 1 1 2 1
2. FILBERT (Taylor, Andy) 1 2 3 3 2
3. PAUL (Leo, Cliff, Robert) 3 4 4 1 3
4. BARB ANN (Nuno, Eduardo, Jose) 4 3 2 4 4
We have been racing every Saturday ("rain or shine") for over 40 years and all are welcome to join in on the fun….Sailboat racing has been referred to as a "chess game on the water" so it's a good workout for the mind as well as the body….We have 9 year olds and 89 year olds participating and meet at 10:30am for a Skipper's Meeting, rig the boats soon thereafter and sail as many races as possible before we head in for a debriefing discussion with grilled hot dogs and beer at 1:00pm.
See you next week!
Gary Fretz, Race Committee Chairman
