Want to know how Frank and his team did it? Read on:
We went out the two previous wed night sailings and got in some good practice…especially mark rounding’s with spin up/down..(windward and leeward)…lots of spin jibing…we found ourselves not doing well jibing on deck…so after lots of failed attempts with inside the boat jibes, we finally developed a process that worked well for us… Crew rotation practice…..both Brenna and Mladen do foredeck or middle, so when something goes wrong during the race, both are aware of what’s wrong and how to fix it…(Brenna made a great save when our spin sheet went under the boat during one take down….could have been a catastrophic foul-up…..!!!) We cleaned the boat real well sat morning…got out a little early and got a little practice in…. As for the race itself…nothing too special…we were lucky…but prepared and ready to take advantage of all opportunities on the course We checked the line before the starts…decided where we wanted to start and got mostly good starts and just work our way upwind. There were lots of shifts to play and that helped us catch up several times…..Mladen is foredeck and always looking forward for windshifts, pressure and what other boats are doing…Brenna is middle and looking around beside and behind us for other boats, there angles and speed…
We live by 3 rules in this order……
1…always drive the fastest path to the next mark…(be on the favored tack..)find pressure
2….always trim all sails for max speed….lots of gear changing..ease in light stuff…trim as pressure builds..centerline boom…constantly adjust the spin…always on the edge of a luff….
3….boat balance…fair amount of heal in real light stuff…dead flat in the heavy stuff….anticipate…don’t react…lots of heal to round the leeward mark in light to medium…
And oh yeah….avoid conflict..no boat banging..or killer mistakes like OCS or protests…
And above all we have fun as a team.
Frank
