Thursdays Plan

Ok, sailing is a pretty good sport for keeping you humble. The plan worked for the first round but saw me loose ground on the next two. Starting at the heavily biased starboard end gave me enough edge to lead at the first mark despite the boats to the left of me (looking upwind) getting more pressure on port. I still felt right would work so I stayed right of Dad on the next beat without going all the way. Basicly, not getting greedy. That saved me as it was left that was paying and it ended up reducing my losses. As the race wore on I got more confident about the consistency of the left hand gain and culminated in the 'bell ringing' (going to the corner) which got me back in the race.

I still stand by my pre-race planning, despite it not quite working. I reckon 9 out of 10 times my theory would have worked. However, there were pointers that should have made me re-assess my plan before the start rather than during the race. It was an unusually large hole underneath the cliffs meaning there was a risk of less breeze on the right. The course area was slightly further east than usual meaning the classic Beer sea breeze strategy may not pay.

As for my own racing, I must mention the doomed gybe mark manouvre. I'm always up for trying new things and discarding them when they fail! Overall, I was happy with the result as I didn't take any risks and kept myself in contention depsite suffering setbacks. It was one of the more enjoyable races so far this season as Dad, Andy and Ron were all sailing well enough to take the bullet. In the end, Ron prevailed on a day which could easily have provided trouble regardless of the rig.

I generally sailed the boat flat upwind with the sheet block to block. I eased them 6 inches and allowed a small aount of lewward heel in the light patches. On the reaches, I tried to maintain a consistent heel whilst pumping the sheet the maximum permissable amount of times in a reasonable subtle fashion so as not to disrupt air flow too much over the sail. Once a wave/gust. On the run, I failed to clear my air from under Andy but successfully covered Dad second time around. I took care not to over ease the sheet beyond 90 degrees and benefited a huge amount from a more relaxed approach second time around (the first run had me a bit on edge after being overtaken) rather than my flustered first effort.

Lastly, apologies for not reading the comments last time around. I will do in future. To answer Rons Q. I would try to anticipate big waves and either pinch above or foot below them. If they're unavoidable then easing sheet witha a bit of leeward heel and going for speed would be the last resort.