CYC Open - Food For Thought

My home Solo open at Frensham Pond had so little wind the morning turned into a drifting match. I left at lunchtime. My task this weekend was to do my first Solo open on the sea at Chichester Yacht Club. This was a very different challenge to Frensham - and there was plenty of wind 😮

(Actions shots taken by/copyright of CYC)

Me on the beat

At the top mark

Packing away

Gybe Talking

But it soon turned out that there was also plenty for me to learn. Let's start with windy gybes. Clearly I don't know how to do this: first race I went in at the gybe mark and was nearly run down by the ILCA fleet while in the water. Second race I put it in halfway down the run, though this time I got it up again quite quickly and only lost one place.

Thoughts - I am too used to light wind roll gybes. I need to keep the boat flat. I think I also had way too much kicker on - I must try again with less.

Clew Slug

This is the second or third time the slug on the clew of the North P2 has pulled out of the boom track. The first time it happened I assumed I made a mess of rigging the sail, but no - it just pulls out through the track. My immediate thought was that the boom must have an issue but this has not happened with any other sail. I guess I will have to attempt some sort of fix on the track, but  I am not happy about it. Luckily no damage done, but it can't help the way the sail sets can it?

Mast Bend

So with the new mast setup we should have been good for a windy beat. But although the boat was ok upwind, the sail didn't look like it was setting very well - very flat in the middle. Perhaps I needed to back off the kicker a little, but whatever I did it wasn't quite right. Although I have the non-bendy Cumulus mast, the current setup allows the mast go forward most of the way in the gate and I think that is too much bend for the sail. That's a good thing though - I can easily adjust the chocking. I think I will tighten the forestay half a notch and change the 4mm chock for a 6mm and see what that looks like.

I would say the front guys had much less mast bend, though you can't always tell from photos...

Kicker String

I managed to reach the end of the kicker - I found I pulled it on enough that it was block-to-block and would not go tighter. I am not sure I need it any tighter, but since learning about splicing 12 strand dyneema I have been meaning to re-do the kicker, so now is a good time to get on with that.

Chichester Sea Life

I found a very small crab in the bottom of the boat while packing away. It really didn't want to be caught but I eventually managed to get it out of the boat.

In The End

Given I went swimming twice, seventh wasn't too bad (results here) - but the report must be: "could do better". Thanks to CYC for their great hospitality ⛵