Nationals Preparation Tips Part 4

Strong winds
From when you need the ease the boom out, and windier.

So you're sailing along fully hiked, fully trapezed, boom and jib all the way in. This is your fully powered up wind strength.
You get hit by a stronger gust, the boat heels over and doesn't go any faster. What to do?

First of all, you need to get the boat level again quickly.

• Ease the boom out. That should mean it moves mostly outwards if you have enough vang on, rather than up and outwards.
• Feather the boat into the wind a little to also take the pressure off the sails a bit.
• Hike a bit harder.

This is the quickest way too get back level, absorb the power of the wind and get going faster. Don't just wait for the wind to drop a bit to get back to level. That's very slow. You need to work here if you want to eliminate those slow patches.

The same goes if you are already sailing with the boom eased and you need to ease further in stronger gusts.

If you are sailing heeled over, the boat just wants to dig a hole in the water and stay there. By sailing flat, there's a feeling of the boat, especially the leeward side, being released and able to accelerate forwards with less resistance. That's the feel you are aiming for.

As the wind keeps picking up, sooner or later easing the boom out will not be enough, the jib will blow into the back of the mainsail and the mainsail will flog. Even if you've manged to keep fairly flat the boat won't want to accelerate, it will feel chocked up (literally!) and bogged down.

Here you need to ease the jib out. This is where you will benefit from having placed your jib cleats in the right position (see Part 1). It's a bit of a knack to flick the jib sheet out of the cleat the windier it gets, but work at it. It won't take much easing normally, maybe 25mm will ease the jib leech out quite a bit. The boat will breathe again, the boom can go out, the boat will become level and accelerate. Once you are going again you can usually trim the jib in again, maybe all the way, maybe half way.

If the wind is steady above your full powered up strength, you'll probably need to sail with the jib eased just slightly, easing out even more if you get that choked up feeling with the jib blowing into the back of the main. In practical terms, we might sail with the jib eased 10mm in about 17 knots, maybe 20mm as it gets above 20 knots. Also, if the wind is steadily in the range where you are sailing with the jib eased all the time, you can move your jib tracks outwards, assuming you have athwartships tracks. We might only go out a maximum of four holes in 25 knots. So say one hole in 17 knots, two holes in 20 knots. This may or may not be combined with eased jib sheet. You'll balance between fully sheeted and eased a bit, just judging by whether the boat is feeling choked or sailing free and fast.

There will also be a point where it is a faster route to the windward mark to sail a little bit below close hauled rather than pointing high. You'll sail further but faster. It's probably going to come at about the wind strength where you have to have the jib sheet eased a bit. You'll have to judge by feel, and comparison to other boats, to see if it is faster route to windward or not, to just sail a few degrees lower, with boom and jib out a little. The boat should be noticeably faster, up and planing. It might only be a matter of 5 degrees lower, and jib eased 10mm, or you might need to go a bit more aggressive to get up on the plane and then bring the angle closer to the wind and the jib in a bit once you are going. And most definitely, sail the boat flat if you are trying this.

If it's really blowing hard, you are going to get gusts where unfortunately you will get the boat staggering momentarily, heeling and sails flogging. Big slow spots. It's a competition to see who has the fewest of them. You need to try to anticipate the really big gusts. The crew can help a lot here by looking out and warning the helm of incoming gusts, or sometimes just as bad: lulls.

Developing Feel.
A lot of the finer points of getting your boat to go faster comes down to you being able to judge whether in fact you are moving faster or slower. Sure, you can judge relative to other boats but they need to be very close, and how do you know whether they are going well or not well themselves anyway?

Because we are (fortunately) not allowed speed data reporting devices on our boats, we need to judge this all by ourselves. We need to be in touch with our boats, listen to what they are telling us. It's the sound the water makes as it's passing along the hull, the rate of the water passing by, the feedback from the tiller, the feeling of deceleration or acceleration in waves, and all relative to all the other wind strengths and wave conditions you have sailed in.

How do you do that?
Time on the water, and paying attention to all of the inputs you are receiving from the boat and the wind and water. It might also be called mindfulness today, and it might be just simply enjoying and being absorbed with the act, the art, of sailing.
You can't get away from the fact that time on the water, effective time on the water, is the most sure way to develop feel.
We may not be able to spend hours each day on the water like professionals and Olympians, or even two afternoons on the weekends, but we just have to make the most of the time that we do have available on the water.

Try to make a bit of extra time before or after a race, or even make a day just for sailing, and whenever you are not practicing manoeuvres you can be paying attention to your boat.

How fast is it going? How fast relative to 15 seconds ago, a minute ago, last week? Or slower?

See if you can feel it by any means available. A good way to learn to feel other inputs more is to stop looking at the main one, your telltales on the jib! Try closing your eyes and see if you can sense how the boat is going. Your crew can give you feedback if you are off course. Try purposely to sail slightly higher. How do you tell the boat is going slower now? Same with sailing freer. What feedback's are you getting? There is much subtlety to steering upwind. Even though the telltales may be flowing, you still can sail through a few degrees above and below an optimum. Try to feel these differences.
An alternative technique to closing your eyes, is to try looking aft over the transom. You get a good sense of speed from watching the wake, and you can also better gauge how flat the boat is sailing by comparing the top of the transom with the horizon.

Crews can also work on their feel for the boat. I think it's more difficult as a crew, as you don't have the feedback from the tiller and the jib sheet is usually cleated. If you handle the mainsheet upwind you have more feedback there. Try closing your eyes, even on trapeze and feel how the boat moves. If there's two of you with a good sense of how the boat's going it improves your chances of recognising the slow spots.

Of course, this is the most important feel you need is for the boat: when it is going slower than it should be!
Because then you can do something about it.

Jamie
Thomson Sails
https://thomsonsails.com/