Wednesday, November 26, 2014

Wed nite racing -26th November

Great sailing conditions, with a nice technical sea.. 18- 20 knots at the start.. with it becoming 15 or so during the race. Yolo was 4 up, so a bit light.. With all the big boats "bullying their way" on the start line, Yolo took a conservative approach.. and ended up sailing from the back.... followed by a good upwind beat.. which kept us in range and a nice downwind leg... if not a bit too square for our liking.
IN the end, we came in second in our class...
That being said.. we are very dissapointed that there were only 3 boats in our class.. and if one notes the overall results, only one boat has actually sailed all the races.. So for all intended purposes, a bit of a disappointment, the class numbers have dwindled . the top three are those that have raced the most races in the series...
Boat performed well... Aboard were: Dale, Ian, Sieger and Evan.

Pics Courtesy: Dave Mabin

Monday, November 24, 2014

VOLVO PRO AM RACE

Yolo Skipper was fortunate to have received an invite from Xtra-Link and Cobham to sail aboard on the Pro-Am Race scheduled for Friday the 14th November.
Weather was cloudy, with winds blowing in the late 20's.. touching 30 at times. The sea was bumpy as the sea built up in the NW breeze.
The bridge decided no racing, but the Boats went sailing anyway.
Boat speeds were maintained easily between 17-22knots.. just beam reaching across the bay.. with one reef and a J2 set.
Sailing was wet with the boat punching through the chop.. with the additional water from the bow spray.



Pic. Dale Kushner at Helm of SCA, with Sam Davies.(pic Courtesy of Team:SCA)

Sunday, November 16, 2014

WEDNESDAY NIGHT RACE- 12th November 2014

A Nice NW on the bay with about 20knots blowing and a lumpy seaway, Overcast conditions with the odd raincloud..
Yolo had aboard some guests.. so took it conservatively... and ended up being very late for the start.. Being at the back, we could see ahead a ship making it's final approach for port and realized that this would be an obstacle later tacked off early and made the long beat for Landfall, Nicely powered up and working the waves, Yolo caught up.. together with reading the shifts... Coming onto the mark there was a 40 footer on starboard to our lee that was pinching and a Simonis on Port.. The 40 footer could not lay the mark and tacked with very little speed and essentially stalled on the new tack and the Simonis came through just below them... Although on Starboard, we needed to avoid a collision.. and quickly depowered and sailed below them.. and immediately rounded the mark.. In a proper race.. they would have to do a penalty each.. Thereafter a downwind.. and a beat to Number 4 and finish.. Yolo had worked to the front of her class...
Aboard were: Dale, Sieger, Evan, Guests Loauy HAbib, Geoff Grills, Yuri(the Russian, but not that one).,
Boat performed well.

Monday, November 10, 2014

IRC NATIONALS

IRC was a well organized event.. this time the location was out of the V&A as part of the VOR festivities.. it brought considerable public interest and put our sport int eh public domain. Prior to the event we did a lot of boat preparation..

Day 1:
Light conditions with two races being held.. We managed a first and a third.. We were quite pleased with this.. as the conditions were definitely









not ideal for a Sunfast 3200 which has a large wetted surface which drags with it's wide stern in the lighter conditions...

Day 2:
This was the double points medium distance race.. Conditions started off with twelve knots.. with nice starting conditions but by the time we got near the Sea Point Pavilion(after tacking up the shore line) the wind had died.. with little puffs coming once in a while.. Yolo lost some distance at this point, but caught a puff to round the bouy.. and sail back to the light.. after a while new breeze started to set in.. with the boats in front getting first and pulling away..  Towards the latter part of the race we caught up with the class leader but we did not cover.. allowing them to pull away again.. giving the race back to them.. and us scoring a second..

Day 3:
Due to time pressures and possinle wind shifts the course set was a short one... Yolo sailed a good first beat and started to pull nicely on the downwind.. with Just the J sailing faster.. however we ended up sailing into a "hole" and while the J sailed around it and the little boats were able to catch us on time in the new breeze... So a 4th place.. (to be our discard) The last race.. breeze had come through.. 25knots and counting. Yolo got a good start and although they should not have.. gave some room for the J at the committee boat..(could have pushed them out) First half of the beat was good.. but suffered on the starboard tack as the big boats came through to weather and dropped dirty airs.. between that and dodging kelp and plastic on that leg we fell back a bit.. With all that we did not focus on the downwind.. Round the mark.. Kite up.. and off we went.. 15plus knots of boat speed... boat was happy... but the gybe angle was coming up.. and the wind was gusting 38 where we were... so we decided the gybe was too risky, if we got it wrong, there would have been carnage, few boats had kites up, those that did some were in trouble.  We dropped and gybed..
In hind site we should have tried. Yolo got a 3rd in this race.

Overall before discards  15 points(winners had 17 points) after discards we were level on points with the winners, but the tie split determines the winner giving them a well deserved win..

Event was enjoyed by full crew, both abaord and ashore.. Well done to the organizers and the bridge..

Aboard were: Dale, Ian, Sieger, Hans, Shane, Mark, Ross, Daphne. (On the last day Ross was replaced by Mornay as Ross had fallen off his motor cycle.. Hope you get well soon Ross.)
Boat performed well.

Sunday, November 2, 2014

Work progress Report

Boat has been antifouled. We have also had the standard decals removed in preparation of Xtra-Link decals.. so the boat will have a new look. top sides polished.. YOLO is starting to look quite "fresh" again. Xtra-Link decals to be applied on Monday and should be back in the water on Tuesday..