Photos and Video from Farallones 2011?

[abbarr]

Hi All,

Here's a short clip of Voyager just outside Bonita.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWxOBNYMgz8

I've also uploaded my gps track via jibeset. If you have one, please take a minute to upload it. It's excellent.

http://www.jibeset.net/gpsshare.php

Alan
voyager

[dhusselman]

Hi Bob,

No problem in sailing down, I just wasn't sure you saw me..
You had your boat dialed in nicely with your reefed main and #3?
I was struggling with the "cruising" 110% jib. Can't wait to get new sails...

[Philpott]

Thank you, Alan, for that video. You make it look so easy and you seem to be having fun, too. How did you do that? Were you on drugs?

[Jud - Vancouver]

Hi All,

Here's a short clip of Voyager just outside Bonita.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWxOBNYMgz8

Alan
voyager

Wow --what a ride ! Gives a pretty good feeling (two dimensional, anyway, in the comfort of my chair!) of conditions that day. The boat looks very much in control with the reefed main and #3. Reminds me that I need to get a #3 made (it ought to be small and cheap for my Cal 20 !). Looking forward to next May.

BTW, what kind of boat are you sailing?

[abbarr]

How did you do that? Were you on drugs?

Boat was balanced. I was just along for the ride.

[abbarr]

BTW, what kind of boat are you sailing?

Beneteau First 345. Video made it look like a dinghy.

Alan

[Jud - Vancouver]

Beneteau First 345. Video made it look like a dinghy.

Alan

My thoughts exactly --when I was watching, I was thinking to myself, "wow, and I thought a Cal 20/Santana 20 was small...that sure is a small dinghy to be sailing offshore !" Thanks for clarifying...

Anyone else who did the Farallons Race...I'd be really interested in reading accounts of experiences in this year's race. I was just as interested reading the account above on a blog (sorry, can't remember your name) of bailing on the race too...lots to learn there as well, the decision to turn around when in over your head is an important one.

Jud

[tiger beetle]

From Nelson/Marek 45 Tiger Beetle:

SSS Farallones race was timed to start on a strong ebb, with winds forecast to be NW 25 going 30, increasing through the day. The big question is how quickly will the winds fill around the corner from Pt. Reyes into the Gulf of the Farallones (where we'll be racing), and whether or not I want to go through a sail change on the course from a light air sail in the bay to a heavy air sail offshore.

Given the winds were pressure-driven, not thermal, I figured it would be blowing hard offshore all day and there wouldn't be much of a shift from light air in the bay to heavy air offshore, and I didn't want to do a sail change if I could avoid it. The most recent previous time I did the race in heavy air I went with the no.4 (85%) headsail and we had winds 19-22 knots. I felt underpowered most of the time and didn't want to repeat that.

So I decided to set up the no. 3 on the furler, be underpowered at the start and hopefully have the right sail up for the rest of the day - and there was plenty of breeze, perhaps too much... so at least I didn't err on the side of too little sail.

The start was mellow, 10-14 knots and flat water, Beetle was slow with the no. 3 but most boats were also conservatively set up so I didn't feel too bad. In this race the slower boats start first, so I was catching up with the fleet by Point Bonita and a few boats were already turning around. Conditions were lumpy chop and breeze was already up at 19-20 right at Pt. Bonita, good chop at 3-5 feet on a very small swell (almost didn't notice the swell given the wind waves).

I figured it would be a pretty wet day and had put on my foulie bibs, and was glad I did - water started to fly over the boat almost straight away. Beetle is so big and fat that the water normally stays forward of the wheel - but not this time

We took off in the fresh breeze, and two miles out the windspeed was hanging around 27 gusting 31, and I put in a reef (should have put in two) and footed off a bit to keep speed up while punching into the wind waves. Moving a lot of weight out of the bow kept the nose up so at least we didn't spear waves as often as usual, though the cockpit would fill up with a foot of water fairly often. Big drains are nice! (a pair of 4" diameter drains straight out the back dump water quickly).

After an hour the wind died back to 25 and I tried to keep the boat powered up to punch along, and when the wind kicked back up to hold at 27 I decided it was time for the second reef - and we went much faster after that! (next time remember to reef earlier).

Also should have remembered to put on my foulie boots (which I don't particularly like, preferring tennis shoes), as I was standing in ankle-deep water in the back of the cockpit. But the day felt warm, sun was out, visibility about 10 miles (at least that's when I saw the island), and nothing too bad had happened on board. Several big clangs and crashes were heard coming up the companionway, and stuff that normally never falls over was flying around the boat. The tea kettle hopped off the stove and deposited itself 10 feet away on the opposite side and forward - weird, how did it do that? One locker door opened and a bunch of canned soups got loose, a pillow took a dive onto the floor and met up with water under the floor boards... I tried out my special tiny bilge pump (a 1/4" diameter hose connected to a small pump that lets me suck up water from various corners in the boat), but it didn't want to work too well. There was a fair bit of water getting in through the companionway hatch (found a new leak in the interior hatch frame, I need to pull out the sealant and glass the frame in properly, something to do later) and it was making the interior quite damp.

Up top it was wet wet wet, but the sailing was pretty good. I put the autopilot on, went forward to harden up on the mainsail leech cord, retrieved some strings that were trailing in the water (spinnaker pole trip lines that had come undone), and watched the boat banging along to weather. Nice thing that the swell was done and we didn't have a single belly-flop the whole day. It's really unpleasant to fly the boat off a ten foot wave with no backside and fall vertically in a huge crash on the other side, I was pleased nothing like that was happening.

At the island it remained lumpy, I went wide by quite a bit (bad lee shore there), turned down and jibed, heading for the Gate. Right behind me was a Wyliecat 30 with their gigantic mainsail, and I was looking forward when he gybed and the crash that gybe made caused me to jump up afraid that something had broken at the back of my boat! Next time I'll ask the Wyliecats to warn nearby folk prior to gybing, will reduce the number of heart attacks on the course.

Wind stayed on the beam or nearby for the return sail, I dropped the second reef and tacked the no. 3 to the rail and we trundled along downhill towards the Gate, winds holding 25-30 knots, not too much happening in race mode, one boat off to leeward seemed to have a suicidal bent as he had put up a spinnaker and was sailing off towards Half Moon Bay. Nobody else went for a kite that I could see.

It was fun to watch the Wyliecat go by, surfing along, follwed by Warpath (lightweight Farr 36, I believe) - they were going fast downhill. Beetle doesn't surf, but did bit of surging now and again. About an hour after turning the island to head for the finish I saw the last of the boats still headed out.

Halfway back I shook out the first reef as it lightened up a bit around the Lightbucket, then filled in again. It's weird when the wind drops to 24 knots and you start wondering where all the breeze went.

Straightforward sail to the finish, was 8th boat in (I think) and managed to correct out next-to last, which is fine by me. Racing my living room I'm generally not as fast as the rating, and didn't break too much, and it was a nice (if wet) day on the water.

- rob/beetle

[Critter]

Jud, there are a couple more brief stories on Pressure Drop, including mine (I'm Hanno over there):
http://www.pressure-drop.us/forums/s...ded-Farallones

[Philpott]

"It's weird when the wind drops to 24 knots and you start wondering where all the breeze went." Now THAT's the start of a slightly scary bedtime story for Dura Mater. Wonder if it will keep her awake at night worrying about next year? I really appreciate the time you take to write about your race experiences. Thank you.