[Public-List] FW: Racers speed of A30

[elyse.pastor at sympatico.ca]

Dear Lawrence, dear Gord, dear Jonathan, dear David,
Thanks again for your detailed explanations about the reasons why we are slower then the others. I will certainly take every point and look into it.
I have spoken again to my mentor of our club (who has been racing for more then 30 years on his Alberg 37) and gave him your responses. What he asked me again was with what size of sail in what wind are you sailing and what are the maximum speeds that you are experience? He knows exactly what sail to take on his A37 at any wind speed. And about the waves - we are on a fairly small lake where the waves (if they build) are very close together and may-be max 3-4ft.

Am I correct if I list the following (or please correct if you have better data and I will go out and try them (with what sails I have)):
0 - 10kts  150-170 jib with the complete main sail
10-15kts  120jib with complete main sail
16-21kts  120 jib with 1st reef on main sail
22-26kts   120jib with 2nd reef on main sail
>26kts - we would need a smaller jib that we do not have.
Maximum speed upwind: 5.8-5.9kts

In any upwind setting, we have the jib as tight as possible (in perfect shape), and try to have the toe-rail about 4" out of the water. If the wind increases and we have the same size of jib, we also move the roller on the track further backwards in order to spill some air on the top of the jib (change the shape of the sail and let some wind drop-out on top). Another main adjustment we do on the main sail depending on the wind-strength - we open it to the point where we see that the main sail has a slight back-wind pocket just after the mast. If possible we close it tight to the centre of the boat (we also have a traveler that we use), depending on the wind force. Always with the objective of the rail about 4" out of the water.
Again, the maximum speed we are obtaining (close to the wind) is about 5.8 - 5.9kts under the above circumstances (we use a GPS to measure boat speed and assume that the speed is accurate). Unfortunately, this will still leave me towards the end of the race group even if our start is perfect (closest to the committee boat within 3 seconds after the start over the line). For your information, we race a triangle and then a sausage with the winner (last week) in 55 minutes (Grampian 26), us (6th) with 1 hour 4 min and and last (Tanzer 22) (8th) 1 hour 9 minute. On the net after correction: 1st 51 minutes, us 59 minutes and last 1 hour 4 minutes.
For those of you who also race against many other sailboats, would you know what rating a Grampian 26 "0.929" or a Mirage 24
"0.923" have in your club? I just would like to compare if these numbers are similar or even the same (our A30 is "0.929").
So - that is enough. Our next race - next Tuesday.
Thanks again to all of you for your inputs.
Bruno & Elyse; Lady Heron 297