CYC Three Tree Point

After two marginal races the weather was looking epic for a great March day of racing.  The rains would pause, the skies would clear, and the wind would fill in with 10-20 kts out of the south / southwest.  Going into the race we had 3.5 points and were in first place, with Terremoto in second with 5 pts.  We knew that in heavy air we may have an upwind advantage over Terremoto so our goal was to load the rail and point it, hoping to leverage our heavy #1 in 15 kts to point high and fast. 

However, on race morning there were a few conflicting weather forecasts with some indicating that a northerly would descend and shut off the wind around the finish.  Unfortunately, race committee got nervous about the weather forecast and decided to shorten the course, selecting Alki and Meadow Points as rounding marks.  This effectively cut the course in half.

We had a good start among the maneuvering boats and got clear air on the upwind side of the course.  The fleet charged west in 12-15 kts and our plan of big sails and lots of crew was paying off.  We pinned multiple boats on the inside but we all eventually ran out of water and had to tack back.  

Hamachi powering off the start line (Thanks Jan!)

Absolutely snuck to the outside and came back on all of the boats now on port tack.  There was a lot going on and we didn't see them until the last minute and they had to duck us and called a foul.  We were in great shape up to that point, but quickly threw in a 360 and pressed on.  We all tacked out to Westpoint and there the boats divided.  We continued on into the channel to catch the now flood tide.  The fleet split with some continuing west while we decided to tack back east into Elliott Bay.  We could see boats getting lifted and stayed on the east side of the course up to the mark.  We traded a few tacts but most of our competition stayed west, and we caught a tremendous lift to sail straight to and then tack over to the mark.  This allowed us to get good separation from our fellow 40 footers.  We rounded, set the A2.5 and headed back for the finish.  

Hamachi heading for home (Thanks Jan!)

Heading downhill we had 10-12 kts of wind, which means Hamachi is well below the point we could plane, but we still made 8-9 kts through the water.  We jibed east towards Magnolia, jibed again to to make Westpoint, then jibed at Westpoint for the Meadowpoint buoy.  The forecast had the wind filling in from the south between noon and 1pm, and it was accurate.  Unfortunately, instead of riding this wind home from Three Tree Point, it meant that the slower boats in the shortened course were blown back up to the leaders.  We rounded Meadowpoint ahead of the wind line and then beat the short distance back to the finish line in the building breeze.  Like the previous weeks, we crossed fifth overall behind the big ORC sleds and took PHRF line honors.

Happy crew: Jason, Shawn and Chris (Thanks Jan!)

In the end Terremoto and Absolutely used the building southerly to close the gap on corrected time with Terremoto finishing first, Absolutely second and Hamachi third in class.  Overall those boats finished fourth, fifth and sixth in the 58 boat fleet.  On corrected time Absolutely finished 40 seconds ahead of us, so our screw up at the start became significant.  We wish we could have sailed the long course, because the weather would have played to our advantage, instead of detriment - but that's sailboat racing!

Results: http://www.cycseattle.org/results/2017_specific/centerOA.html#r3phrf_nw

The Three Tree Point (Alki) race standings meant that Terremoto finished first in our division for the CYC Center Sound Series with 6.0 points (4 - 1 - 1), we finished second with 6.5 points (1.5 - 2 - 3), and Absolutely took third with 9.5 points (1.5 - 6 - 2).  Our generous gift of sharing first in class on the Blakely Rock Race was significant, but not material as Terremoto had us on tie breakers.  There aren't any official overall rankings, but if you add up the points for the 60 boat CYC Center Sound Series fleet, Terremoto finished first with 20 points (4 - 12 - 4) and Hamachi finished second with 28 points (1 - 21 - 6).  Given our experience with the boat, we are really pleased.  Further, we made an impression on the fleet and I think many are trying to figure out "who are the guys with the blue boat?"

We compiled some of the GoPro footage from the three races into a summary.  Only sailboat racers can watch videos of sailboat racing.  Most people find it equivalent to watching paint dry…  Enjoy!

CYC Scatchet Head

CYC's Scatchet Head has been a wet and windy gear buster the last few years, and we were hoping to get a good blow.  While the J/125 has a reputation as a bomber downwind offshore sled, all we've been able to do is test its inshore upwind abilities with the races to date.  We've been pleasantly surprised by the boats all around capabilities, but are getting anxious to "send it".  We were hoping CYC's Scatchet Head would deliver and the Pacific Storms were lining up.  In the end the race occurred between two strong fronts, so all we saw was 10-15 kts oscillating between the SE and SW.  So the "go big" moment had to wait, but the boat continues to earn the respect of the fleet.

Our crew of Chris, Mike, Adam, Steve and Mikki (along with Jason and Shawn) were off the dock early.  The heavy rain rolled in for the start and we set up for our first real downwind leg, albeit in lighter than desired conditions.  Given that we have never even sailed the boat in a downwind race leg (it's hard to count last week since we never saw more than 5 kts downwind), and we are new to asym spinnakers (the J/36 had a pole), we were making it up a little as we went - but that's how we roll.  We debated about the wind and the forecast to build...or not...and decided in the end to go with the A2 based on the color coded crossover chart on our bulkhead (hey - if all else fails, read the manual...). 

We chose the west side (pin end) of the start and set off down the course in 10-12 kts.  We struck the #3 and hoisted our spinnaker staysail, only to find that the winds were too light and it did more harm than good.  We stayed west and were getting better breeze than the rest of our fleet.  The larger ORC boats started right behind us and the TP52s hugged the west side, as all the forecasts said it would be slightly heavier air there.  A group of us jibed to head farther west in search of this breeze, while the other half of our fleet kept on their lines to the east.  The wind was out of the SE so many of these lighter boats (Wicked Wahine - Melges 32 / Terremoto - Riptide 35) were choosing to sail deeper lines to lay the mark.  After a short run to the west we jibed back pointing mostly at the leeward mark up at Scatchet Head.  We spent a bit of time trying to find the downwind sweet spot, and found we were pointing higher and faster than these other boats, but in the end sailed a longer course.  The wind built to 15 kts gusting to 18 kts and we felt the boat's potential, but never really got it on a plane.  We all converged at the Scatchet Head buoy and, after a conservative takedown on our part where we gave up a little time, we rounded immediately behind Wicked Wahine and abeam Terremoto.

We powered back up hill for home in 10-12 kts with our Heavy #1.  We dialed the boat in, making 7.25 kts through the water, and passed Terremoto and then Wicked Wahine.  We pushed out to the west of the fleet to catch the incoming flood tide and stayed west of everyone.  About half way home there was a big wind shift to the SW which we reached first.  This allowed us to point high and put some separation on everyone.  We had the ORC boats Jedi (J/145) and Jam (J/160) trying to reign us in and we were able to fend them off.  Within a mile of the finish the next front overcame the fleet and the wind jumped up to 15-17 kts.  This allowed us to power along pointing incredibly high and cranked across the finish at 8kts. 

We were the first PHRF boat across the line and fifth overall to finish behind the big ORC sleds: Crossfire (R/P 55), Smoke (TP52), Glory (TP52) and Neptune's Car (SC70).  On corrected time Terremoto was able to keep the gap small enough that they finished first in class while we took second.  Overall, this was not the race for the fast PHRF boats, as we corrected out to 22nd and Terremoto took 16th.  Through two races we are 1st in class and 5th overall.  Results can be found here:

Overall:     Overall Results
By Class:  Class Results

CYC Blakely Rock Race Summary

The 2017 racing season kicked off March 4th with beautiful but cold weather in Seattle.  Sixty two (62) boats had assembled for the CYC Blakely Rock Race.  A week of storms dissipated leaving patchy blue skies, sun and the remnants of a southerly.  This was forecast to fade over the course of the race leaving everyone potentially in a drifter.  Our crew of Mikki, Alyosha, Steve, Lucas, Chris and Max (along with Jason and Shawn) assembled early to entertain the camera crew making Max famous over in China.  We were off the dock, cameras and drones in tow, and after the cameos set about to racing.  We hoisted the heavy #1 in the stiff morning breeze and quickly dialed the boat in.  Based on the pressure we decided to return quickly to the dock to pick up some heavier air sails in case things did not settle down as planned.  Back on the water we quickly entered the start box for our start sequence (#8), which had the highest performing PHRF boats.  We started amongst the usual suspects and PNW power houses including: Absolutely (Farr 39), Terremoto (Riptide 35), White Cloud (Cookson 12.5), Wicket Wahine (Melges 32), Madrona (Custom 40ft), and Freja (Aerodyne 43).

Team Hamachi - Pre-Start

We had an average start and ended up behind traffic in bad air so we quickly tacked out and back to set up our lanes.  We worked up the east side along the Shilshole breakwater and then worked back west, making several tactical tacts to gain on our fleet, eventually moving out front with White Cloud.  The upwind beat in 8-10 kts left everyone fairly bunched as we approached Blakely Rock.  As predicted the wind began to fade causing people to make extra tacts as they rounded the mark.  We rounded abeam Terremoto and immediately behind White Cloud and Absolutely.  Once around most of the fleet hugged the western shore searching for puffs of wind.  We moved out towards the middle of the channel seeking the benefit of the ebb tide.  A group of four boats including Hamachi, Terremoto, Absolutely and Dos started separating to the east chasing our own pockets of wind. After a half mile Terremoto and Dos jibed back west towards the fleet, while we continued on with Absolutely on our stern.  Surveying the course we clearly saw more ripples in Elliott Bay and along the eastern shore, but apparently only Absolutely and us had this assessment, because no one followed us.  

As we continued east the breeze slowly built.  We jibed to lay West Point as well as the northern mark and carried this breeze steadily north.  At this point only Absolutely and Hamachi were in the wind and we put serious distance on the entire fleet.  In fact, we were reeling in the two lead boats: Crossfire (R/P 55) and Smoke (TP52); which were several miles ahead at the time we rounded Blakely Rock.  Over the course of two hours we pushed north following the wind line that was clearly only on the east side of the course.  The wind was directly out of the west so we were in a very tight reach and Absolutely eventually had to fly a jib, while we had our A1.5 cranked tight.  This allowed us to put additional distance on them, and we somehow kept gaining on Smoke, watching them round the windward mark about 0.3 miles ahead of us.  As we approached the mark we put up our #1 jib and reached in and around.  In the process we struck the A1.5 and put up the A3, which was now serving as our Code 0.  We were the third boat to round the windward mark (behind Corssfire and Smoke) and, with the exception of Absolutely and Wicked Wahine, the rest of the fleet could hardly be seen.  

We now pushed south towards the finish making good time, as Absolutely worked north.  After 20 minutes we came across the race committee boat heading north.  They hailed us on the VHF and asked us to call their cell.  They relayed that they had a conundrum as they were moving to shorten the course, with the goal of making the northern mark the finish.  However, now that we were around it (by this time so was Absolutely), they could not do that without giving us some consideration, or making the entire fleet sail the complete course.  Over the next 10 minutes a weird phone dialogue/negotiation ensued as they worked to figure out what they were going to do.  The wind was fading and we had good boat speed, while Absolutely was parked behind us.  It was also clear that we would finish with plenty of time on Absolutely to take the overall PHRF win.  The race committee was not at the windward mark and did not have clear timing between the boats. Absolutely claimed that they had the time they rounded and also timed how far behind they were from our rounding - they said around five minutes.  We did not have times for either.  In this scenario, even with the shortened course, the race committee said that Absolutely could have won. We pointed out that we were now 0.5 miles in front of Absolutely, with 1.5 miles to sail, heading towards the finish at 3 kts while they were parked - in our opinion we were clearly going to win (we were).  We were happy to finish the full course to prove our point, but this would mean everyone else would have to as well, and most would not.  After a final discussion with the race committee and then our crew, we decided that the best thing to do for the fleet was to shorten the course.  Further, in the theme of sportsmanship, we agreed to "share" the victory with Absolutely.  We were putting good karma (and good will) in the bank for future occasions. 

Team Hamachi - We Know Our Finish Place

When the results were tallied only 28 boats of 56 in PHRF finished the course.  On corrected time we (and Absolutely) finished 45 minutes ahead of 3rd place and an hour and 15 minutes ahead of the 4th place finishers. We were all pleased with the overall outcome, especially given this was only our second race and fifth day sailing Hamachi.  Race results can be found here:

Overall: http://www.cycseattle.org/results/2017_specific/centerOA.html#r1

Class: http://www.cycseattle.org/results/2017_specific/center.html

Some great shots of Hamachi from Jan:

Mikki on Bow:  Mikki on bow 
Hamachi going to weather:  Team Hamachi in the office, Hamachi powering uphill

Hamachi 2017 Racing Calendar

Welcome Race Fans!  The new crew of Hamachi is psyched for what is shaping up to be an eventful 2017 racing season.  We’ve decided to focus on the PNW this year, with plans to travel for bigger adventures in 2018 and beyond.  You can also follow us on Facebook.

Here’s our current race calendar – we look forward to seeing everyone on the water!

CYC Center Sound Series: Blakely Rock, Scatchet Head, Three Tree Point

PSSR Big Boat Series - Spring

SYC Tri Island Series: Protection Island, Vashon Island

Swiftsure

VanIsle 360

Shaw Island Classic

Northern Century

Foul Weather Bluff

PSSR Big Boat Series - Fall

Grand Prix

Round the County

Round The County 2016

This was our third round the county in a row, which means we’ve done it both directions, and were looking to leverage that experience.  For the 2016 edition we made a major upgrade: after five years racing our J/36 Monekybones we acquired Hamachi, the beautiful blue J/125 previously owned by Greg Slyngstad.  The complicating factor was that we did this the week before Round the County.  As a result, prior to race day, we only had one full day of sailing it under our belts, which consisted of an upwind ferry trip from Seattle to Cap Sante in Anacortes.  Further, given Hamachi’s PHRF of -3, we had to enter the ORC class, which meant our competition was four TP52s, a Santa Cruz 70, a Farr 40, an Andrews 53, a J/145 and a J/160 – formidable competition with incredibly experienced crews – especially considering that all our previous experience had been buried down in the fleet on a J/36 with a PHRF of 81.  Needless to say we were in over our heads, just the way we like it.

Hamachi came with a magnificent sail selection.  We barely knew how to rig the boat and had yet to fly half of the sail inventory, including ones we may have to use during the course of the race.  We opted to go with the light and heavy #1, a #3, a handful of spinnakers (the A1.5, A2.5 and A3.0) as well as the Code 0 and staysail and, because it’s the PNW, the drifter.  The eve of the race we debated loading aboard the #4 and A4, but the last minute Predictwind forecast looked like things were lightening up.  And then they didn’t…
 

The Saturday start was a November classic where 15-20 kts flipped to 30 kts ten minutes before the start as a cold front rolled across the San Juan Islands.  Hamachi was not rigged with reefing gear and suddenly we were flying around the start line with full main and no option but to go with the #3.  We jury rigged a reefing system in case things got worse and started longing for the #4 (yes Jason – I told you so!).  We were focused on not breaking the boat and started conservatively on the pin side.  We pointed high to lighten the rig load and did the only thing we could – sail it like the boat we knew: Monekeybones.  Luckily they are both fractionally rigged J-boats that have similar upwind characteristics, so this worked well.  Downwind, they are complete opposites with the J/36 being a fractionally rigged spinnaker on pole, while the J/125 is a masthead rigged spinnaker on a sprit.  The J/125 excels downwind.  However, this year’s RTC was an upwind race.

Once racing we leveraged our knowledge of the San Juans to ride the current relief up the east side of Blakely Island.  We started near the end of the fleet but quickly started passing boats, including ones in our class, using great strategy and tacking skills.  An hour into the race we had worked our way to near the front of the fleet and were locked into upwind sailing duals with the likes of Strait Marine (the Farr 40), Terremoto, Jam and White Cloud.  We executed a few good sail changes and kept the boat motoring upwind at 7kts, but got caught in towards James Island and got passed up by a few boats.  On the beat towards the south tip of Lopez the wind built against the ebbing tide creating steep waves.  During a sail change we lost the jib halyard overboard which cost us five minutes, but luckily recovered and pressed on.  

Hamachi powering upwind near James Island (thanks Sean Drew!)

Rounding the south tip of Lopez Hamachi cracked off to a tight reach in 25kts of wind and accelerated up to 14 kts rocketing by several boats on a full plane.  The forecast was for the wind to dissipate as we approached Salmon Bank, so our plan was to fly the Code 0 as soon as we could get the wind angle, and then downshift to a spinnaker.  During this stretch the crew got caught up enjoying the ride so we were late to rig the Code 0, and by the time we were ready to fly it we needed to shift to the spinnaker.  This cost us some time but eventually settled in to the A1.5, which was also our first time flying it.  We ran with our fleet across the half way mark, crossing at 12:05 ahead of Strait Marine and right behind Jam.  We knew that the wind would fade to a drifter, and could see it developing in front of us.  Further, we knew that the ebb tide would be significant around Lime Kiln Pt, so we planned to hug the shore.  Around Eagle Pt we decided to leave our fleet and jibe in, sensing better pressure and an opportunity for early current relief.  In the end this did not pay off.  As everything turned into a drifter, puffs would roll through and push groups of boats up the course, but few ever reached us.  Our competition caught a wind line that we could not reach and we were forced to watch them sail off towards the finish.  We fought for a few hours and eventually made our way out to the pressure and pressed on towards the finish with Madrona, only to stall out 200 yards from the line.  We waited 30 minutes and eventually the wind shifted 180 degrees and we threw up our jib to cross the line around 4:50 pm.  We parked Hamachi in Roche Harbor and enjoyed an amazing sunset before heading to Johns Island to spend the night.

Hamachi at rest in Roche Harbor

Sunday morning was beautiful and light.  The first group of boats had major issues with their start, and so we all waited while they were recalled – twice.  It was a downwind start heading off to the north and again we played it conservative flying the A1.5 and staysail.  We quickly learned that in very light breeze the staysail is a bad thing, since it would choke the spinnaker.  We had no power.  Once we figured that out we furled it up and kept it on deck in case we needed it.  We got a little confused with the course and almost missed rounding Danger Shoal.  We were already the last boat in the fleet so hopefully no-one noticed us beating upwind with our spinnaker and staysail to make the rounding.  Having spotted the fleet 5-10 minutes, we thought it would be a good time to catch up, and quickly did that.  With all of the boats jibing up the coast of Stuart Island we stayed outside in good pressure and avoided traffic, sailing deep lines and taking names.  By the time we hit Turn Pt and turned towards Patos Island we’d caught up to and passed half of our fleet, and were within shouting distance of the TPs.  

After spotting the ENTIRE fleet a 5-10 minute head start, we started taking names (passing White Cloud here)

On the run towards Patos we had the wind on our beam and sailed high, as we saw it was lighter to leeward.  This allowed us to further gain on the few boats ahead of us.  As the wind started to come around to 80 deg TWA we decided to go big and put up the Code 0 and staysail.  This was a lot of fun until a wind hole developed in front of the fleet and we had to immediately furl the gear and re-launch the #1.  We struggled through the wind hole, as did our local competition of Strait Marine and White Cloud.  We finally got back on track but spotted these boats a half mile lead in the process.  We rounded Patos with Madrona and Artemis around 12:20 and pointed high as we all turned east.  At this point the wind started to build from 8-10 kts towards 20 and then 25 kts as we tacked east.  We hugged the rhumb line and downshifted from the #1 to the #3.  As the boat powered up (we only had a total of 6 crew on our 41 footer) we pointed higher and higher eventually cranking along at 7.0-7.5 kts at a TWA of 25-30 deg.  It was a beautiful thing.  The waves were large and the boat was pounding so we tacked into the lee of a few islands to get to calmer water.  By pointing high and finding the flatter water we were slowly reeling in White Cloud and Strait Marine, eventually getting into a tacking dual with White Cloud as we rounded the tip of Orcas.  Once we got our first look at the finish, we could see it lightening up and Jedi caught in a wind hole.  We switched back to the #1 as the wind faded and several boats caught up to us.  Our small fleet shifted east to sail out and around the wind hole and then tacked back west to reach across the finish line at 9 kts.  We finished at 3:25.    

Some video highlights from the race

In the end the ORC class was fairly tightly grouped on day #2.  Based on corrected time we finished at 7:03 (hr:min) behind Glory at 7:02 and Jam at 7:01 but ahead of Artemis, Jedi and Neptune’s Car.  Overall we finished seventh out of ten boats (ahead of Jedi and Artemis) - these results were driven by who got wind and who didn’t on day one.  Given our experience level with the boat, and the fact that we couldn’t really ever exploit its downwind strength (we spent all of 10 minutes planning all weekend), we were pleased with the outcome and really looking forward to the 2017 racing season.

Shawn and I would like to thank our great crew of Mike, Pete, Steve and Lucas.  You guys worked your assess off all weekend, and we all had a blast!

From left to right: Shawn, Steve, Pete, Jason, Mike and Lucas