Beercan, practice, match race, beercan

I received a polite email that more or less said "I know you've been sailing, wheres the blog?", and yes, I have been a bit lazy about updating the goings-on of Shields 88. It's quite cool to get emails re the blog, always nice to know someone reads this stuff!

So. June 17 beercan. Me, Niki, John Ponsetto, Steve Schwartz (of 90) and Nik's sister Katie. Tried mixing it up in positions with John driving, Niki on jib, Kate on main and Steve on the bow, so pretty much the opposite of everyones usual spot on a boat! It was great fun, we put down a case of beer, but there was very little wind. We started about 5 minutes late to the start, with the 10s, and were first Shields over the line, with Robin just behind and leeward after we tacked. They had great speed, and Jessica rolled us to leeward! Not bad for a new owner. We stayed right in the dying breeze and got ahead when they tacked inshore, rounded first, but then the breeze really crapped out and we got a tow from our friends on Challenge. It was a fun night, especially since everyone got to try a different spot on the boat. I think Niki likes our 2:1 system, which after a _lot_ of tinkering is nearing perfection.

June 22nd practice. We had me, Niki, Brian Sabina and Jocelyn out for this one. Interesting note is that the crib weather station is completely full of it. It was reporting 17-20 kts when we were sailing, and I really doubt we had any puffs over 4kts. A very frustrating night as we only had about 10 minutes of sailable breeze. We did practice 2 roll tacks, so I guess it was worthwhile for that!

June 23rd Match racing on Tom28's. Had a great time sailing the Olympic Day exhibition sailing on Chicago Match Race Centers Tom28's. Sailed REALLY close to North Avenue Beach (in fact the umpires gave us a penalty for entering the swim area!) and picked up a bunch of tricks. I did bow all night, which is not my best position, but had fun with it. We got off 8 races, I think we won 5, but it all blends together. Picked up a couple neat tricks, mostly about head to wind sailing. In dial ups (at starts and luffs) the driver had me backing the jib hard by grabbing the clew, in order to do hard turns down when bearing away. To keep things secret, I would watch his hands for a point, and back the jib that way. It was a really effective tool for an aggressive turn down. Also picked up a neat trick of presetting the pole to leeward before the final tack to an upwind layline. It works if the downhaul is off (the Tom28s dont have one) and you keep the topping lift really high, so that it doesn't foul the jib. We will incorporate both of these things into 88's bag o' tricks. The little bit of sailing I do with CMRC is really bringing my boat on boat game up, and I feel its helping my Shields sailing. While really attacking is generally a small part of our sailing (and should be less so at Nationals) it's great stuff to experience, so that when it comes up in a race the reaction is instant.

June 24th beercan. It was me, Niki and Brian Shaw. Had 3 Shields out in another light air night. It was sailable at around 3-8kts, and beautiful to be off land as it's been a scorching week of weather here. Brian drove, I did main/spin and Niki did bow. We started about halfway down the boat, with 45 winning the boat, and 67 behind. Had a long stbd leg, with 45 holding us off. Once we tacked it seemd like they were going to faceplant a tack on us, so we bore off a bit to get some speed, and then once they tacked took a nice big bite to windward to clear air. This was pretty effectice, and Brian drove great to maintain clear air all the way to layline. The trim setup for this was a pretty tiny ease of main and jib, and then a slow trim up/turn up, where we held high (pinching) and then a slow ease on main, turn down, then ease on jib. Brian was able to roll 45, get a controlling spot on their hip, then tack for lay. We had a decent set, but 45 got on top of us, so it was some tricky sailing to extend out to leeward, and Brian drove great again to extend. We heard horns from the RC, which we though was a shorten course, making that leg the finish, but it turned out to be just a shorten course for the next leg. We realized this as we were sailing past the RC boat towards the harbor, but did a quick drop, tack, gybe and round. This was good as we got a chance to try what seems to be the toughest drop of the Shields for us; jib up, pole down, chute down on port while the pole comes down on stbd . This is tricky as the bow has to flip the pole up behind the jib leech, then down up to our bungee pulpit and on the deck. Niki nailed this one, and it looked good! 45 bailed to the harbod, as did 67, so we had a default win and gave the rum to Brian. Really fun night. I wish the class rules limited weight so that we could sail with 3 all the time, as it's the most fun for Shields sailing.

Last night we sailed with full tension on the shrouds, and the headstay set at 48, but put 1/2" shim behind the mast. It gave us plenty of headstay sag, and with the addition of a tiny bit of backstay resulted in a nice light air main shape, without taking the sag out of the jib. I like this trick, and will do it in the future, but I REALLY need to come up with a better way to change shims. It's very hard to get the fitted shim in behind the mast, as the vang bail is in the way.