Sydney To Hobart 2015-2016

[Pelagic]

I'd love to see a competition like this become more of a seamanship and navigation challenge.

Make it a 'predicted course' competition where each boat predicts its average speed and eta to the finish line, based on weather forecast.

The boat that sails the most efficiently with closest ETA is the Winner.
Line honors can be a separate trophy, but not the one that all the non professionals are vying for.

[transmitterdan]

Originally Posted by Pelagic

I'd love to see a competition like this become more of a seamanship and navigation challenge.

Make it a 'predicted course' competition where each boat predicts its average speed and eta to the finish line, based on weather forecast.

The boat that sails the most efficiently with closest ETA is the Winner.
Line honors can be a separate trophy, but not the one that all the non professionals are vying for.

Isn't the cruiser's category already set up like this? The fact that only 1 boat signed up may speak volumes about the popularity of that format.

[Polux]

Originally Posted by StuM

So where is your cut off between "fast boats" and "old slow boats".

Following your argument to its logical conclusion, there is no point in having any form of handicapping. The only prize should be first across the line. And then it comes down purely to who has the biggest pockets, not who are the best sailors.

And suddenly you have a fleet of 3 or 4 boats, rather than 100 and that's the end of the sport.

Sorry, but I've seen the same argument too many times at club level where the guy with the newest, fastest boat in the club thinks that he should win every race and collect every trophy at the end of the season.

I have nothing with against ocean club racing with all types of boats with the victory being attributed by rating I am only talking about Ocean professional top/amateurs top racing on a worldwide basis.

Regarding that what he see is the predominance of boats that fit classes, boats that can be different but that has to share some common rules like max draft, max beam and max length. The first that arrives is the one that wins. There is not a overall winner but several winners one for each class.

Again I am talking about professional/top amateurs and regarding that it is expected that top sailors can get sponsors and if winning on the 100ft class can be very expensive and demand a strong sponsor, winning on the smaller classes would not be that expensive. You have inexpensive small production boats on this race going faster than bigger carbon racing boats.

Now, what does not make sense is to see old outdated slow boats winning races like the S2H. That's good for club racing, not good for top racing.

That's as if it was possible an old VW Beetle to win a F1 race. A VW Beetle can be very well raced but we all know that the level of skill needed to race a VW Beetle is not the same as the one needed to race as well a F1.

Equally the level needed to race well an old S&S 34 has nothing with the level needed to race well a TP52, much less the level needed to race well a top racing Maxi.

If the S&S34 won this race it would not be certainly because their sailors were the best on this race, simply that the boat was the one that was sailed better regarding a given rating, that can be more or less correct. It does say nothing regarding the overall competence of that crew compared to others. Probably they could not even sail properly a TP52, that is a hugely more demanding boat to sail.

[Polux]

Contrary to the performance of old slow boats that can win the race sailing on its tail, I am interested by the real performance of inexpensive production dual purpose boats (cruiser/racers) face to carbon very expensive boats.

On this race there are some of those doing extremely well, two with really an incredible performance.

The first of them is a 43ft A13 (Archambault), Teasing Machine, that is racing on 12th position. All boats ahead are racing boats, all in carbon and not a single one smaller. The ones that are immediately behind are also bigger carbon racing boats if we exclude the famous Helsal 3 that is a 66ft racing boat, I mean exclude carbon.

Another with a great performance is Imagination, a First 44.7 racing on 18th position, again in the middle of bigger carbon racers ahead of the first 70ft racing Clipper.

Immediately behind a Marten 49, a very fast carbon cruiser racer, on 25th position, the 2th very impressive one, the little 35ft JPK 10.80, a non carbon cruiser/racer that is has behind a First 40, Mayfair. Both boats with a great sailing performance. Behind them comes the 80ft Maxi Ragamuffin, followed by After Midnight, a Farr 40 and Black Sheep, a First 45.

Behind the First 45 comes a Sydney 38 (TSA Management), a Lyons 54, a 70ft racing Clipper, a Sydney 38, a carbon racing R&P 46, a racing Farr 43, a racing JV52, a racing Ker 40, two 70ft racing Clipper, a Swan 65, a X-50, another two 70ft Clipper racer, a Warwick 67, another Sydney 38, and in 47th place another 70ft clipper racer.

The ones at bold are really the ones that impress me on this race:
relatively inexpensive production cruiser/racers that can really go fast and fight on real time with much more expensive carbon racers or bigger yacht, not old slow boats like the S&S 34, that is leading the race sailing on its tail (67 out of 77).

[JPA Cate]

Just now, it's looking as if Ragamuffin 100 will overtake Rambler coming up the Derwent.

And for those cruisers of us, a bunch of us were talking about the not having a spare mainsail aboard, and came up with a 2 part answer: extra weight of a 130 or so foot tall sail; & cost thereof a $500,000.. I am told that similar laminate sails turn into shreds when they blow out, not something you can slap some sticky-back sail cloth on or re-stitch.

[Polux]

Originally Posted by Ann T. Cate

Just now, it's looking as if Ragamuffin 100 will overtake Rambler coming up the Derwent.

And for those cruisers of us, a bunch of us were talking about the not having a spare mainsail aboard, and came up with a 2 part answer: extra weight of a 130 or so foot tall sail; & cost thereof a $500,000.. I am told that similar laminate sails turn into shreds when they blow out, not something you can slap some sticky-back sail cloth on or re-stitch.

It seems that Rambler is more damaged than Ragamuffin. Normally Ragamuffin would not be a match but regarding the situation they are in it is difficult to predict an outcome: they are sailing almost without wind, making 1 or 2K. It will be interesting.

Regarding laminated sails there are many types, some for heavy weather that will take a lot and lighter sails that offer better performance. In top racing you chose the sail for the kind of wind you will get (on short oceanic races like the S2H), even on the mainsail: performance versus weight and strength.

If the Wild Oats was doing a much larger oceanic race, with a lot more unpredictability regarding the weather I am sure they would have sailed with a heavier mainsail, at least if they had one ;-).

What most laminated sails don't like is flapping around and that can damage them quickly, but again they are not all alike even in what regards that.

[44'cruisingcat]

There I was thinking the whole point of handicapping was that any boat could win the race....

[Rustic Charm]

It's literally kneck and kneck for second place. Finally grabbed the attention of the media. 500m to go

[Rustic Charm]

Originally Posted by 44'cruisingcat

There I was thinking the whole point of handicapping was that any boat could win the race....

[Rustic Charm]

Great picture of Raga going through the line for second. Rambler took a punt on going wide to find some wind stuffed up the gamble. Pathetic media coverage as usual. We won't hear anything more on the race until each evening news now.

[Rustic Charm]

For anyone who wants to play down this race, from the chief himself


“This is a hard race. I have sailed around the world two and a half times and I thought I had seen it all but this is one hard body of water” was how Comanche’s skipper Ken Read summed it up dockside after bringing his wounded supermaxi across the line tonight.

One of the most extraordinary line-honours triumphs in the history of the Rolex Sydney Hobart.

“This is a hard race. You guys have a hard race here. The people who have done this race 25 times, God bless them, they are the hardest people on Earth or the dumbest people on Earth, probably a combination of the two.”

This was a moment of supreme elation, joy and relief for Read and Comanche’s owners, Jim and Kristy Clark. Relief because Comanche could so easily not have made it to Hobart at all. It had all come so terribly unstuck on that first night of the race, when something destroyed one of their daggerboards.

“The first thing was we had to get rid of the daggerboard,” Read recalls. “It was attached by a bunch of ropes and you could hear it failing around under the boat. I was most worried about the sharp edges of the daggerboard actually puncturing up through the hull of the boat. So we desperately cut the ropes to get rid of the daggerboard. And of course when we got rid of the daggerboard by cutting the ropes we saved the hull but kind of cleaned out the rudder on the way through.”

They had somehow wrecked the entire steering system inside the boat, and when they finally had a chance to inspect the damaged rudder they found it facing backwards.

“That’s when we said we’re done,” Read said. “We stopped and took all the sails down. We actually started kind of drifting back towards Sydney. And then all of a sudden I see the tools come out and when I see the tools come out with these guys that’s usually a good sign that they have an idea. All of a sudden you hear cutters and little grinders.”

Somehow they patched it all together.

“There’s three stainless threads holding the entire steering system together right now,” Read adds. Maybe they would not need to pull out after all. “I talked to the watch captains and we all decided unanimously we’re here to finish this race.”

“I did not quite know what was going on,” Jim Clark said. Stuck on shore, the owner was only getting patchy news from his boat. “First I was told they retired and then that they were racing on. Until we came alongside the boat I wasn’t fully aware of exactly what had gone on. It was my first real indication of just what had happened.”

While Read’s tradies were ferreting away at the steering, Rambler swept past into the lead. It would be 13 hours before Comanche would take it back again after, bizarrely, Rambler smashed one of her daggerboards. Suddenly it was game on again.

“About half way through we put in a long port tack and chewed up Rambler,” Read says. “We went from let’s just finish to, holy crap, we might win this thing.”

And win it they did, in grand style.

Comanche had blitzed the field in the fresh nor-easter at the start, and, until losing her daggerboard and rudder, had continued to slowly increase her lead in the tough, southerly bash on the first night. But that was expected.

What was not expected was how, in today’s lighter winds, the big, wide supermaxi consistently built on her lead over Rambler and Ragamuffin 100.

“I have been hearing all the time that we couldn’t perform in light wind” Read said, “and I have been saying that we’re really different from last year. This boat is doing everything we dreamt it could do and more.

“We love this boat. It got us here safe, right?”

By Jim Gale and Bruce Montgomery, RSHYR Media



Read more at Ken Read describes the Sydney Hobart as "one hard piece of water" - MySailing.com.au

[annk]

Nice footage here from day 1 RSHYR Day One Video - Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race 2015

[Polux]

Originally Posted by Rustic Charm

Great picture of Raga going through the line for second. Rambler took a punt on going wide to find some wind stuffed up the gamble. Pathetic media coverage as usual. We won't hear anything more on the race until each evening news now.

Yes, well played by Ragamuffin and no excuses for Rambler. They were slightly faster and all that they had to do was shadowing Ragamuffin covering all their moves. Just at the end they decided to go on a different course.

Bad mistake, they should know that Ragamuffin played home and the crew knew better how to take advantage of the very light wind.

[Polux]

Now that line honours are decided let's see who wins the race

Curiously those production cruiser/racers that I said I was impressed with, regarding real time racing and talked about on a previous post are on 1st, 2nd and 3rd and 4th position, the JPK 10.80 (Courrier Leon), the A13 (Teasing Machine) ,the First 40 (Mayfair) and the First 47.7 (Imagination).

If one of the two that are leading the race won it will be the first time that Line Honours and the race will be won by non Australian crews or it will be the first time?

[Rustic Charm]

Originally Posted by Polux

Yes, well played by Ragamuffin and no excuses for Rambler. They were slightly faster and all that they had to do was shadowing Ragamuffin covering all their moves. Just at the end they decided to go on a different course.

Bad mistake, they should know that Ragamuffin played home and the crew knew better how to take advantage of the very light wind.

Yes, just one of those gambles that didn't play off