Bissell Racing

Day 2 of the Snipe Worlds was more of the same.  Very light wind and a dense fog.  After a long postponement, they finally started the race around 4pm in about 4 or 5 knots.  It is getting frustrating only having one race per day especially since we’d really like a throwout.  We need 4 more races in 2 days for that to happen.

The race for us went much better.  We started down at the favored pin end and had some initial troubles but we were able to tack, bob and weave through a couple starboard boats and find a lane going the way we wanted.  Hitting a few really nice shifts and connecting the dots with the pressure, we reached the windward mark in 3rd.

Danny did a great job telling me where to go on the downwind leg and we caught a boat to round the leeward gates in 2nd.  We and the first place Japanese boat extended from the fleet and turned it into a two boat race.  We took some chunks out of them upwind, but lost a little bit in our approach to the windward mark.  They tacked on us when we were on the layline, forcing us to do two tacks and overstand a little bit. 

We caught up a little bit on the final downwind and since we had some room to play around a little bit, we decided to round the opposite gate and split from them upwind.  Unfortunately, it didn’t pay off, but we managed to hold on for a 2nd place finish.

This jumped us up in the standings 21 places and we are now in 18th.  Still not great, but getting better. 

Peter Commette and Tomas also had great races.  Tomas and Enrique are leading the US Team with a 1,3 and are only one point out of first overall.¼/p>

To keep honest to the reporting I have to write about the painful day we had even though I’d rather not.  Only one race was completed in about 3 knots and we finished 39th overall.  ouch.  Not the way we wanted to start, but it happens and we’re moving on.  In six races there will be a throwout, but many people are having doubts they can get 5 races in the 3 days we have left of racing.  There is just no breeze and the forecast doesn’t look any better.

 Hey, Wha Happened?!?!  So, how did we manage a 39th?  Well, our pre race strategy turned out to be wrong, and our tactics could have been better.  Let me explain….

First off, our Portuguese coach (hired for his local knowledge) tells the whole team before the race to GO RIGHT, emphasizing with english phrases he knows like “for sure,” “absolutely,” and “without a doubt.”  Then we go upwind with our tuning partner Henry and the right payed off pretty well.  And last but not least, the wind was blowing from the same direction as the PreWorlds and it was a game of who could get to the right first.  With all these factors adding up, we decided to start near the committee boat and tack soon for the right.

Well, a big lefty ended up coming in and we had made some big sacrifices to get to the right.  It was a game of catch up from that point on and we actually caught about 15 boats to finish in 39th. 

Other American teams faired much better.  Tomas Hornos and Enrique Quintero won the race, very impressive for the youngsters.  Augie Diaz finished 7th, Jerry Thompson placed 8th and Peter Commette landed in 15th.  The rest of the team was back with me. 

Danny and I are down but not out and we still believe we can make something happen.  Hopefully I will have better news for ya’ll tomorrow.

Hurry up and wait, then go home.  This has been the theme of the last two days.  Yesterday, there was supposed to be a practice race and everyone was treating it as a trial run for the big dance. 

We all rushed down to the club, got our boat in racing form, and waited for them to hoist the “D” code flag which means you are allowed to leave the dock.  A fog rolled in that was so thick, the Race Committee couldn’t see 20 ft.   After waiting and waiting, they finally hoisted the AP over A which meant no racing for the day.  So we went home.

We came back to the Opening Ceremonies that started at 7pm.  The US Team decided to wear blazers and ties for a team uniform.  It was pretty cool.  Each country marched in lead by a local Portuguese opti sailor holding a sign displaying the country’s name.  The teams would march in, walk up on stage, and stand there for pictures while they played the national anthem and raised the country flag.

We woke up this morning and I looked out the window of our hotel.  It was breezy and there was no fog.  My hopes were up for a great day of racing.  However, as soon as we reached the shore line on our way to the club, the wind was blowing very light from the East.  We’ve seen the Easterly many mornings since we’ve been here, only to see it die around noon or one and switch around to the North. 

The first race was scheduled for noon, so they let us leave the dock at 11.  Henry Filter, Peter Commette, Danny and I were the first ones out.  The Easterly, sure enough, died and actually filled in from the South, a direction we haven’t seen yet.  Henry and I are tuning partners, so we promptly got together and did a 3 minute split tacks upwind to check the course.  I went right, Henry went left.  When we came back across, we were way ahead.  So Danny and I start to form our strategy and going right seems to be the way to go. 

Right before the five minute gun, our coach comes speeding up to us and says in broken english with a cigarrette in his mouth that he thinks it will definately be a left favored first beat.  Danny and I look at eachother and decide to trust what we saw during our split tacks.  It wasn’t an easy decision though because our coach is from Portugal and was hired for his local knowledge. 

Well, as luck would have it, we had no other option but to go right after a horrendous start.  I totally choked the start and I could tell that Danny wanted to strangle me, but we kept our cool and found a lane to go right.  When we tacked back we were crossing the entire fleet aside from a couple boats that went right with us.

We were about to round the windward mark in about 4th when they decided to abandon the race.  Not sure exactly why, but maybe they saw me go from a 5th row start to about 4th overall and decided it wasn’t fair.  Oh well.  I should also mention that our tuning partner was about to round the windward mark 3rd.  Way to go Henry!  We’re both the lone rangers on the US team using North Sails and we both felt super fast today.

So our speed is good, luck is good, starts bad.  I think it was nerves, but I have it out of my system now. 

We drifted around for the rest of the day and they finally called it around 5pm.  So hurry up and wait, then go home.  Worlds will hopefully start tomorrow and we are more than ready.  Thanks for tuning in.

This past week, we have been working on the boat and training.  We seem to have the best boat speed on the US team in light wind.  In Medium wind all the boats seem pretty even.  In breeze, we were a little bit off the pace, but we’ve made some major improvements.  The biggest change we made was the addition of a barber hauler system that helps us move our jib leads outboard.  It has made a big difference and the boat feels a lot better.

Today, we are going to wait until the afternoon to go sailing, since that seems to be when the best breeze fills in.  We’re in good shape, but we can still improve on our pole reaching, downwind surfing techniques, and jibing.

We have a few projects left to do on the boat.  We need to drill new holes in our spreaders, so we can put security pins in the bracket to keep the mast from inverting in heavy air.  Our pole launching system could be better, because the pole doesn’t launch as smooth as we’d like.  We have an epoxy job for the trailing edge of our rudder and the bottom of the boat needs to be sanded and pollished. 

Tomorrow is measurement and registration day and Monday will be the official practice race.  The big event starts on Tuesday. 

We found a roadside speedometer that was there to monitor the speed of the traffic.  Danny sprinted past it but didn’t register a speed.  He thinks he was going too fast for it.  Haha.

Today was a light air day.  For most of the day there was no wind.  It finally filled in and we started the only race of the day around 4pm. 

Our coach told us that the far right might not be as good today because of some adverse current.  You could see it on the water.  The choppy water meant good current and the glassy water meant bad current.  The right side was still favored with the breeze, but the middle right was the best of both worlds because you didn’t get into the bad current but still got the good right shift.  We decided to start near the pin since it was heavily favored and try to get to the middle right from the pin. 

As luck would have it, we were able to execute our plan and it got us to the 1st mark in 3rd.  A couple boats to the right of us were able to cross us.  After the offset we decided to be the first to jibe and the left payed downwind so we could round the gate in 2nd. 

It was a Portuguese boat leading the race and we engaged them in a tacking duel.  Our tacks were far better and we gained about a half boat length in each exchange.  Right near the finish line they tried to cross us on Port and we were on a collision course for the middle of their boat.  They fouled us, didn’t spin (typical) but it was enough for us to cross the line in first.  I told Danny I didn’t want to win the race (my wasting bullets superstition) but he’s so competitive, he wouldn’t let me lose.

 Despite winning the last race we finished in 6th overall which I’m completely happy with because we know we are sailing well and not giving anything up in boatspeed.  Our boathandling is rapidly improving and it’s only Day 2 of our 16-day campaign here in Portugal. 

Tomorrow is a practice day with our coach and team and I’ll write up a report if anything interesting happens.  We haven’t gotten to the bottom of whether Danny can run 20 mph or not, so maybe we’ll have some results for you tomorrow.

 The Snipe PreWorlds began today and the weather was perfect for sailing.  It was the type of breeze where you are only kind of hiking out.  It was sunny, about 73 degrees, but the water temp was about 60 degrees, so a little chilly.   There were three races and we didn’t start the first race until 2:30pm.  We went out with our Medium Air setting, but ended up tuning down to our Light Air setting for the third race. 

We felt pretty fast in the first race.  We did exactly what are coach suggested; started near the committee boat and tacked right away.  There seemed to be a persistant right hand shift all day, but we were the first to nail it.  We rounded the first winward mark in 1st.  While sailing down the first reach leg of the Olympic Course, I told Danny that I have a serious superstition about winning races in the PreWorlds.  I never like to waste a bullet in a race that doesn’t matter.  But, the conversation soon shifted to the reach mark and the ensuing jibe.  Danny joked that our first jibe in Portugal was going to be around the jibe mark in the first race.  I think we psyched ourselves out because we completely botched the jibe.  There was a good deal of current sweeping us downwind into the mark and I misjudged the turn.  By the time we got sorted out, the 2nd place boat jumped into the high road and passed us.  We finished the race in 3rd and we were happy knowing that we will have a bunch of days to get our boathandling down. 

The next race we were sitting in about 5th place on the final beat and decided to experiment by going left to see if we could make it work.  Well, we lost 7 boats and ended up 12th.  The left doesn’t work, but this regatta is the good time to find out. 

The last race of the day we started a little bit down from the committe boat planning on tacking as soon as possible after the start.  We looked over our shoulder and thought we could cross a few boats on our hip so I sent it.  We botched the tack and only crossed 2 of the three boats, the third boat had to avoid us and started screaming at us in Portuguese.  So we spun a 720 (which made us the only boat all day that took penalty turns and I know from first-hand experience that we weren’t the only boat to committ a foul).  The 720, 20 seconds after the starting gun put us in last place by about 50 yards.  By sailing smart and fast, we were able to climb all the way back to 11th. 

 We are currently in Sixth Place overall and close to the top 5.  Our only goal for this regatta is to get some good practice in, and try a few different tuning ideas.  So far, we are achieving the objective and having a good time in the process.  We have taken to placing bets with eachother.  Danny thinks he can run 20 mph.  I say no way, so we’re going to have a car pace him tomorrow.  I’ll keep you posted.  Thanks for tuning in!

This site’s purpose is to give up-to-date information, results, and lesson’s learned in the various sailing events I participate in.  From regattas, sail tests, clinics and tuning sessions in small dinghies and large keelboats, I will be giving you a front-row-seat perspective. 

This website will be a work-in-progress and your comments and feedback are very much appreciated. 

The first event I will take you to will be the Snipe World Championship in Oporto, Portugal.  I leave this Wednesday to prepare for the PreWorlds event that takes place September 1-2.

Thanks for tuning in,

Brian Bissell