Boat Rigging, BBQ and The Rules

Saturday 28 August 2010

On a crisp late winter's (translation: great in the sun, chilly in the shade) twenty five or so Sydney sailors attended the NS14 training day, held at Concord Ryde Sailing Club, which included onshore boat rigging, a bbq and rules night.

Representatives from Northbridge, Concord Ryde, Hunters Hill and Chipping Norton attended. From senior sailors down to those with lesser experience, no dog was too old to learn new tricks. Neil Tasker (Barracouta sails) and Andrew Baglin (ISAF International Umpire) rigged up 2 boats for comparison purposes and went through the fundamentals with some interesting back and forth discussions with the crowd. Especially informative was Neil's sailmaking perspective, how sails were constructed, how they stretched and how the control lines affected sail shape. Important lessons were given around how to sheet the jib, the impact of sheeting angle on leech tension, how small changes to sheet tension affect the slot and airflow around the main, how the Cunningham influences speed, power and height; Neil and Andrew demonstrated this by pulling the ropes and we all watched as the sails changed shape before our eyes! Magic.

Moving aft the from the jib they then explained how mainsails work, the importance of a smooth surface, especially over the leeward side of the main where all the drive comes from. Skippers were clearly more interested once the big sail was involved, with questions on how tight should the battens be, how high should the rear bridle be (answer: pulleys block to block), does it matter if the top of the mainsail inverts in strong breezes (answer: no, and the reason should be self-evident), how does the rotator affect sail flatness and the layoff of the carbon tip (or not if you have an all alloy mast), how many wrinkles are good (talking about the mainsail here, not the old salts) and how mast bend is affected by rig and vang tension.

Thanks to Sandra Donovan and Phil Scott for allowing Twisted Sister and Bandit to used for demonstration purposes, and putting up with inevitable "I wouldn't rig my boat this way" comments that added to the learning experience. Most people took notes which would help as many years
experience was shared in a couple of hours, so it was difficult to absorb it all. But even if you just took away one or two ways to increase boat speed the afternoon was well worth while. Again thanks to Neil and Andy for sharing their knowledge.

As the sun fell towards the horizon and fleeces replaced t-shirts, the crowd moved to the clubhouse for a quick bbq - ably prepared by our Concord Ryde hosts - and a chat about the impending season. Then it was down to the serious business of digesting the huge knowledge Andrew has of The Rules.

This highly interactive session gave everyone a chance to explore how a particular rule might work in practice within the NS14 context because Andrew has sailed in the class. Read the Definitions - they make the Rules make sense and help answer most of the questions. How not to get tangled up in the mess at the wing mark - too complicated for here, you needed to
listen to Andrew!

The clubhouse was getting colder and colder and we had to stop for coffee and lamingtons to regain some circulation; this enabled us to power on to cover all the key rules including a discussion on the continuing obstruction area which was of particular interest to those from river clubs who have other classes racing with them; they are better armed now to enforce their rights without causing everyone to run into the bank!

So to sum up, a fantastic learning experience that didn't even involve getting wet.

David Bently