Yesterday the Mistral came in strong at 30-40 knots in Hyeres and 50 knots in Marseille just down the coast. We got to the boat in the morning wondering if the RC was going to send us out. Due to the forecast they cancelled racing for the Tornado Class for the day. The Women’s Laser Radials and the Men’s 470 went out, but did not race due to so much broken equipment. It was a tough day to be a competitor one of those classes. We spent the day admiring the power of wind and waves Mother Nature could dish out and was grateful to be onshore and not sailing.

What a difference a day makes. Today was beautiful and sunny. Only the second sunny day since we arrived ten days ago. It almost seemed warm, well not really. We left the beach expecting light and variable winds and three races. We got all of that and more. 

The first race of the day we had a rough start at the pin end, but for the first time we were fast and went the right way to round the top mark in fourth. By the end of the second lap the wind had inverted and the leaders went from the front to the back.  Unfortunately that meant us. We battled both the conditions and the race course  make a big comeback for a single digit finish.

Race two and race three were a little more stable as the breeze was now in from the east at 6-10 knots. This was a light seabreeze with the shoreline close to the right side with some geographical shifts we had to factor in to our tactics both upwind and down. Getting to the right hand side of the course after the starting is one of the most challenging things to do in catamaran racing.  Because the boat virtually stops when you tack you either have to start on port tack and duck the fleet (or in very rare cases cross the fleet) or you need to have “partners” who also want to go right and will peal away giving you open water to tack. I find the more desperate you are to go right is when you have a boat blocking you that is determined to go left – all the way left! Our speed was better in the light air than in the heavy, but we’re still not where we should be. We can’t wait to get our mast and sails to see the true potential if the new boat.  Until then we will continue to keep working with the gear we have to see if we can find more speed.

After we crossed the finish line in the first race today the RC hailed us over to talk to us about the lack of the event bow stickers on our boat. They were unhappy as all boats are required to carry bow stickers provided by the regatta sponsors. We explained to the RC that our new secret slippery bottom paint is too slick for the stickers to stick. Every time we put new ones on they came off on the way to the race course. We reminded them that we are not allowed to litter per the sailing instructions and he agreed and thought this was an excellent point.

Tomorrow looks like more sun and light winds. The RC is planning three more races to get back on schedule. We are working hard on our boat handling and teamwork.

You can download full results online. Semaine Olympique Française website - http://sof.ffvoile.net.  We want to acknowledge all the support from our sponsor, Advanced Equities, and from our individual supporters. 

Please spread the word with your friends and fellow sailors to join the team to receive our regular updates and, if they wish to make a donation.

Charlie

Stay tuned.