Some advice regarding doing races on F16 when 1-up in shifty and light winds

Put telltales on the LEECH of your sail. Mid upper panel, just below mid leech overall and one halveway between those two. When sailing uni-rigged you have to sail by these. The telltales in the sail are not much help in really getting going because the stream to easily. I found that I'm inclined to oversheet my mainsail often.

second tip. Go to www.tacticat.com register (for free) login and do alot of races practising your tactics regarding shifts, wind strength, racing rules and general covering of the your opponents. You'll learn heaps and because after a while you know them by heart when on the water you'll make alot better use of these on the water in an actual race. I really advice this online training. Apparent quite a few of us F16 sailors are doing it as I've encountered a fair share of those in the game already. (you often race against real people and can communicate with them)

Wouter

So I have followed your advice.

What I found was that the first leech ribbon to break for the backside was always the lowest. This would have been right above the spreaders. I interpret this as saying that my prebend is wrong for these wind conditions. Would I be right in saying that I have too much pre-bend?

Are you talking about when you are going to windward?

Yes, while on the beat.

Okay, so when you say a leech telltale "breaks," what do you mean? Do you mean it is starting to flow forward? And, if so, is it going forward on the back side of the sail or on the side toward you?

You are going to drag this out of me bit by bit.

Yes, by break I meant that it is going forward on the leeward or back side of the main.

A hard one to answer certainly (just look at all the replies).

It might be your pre-bend, but it might also be battens, the way the sail is cut, your sheeting/downhaul/helming etc. Going out trapeezing will also change how the mast bends, so there are lots of variables. If you were sailing uni with a sloop mainsail, I would expect the lower telltale to stall first.
Changing pre-bend will not only adjust the leech, but draft position and amount. Only way to be certain is to change it, and then race an identical boat to see if you now are faster or slower (or have better/worse windward abilities/height).
The sailmaker who cut your sail should be able to tell you what amount of pre-bend he cut the sail for. Usually a sensible place to start off when adjusting and trimming the mast.

Certainly seems to be a bit of a poser.
More info. It was definitely light airs. No trapezing here. It was uni rigged with the sloop main. So perhaps that is all it was.
I am not going to be able to do any boat tuning here. The fastest competition I can find here is the old tornado rig and I could beat those sailors on my old N5.2.
I did ask the sailmaker and I have got the prebend set there.

So perhaps, all is good. The only question left is whether or not I should be easing the mainsheet enough to get that leech ribbon flying in the 3 knot breezes.

Making the leech telltales fly 50% of the time is always faster than stalling them. The question we ask ourself when sailing in low wind conditions is how much downhaul we should use. There is usually a best combination of downhaul and mainsheet that will get you into the groove.
In general, we have found that the fastest settings are with more downhaul and sheet than you tought you needed..

I went down that road once when in a 1 knot drifter. Kept tightening and tightening until I had it real good and slow. The small boats walked away from me. On land, where I could see the sail better, I saw how badly I had hooked the sail. Moderation in all things. So that is why I tried the leech ribbons.

Next time, I will try some more downhaul and see how it affects that lower ribbon.