[...]Well, this year we got screwed out of that, with temps running 15-20 below "average", and it Snowed in Tampa! This is the first winter in the 13 years I've lived here that I did not sail, at all. At all. Not once. And I live on a lake. With 3 cats in the back yard, two of the mast up, ready to go.
[...]
Now, full disclosure, I don't own a dry suit, if it's not warm enough for shorts and a spray top, I'm not going. I sail for fun, not for pain.
You got sailing wrong man. Suffering is part of the experience
We had an interesting discussion at our club the other day: what is the minimum temperature the safety coxswain should be using as a guidance to decide to close the water. Note that the issue are not the sailors but the race management who are stuck in a middle of our lake in an open unheated committee boat.
The decision was to recommend to the safety coxswain to close the water if the temperature goes below -5C (23F) not including windchill. It's just a recommendation mind you, they don't have to... The sailors here still sail with a frozen mainsheet
