For those new to these adjustments...here's what found out when first learning them (Charlie Ogletree's advice to me):

1. Stay off the downhaul until you're double-trapped and still unable to depower easily with an arm's length of main sheet out. If the hull is popping up rapidly, then start inching on the downhaul until you find more control.

2. On many boats, as you apply DH, inch by inch, be sure to sanity check how much you've applied. If you put too much on for the conditions, boat will be slow, flat and require you to foot off hugely to get the hull out of the water...bad for VMG. In high wind days, Charlie stated my boat had the flattest sail in the fleet, we were footed 10-15deg lower than everyone and we were still popping the hull up (cause of the wide angle to the wind gusts). Note that when easing the DH, the sail may not actually move back up the luff track until the mainsheet is also eased momentarily...that's important! Otherwise you think you've eased DH...then crank on more at the next gust, then "ease" and repeat...ultimately you've got a sheet of plywood/barndoor for a mailsail and you've lost your race.

3. going to weather the crew sheets the main, anticipating gusts and lulls. When hull raises too far, crew eases just enough main to control the hull height...then immediately re-sheets BEFORE the hull starts to drop again...if you wait until it's on it's way down, it will likely hit the surface and slow you. If crew has to move more than 1 arm's length to maintain hull height, and you're double-trapping, then start inching the DH on.

When we starting mastering this technique, our performance went huge. Boat feels like it's on rails...each gust squirts you forward, not up in the air.