I have the cleat set up like Trey, sailing out of hand is in my opinion better than cleated which causes you steer more (especially when the breeze is gusty) and that is slow.
Smooth steering is very important. When sailing upwind you should be sheeted in as hard as possible, if you cannot then you do not have enough cunningham on. If you sheet out instead of using the cunningham you will not not be able to point as well as you could. At some point you cannot pull on the cunningham anymore and then you have to sheet out and bring in the rotation. Above 12 knots I have about 30° rotation. If you are racing ALWAYS try and sail in clear air, I would rather have a slightly worse start and have clear air than sit in someones exhaust for 5 minutes till I can finally tack away into clear breeze. Move forward and back on the trapeze to keep the boats trim optimal, I move about 30 to 40cm depending on the wind strength and waves. Downwind in marginal conditions is always difficult. "when in doubt, go deep" . You see people losing a lot of ground trying to go wild when the first boat with a lightweight skipper onboard gets a hull up and everyone else feels the pressure to follow suite. Here is an excellent article by Andrew Landenberger on sail/mast setup and design. I had to read it a few times, but the penny has dropped and it is very good to understand the relationship between mast and sail on an A Cat. http://www.landenberger-sailing.com/spip.php?article21

Good boatspeed will make you look like a tactical genius

regards fron Zurich

Daniel
SUI 198

Spins seem like a vacation cruise compared to the balancing act of the wild thing.

For good basic information, Bob Hodges has written at least one article on A-Cats

With a really bad wild, you are going really fast but you can never make C mark. (from personal experience)

can anyone care to share what a 'wild thing' is/means?
thanks

Ref: http://www.acay.com.au/~gonzo/tornado.htm scroll down to the "Wild thing" header.

Basically it's flying a hull downwind. There is a fine line between going too high and too low. "Wild Thing" is going high to gain speed, as the apparent winds moves forward, you can point lower. The ultimate goal is to be able to gain enough speed that you can point as low as you were pointing before heading up to gain speed. So... same angle, faster boat speed.

CC, some possibly useful articles linked to on our web site:-

http://www.mumblesyachtclub.co.uk/racing_articles.php

Here are some nice video shots of "wild thinging"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mhlC4QvpQhs

Daniel

Glenn HASHBY!!!!!?????? <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/blush.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif" alt="" />