1. Sloop M20
2. Uni M20
3. Sloop M20, VX20

/håkan

That start line was just stunning... a helicopter as a signal boat?! errr... aircraft. <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" /> I envy JC and Trey this weekend's experience...

Dang- Texel's 3 million dollars worth of boats makes the Mug Race look like the Mud Race...

In a light air race I would expect the first boats to be the Marstrom 20's, the surprise would be an F18 with a top 10 finish.

They have corrected the listing at the VC-bouy to :

-1- M20 normal
-2- Volvo Extreme 20
-3- Hobie Tiger F18

Believe it or not that Tiger F18 was only 28 seconds behind the Volvo extreme 20 after an hour of racing. The distance between 1st and 3rd in this elapsed time listing was also only 2 min 35 seconds.

The second F18 (infusion) was only 1 min 19 secs behind the Tiger at 3rd spot.

In the first 10 boats to round the VC-bouy on elapsed we see no less then 4 F18's (3rd, 6th, 8th, 9th)

For the conditions present, I feel the F18's have sailed very fast indeed.

Timbo wrote :



How about 2 F18's in the top 10 on elapsed time at the finish ?

Wouter

Very good sailors and optimized sails (but an OLD hull shape) and a good start. From VC mark to Oudeschield the Tiger (Bundoch) was approx 10% slower than the M20 (Marstrom).

The Tornado didn't seem to like this weather even though those sails must be even more tested and optimized than the TIGER F18 sails.

/håkan

Håkan,

I don't quite see how you can claim that :




The first M20 (normal version) at Oudeschild was Flier/Deventer at 1:51:30 - 0:58:01 = 53:29 leg time
The first F18 at oudeschild was Bundock/Ashby at 1:53:10 - 1:00:36 = 52:34 leg time

In fact the F18 was FASTER then the M20 (normal version) on this particular leg, not 10 % slower.

So I'm sorry to say that your claim is simply not true.

Granted Bundock/Ahsby are probably better sailors then Flier/Deventer but not by that much. Afterall, there are simply no slow teams in the lead of a 600 boat cat race. For such a large fleet will have an enormous depth in talent because of the shear numbers participating. And also it is extremely hard to stay lucky for three and halve hours.

Probably you took the times by Dercksen/McIntosh on the Volvo Extreme 20, or even the M20 GTI of Flier/Deventer, to base your 10% claim upon but really neither of these boats are a M20. Both of them have converted to sloop rigs which goes directly against the fundamental design concept of the M20. The Volvo extreme 20 even replaced the whole M20 rig by one based on the current sloop Tornado rig. This is like nascar racing, they keep the body work of a normal car but replace the whole engine and gearbox. No way this can be regarded as the same car as before.

Wouter

I compared Bundoch and Marstrom (that why I wrote their names) to see how the uni version handled the upwind. And if you do the math you will find out that it was 4 min and 31 sec faster. In fact the M20 (Marstrom) was fastest of the top boats I managed to compare on that leg, I couldn't get the data from the website anymore, but you had it in your posts as pictures (good!).

The F18 (Bundoch) was 9.4% slower on that leg.


/håkan

Wouter, are you more happy if I call it M20 platform?

The only thing that differs the standard M20 from the Gt version as far as I know is a jib and a beam to get the jib attached in a proper way. On the VE version the forestay attachments is designed to handle the load from the jib and the beam is not needed and they use the Tornado mast instead. But the hulls, beams and foils are M20 and thats is the usual focus when comparing boats on this forum....

/håkan

Ohh I see.

Hakan, can you produce the elapsed leg times for this stretch in full on the forum. Not all data is dependable. There are typo's in these marker times.

I'll give you an example.

Pols/Veenstra (M20 GTI) were timed at VC-bouy at 1:13:55 and at Oudeschild at 1:47:34. This suggests that they sailed the same stretch that took nearly everybody else 52 minutes in no more then 33:39

This can't be right.

I would like to see whether Marstrom time is an outlier as well (and therefor suspect) or reflected by the other line honour boats (and therefor confirmed).

It is interesting to see Marstrom being 10 % faster the M20 sailed by Flier/Deventer as well (with Flier being ahead of Mastrom for 80% of the race). This M20 and the F18 by Bundock/Ashby stayed close together where Marstrom just motored along 10 % faster then both of them and coming from the back while overtaking boats. You just don't see speed differences like that between crews of this level. I shall be honest, I find it suspect.

I know that I'm a very sceptical keyboard sailor but this almost suggests to me like a wind was filling in from the back of the fleet or something.

In short I would like more convincing.

Wouter

You can call it that, but I won't regard it as a M20 because the fundamental concept of the M20 is a UNI-RIG with a spi. All other versions like the M20 GTI and VE-20 have left this concept in favour of the opposing belief that a sloop rig is superior to a uni-rig. Even when fitted with a spinnaker.

I find that to be a significant difference. Sort of like fitting a benzine (patrol) engine to your car or a diesel engine.




There is no point in comparing these things to eachother anymore when the rig (the engine) has been significantly altered.

I know from personal experience that sailing a F16 doublehanded with and without a jib does make a difference. Many A-cat and M20 sailors will claim otherwise but I see more and more proof of the contrary. The jib does more then just add a little sailarea.

Also if the VE-20 takes the M20 platform and the Tornado rig then to which boat type is it most related ? To the M20 or the Tornado ?

Hulls and foils only go sofar in determining overall performance. Why else are A-cat sailors adjusting the rigs to suit their weight and sailing style so much while not doing the same with platforms and foils.

If people on this forum compare only the platforms then they are mistaken. The rig is always the most dominant component in performance.

Wouter

Last year when M20 was first and second on sailed time in Texel both M20 passed the Eagle on the last upwind to finish(they had a reach to the finish line), boats where fully powered up. I don't have any time data on that race just a chat with Marstrom.

The standard M20 with snail and uni rig should be fast on the upwind. I'll have a chat with Marstrom and confirm that they overtook boats on the upwind but I doubt that I can get any time data.

I don't this differance way off, it matches the texel numbers for the standard M20 and the F18 roughly or?

/håkan

Wouter at al,

Quoting the times for the first leg amy not give a lot of really usefull info as if one of the boats got a less than optimal start it might take them a few minutes to get out into clear(er) air and so get back up to a more optimal performance. What were the mid and final split times, these might give a more accurate performance comparison. Again this is still potentially flawed as there could be different wind at different times on the same bit of the course. I think that Texel (or any other large race like this) is not the ideal race for comparing times.

What was the course direction from the start to the lighthouse ? was it up or down wind, this could also make a big difference if one of the M20 / M20 platform based boats had 10 boats above them for a couple of minutes etc.

All interesting stuff, but not 100% sure the comparisons are very valid....

I'm now reading reports of the lead boats running aground on the waddenzee. That would be exactly during that VC-bouy- Oudeschild leg we are talking about. Apparently the lead was to quick and the tide hadn't gotten enough to sufficiently fill the shallows yet. This report is on the official Texel site.

By the way the M20 is a fast boat no doubt about that.




Yes, but Marstrom was also 10 % faster then the M20 (standard) that was leading the race at that moment (and had been since before passing the lighthouse). There shouldn't be a 10 % difference between two boats of the same make, should there ? Not when sailed by crews of this level. Not when the guy in front is also the race leader and is having clean air.

I'm not saying that Marstrom couldn't have pulled off this feat, just that the circumstances appear to be contradictionary. With more clearification we should be able establish what did indeed happen.

Lets wait for Goran's comments.

Wouter

Simon,

The VC-bouy - Oudeschild is the 3rd leg in the race. The lead crews only entered this stretch after 1 hour of racing. By that time the lead of the fleet should be well away from the main body and only have comparable skilled crews around them.

It appears that the VC-bouy-Oudeschild leg was a pure upwind stretch then no boat could make in one go. As such it should make for a nice test case.

Wouter

I just saw the finish video and the M20 GTI by Pols/Veenstra does not have this extra beam anymore.

It is rigged the same as the VE-20. They just move the bridle strop up high and fitted a long bridle strut between the spi pole and the high bridle. Just as the Tornado's and F16's have done.

interesting.

Wouter

The M20 GTI is setup to look like a Tornado, we even put Tornado rudders on it and I made a set of carbon/foam spacers for the transom to give the same rake on the rudders as the Tornado. Peter and the guys at Performance sails did a lot of work on the rig to get it all sorted and the boat is a real weapon now.

We had an OK race considering it was out first time at the island and first time sailing an Infusion. there are a lot of trick to learn for getting around the island particularly the third leg where we ran agound hard and had to completly stop the boat to get unstuck. we lost 10 boats (6 F18) right there but got a few back on the long upwind leg.

Its pretty hard to compare performances between diferent boats on that third leg as there were some different tactical options taken on this leg. We worked the shore pretty hard and it worked well, we made some good gains here but other went middle road and got hurt bad whilst some boats hit the left corner (well off the coast) and did well. So comparing times for this leg is pretty much a lottery.

Just back from Texel.
The most annoying piece was from the VC-buoy to the TESO-cross-over. Strange winds, where especially the changes in windforce were challenging. I counted the times I had to go on the wire an back in during that stretch : 36 times......
The word lottery was heard offten after the race.

But regarding the discussion of leg-times. Isn't time depending on the covered distance ?

Where did Wouter finish?

After the sailor...

Chris.