Great time had by all. Conditions were perfect, as usual, at Huntington Lake--75 degree air temp; nice beach; wind 12-18 all day; interesting layout. The day before I got to sail JDD's Blade for the first time and really enjoyed it.

I got some complaining about our Portsmouth rating after taking line honors in 5 races from N5.8s and an Inter 20. The Taipan performed well, with no breakages or surprises.

I'm still learning how to fly my new Glaser kite--it seems to have a faster but much narrower sweet spot than my
old Goodall spin. I'm working much harder with the sheeting and driving to keep the tell tales flying but also not collapse or oversheet. Also, my Glaser kite pulls the bows a good 2-3 inches higher than my Goodall did. So, I was able to drive very, very hard downwind; there's no question that I was planing on the lee hull. Most races I was trailing the Inter 20 and N5.8s at the first mark. In fact, I had a few hot H16s right on my tail a few times too. But once I popped the kite it was like slamming down the gas pedal on a Dodge Viper...

Results will be posted at www.catamaranracing.org

Don't everyone start complaining about the rating yet. I just got out of a boat that had an almost insanely unobtainable falsely fast rating (HT 59.6) and want to enjoy the falsely slow rating of the blade. I need some encouragement.
<img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Eric:
Congratulations on your victory. F16s rule at Huntington Lake, at least yours does.
Steve and I had a great time at Huntington Lake. Sixteen cats from 16 to 20 feet in the open class. Smooth, cool, clean water, lots of tacking and gybing, beaching the boat to rest between races, what's not to like? Just that there were not more F16s there.
Wish the pelican striker to spin pole connection hadn't come undone during race 5 when it did. I think we were closing the gap on the the two non-spinnaker 5.8s, and just really getting it together on the Blade when that happened. Like Steve said, I was determined to finish that race. That couldn't have been done without Steve to take over the tiller while I went forward to jury rig the spin pole. Next time, a bit of rigging tape or some type of safety on a couple of those items prone to come loose...
John

full results and times:

http://www.catamaranracing.org/results/commodores_07.htm

I really want to come over to huntingdon lake one time and experience the racing and scenery with you guys. Sadly this can not be sooner then 2009 no matter what. I just lost my fixed income a month ago and so this year and next are off. Secretly I was hoping to be able to make it this year but evidently I didn't. I have to stash some emergency cash.

But Huntingdon lake and the Gulfport Invitational are two events I would like to do one time. Fly in to hook up with up another F16 crew and just have heaps of fun.

But I'm still young and so is the class ... there is time !

Wouter

Doc here is too modest.

As he just sailed a great regatta in the open class at Huntington lake !

Look at the race results (elapsed time) as presented below.





Our dear Doc, AKA Eric Poulsen, WON every single race on ELAPSED time !!!

And with room to spare :

Race 1 : by 3 minutes
Race 2 : by 50 seconds
Race 3 : by 50 seconds
Race 4 : by 2 minutes
Race 5 : by 50 seconds

And it gets better !

If Doc had sailed off the F16 2-up handicap, as the east board F16 1-up sailors do then he would have still won the event handsomly on handicap.

If Doc had sailed of the F18 handicap, as is done by F16 sailors in EU, then he would have ended up 2nd overall on elapsed time, sharing first place in the scoring without a strike-out and losing out by 1 point in the scoring with a strike-out included !

But at that time (sailing off the F18 rating) the F16 sailed by Doc would have been the faster boat in the fleet next to the Nacra 20 that participated. All others would have been several points slower in the handicaps. Interestingly enough Doc beat this Nacra 20 on corrected time even if Doc sailed of the F18 handicap. And Doc beat the Nacra 20 in each race on elapsed time by :

Race 1 : 4 min 38 sec
Race 2 : 51 seconds
Race 3 : 50 seconds
Race 4 : 2 min 4 seconds
Race 5 : 49 seconds

The Nacra 20 did score 3rd, 2nd, 2nd, 2nd and 2nd on elapsed time in all races and was as such the main competition for Doc with respect to Line-Honours.

I can only say, VERY WELL DONE, Eric !

Show us the way !

Wouter

The corrected time results :

Sailing of the F16 1-up rating (which is totally off the mark, it is far too slow !)






[color:"red"] And here the corrected time results if he were to sail of the F18 rating (which is much more realistic for 1-up F16's ! [/color]





Wouter

Ideed, the doc is too modest.

Huntington has great wind, but it is still a mountain lake, which means there's a lot of puffs. That really helps the fast upwind/slow downwind boats. If a non-spin boat can round the upwind mark at the same time as a spin boat, then with a long enough downwind leg the non-spin boat will often be riding the edge of a puff while the spin boat is struggling in the lighter air just in front. This sort of situation can't really be accounted for in any handicap system.

Now this lake also has two reaching legs. Generally the races go start, upwind to the top of the lake, downwind 1/3 of the way back, reach across the lake, downwind another 1/3 of the way back, reach across the lake, downwind to the bottom of the lake, upwind to the start.

The reaches are hard on the spin boats, but also effectively re-roll the dice as far as the puffs are concerned. For example, coming into a reach leg the spin boat is in 12 mph wind 200 yards ahead of a non-spin boat at the front of a 15 mph puff. But after the reach leg, the spin boat may be able to pick up the tail end of that puff and slowly sail back to the front of it, while the non-spin boat will have to wait for the next train (which may be bringing that #%$^! Sea Spray forward). Or they can both finish the reach leg in the same puff, and get right back into the same situation.

Either way, a Hell of an achievement by Eric Poulsen on the SPI equipped F16 !

Wouter

The thing that was giving me a workout was having to douse/hoist the spin two extra times due to those reaching legs (compared to a straight W-L course).

Not fun with one guy!

Kudos!