Although Wildcat wasn't scored as an open class, I put together a small spreadsheet showing the two F16 compared to the 1st place finisher of the F18 and N20 fleets.



The top table is Corrected time, the bottom Elapsed Time. Yellow highligts are the fastest times in each race.

A couple of observations

1. Team McDonalds had the boat dialed in in every race except R2. Taking first across honors in all races (except R2) on elapsed time.

2. Timbo (sailing uni) had very good boat speed compared to the N20's.

Speaking of Area D, who's coming?
T: are we still splitting digs?

I'm out. Not cleared to sail.

Bummer. I'll have Ding consume your ration of grog.

All the best.

Eustis was a great time! Lou is awesome as PRO and the hospitality is always terrific. Of course, the sailors can really make a regatta and these guys/gals didn't fail us on or off the water. Once again, it made for a wonderful date weekend. Thank you and we'll see you at the next event.

Any chance you and Matt can get over to Sarasota next weekend? Good opportunity to showcase the Blade.

I'll be there, don't know who else.

http://www.sarasotasailingsquad.com/Buzzelli.pdf

Terry, thanks for posting the times. Do you know why I was "DSQ" in race 7?

Halfway through race 4 I broke my tiller cross bar, had to steer the rest of the race with one rudder or the other, as all I had left was each half of the cross bar attached to each rudder, so if I flew a hull much more than a foot, the high rudder would stall out and I would round up. Downwind was not too bad until I had to gybe! That was fun. So I didn't sail race 5 because I didn't want to T bone anyone at the start since I couldn't steer very well.

Thankfully, Matt had a spare crossbar for me so I could race on Sunday.

I don't know what I did wrong on race 7 though, any idea? I don't think Louie reads this board, or does he?

Great regatta, had a lot of fun, lots of good poker too. I missed the rest of you F16 regulars, the wind was great, all you guys in Gulfport should have come. <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Just to confirm, you are messing me, right? I have you as DSQ and no time taken for race 7 according to the score sheet. I did talk to you about it on Sunday and you indicated you ran the wrong course. Don't get me wrong I don't have a problem giving a DSQ for no other reason than sailing an F16 I just want to make sure why it was done.

Yes! The Gulfport F16's should have come, the A cats sure did.

I don't think I sailed the wrong course, it was course 6 all day, twice around, right? Pretty simple even for me. I might have sailed through the "start line" while going downwind to C mark (NOT the finish line) but there were no boats starting at that time, so I thought it was open, maybe not?

That is the only reason I can think of for a DSQ. And I don't think it was me you talked to about sailing a wrong course, but there were several others who did sail wrong courses so it might have been one of them, who looked a lot like me?! <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/blush.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

That was it. The start finish was closed.

beat me to it by a few hours. Yes the starting line was closed.

How is it denoted that the start/finish line is closed? Is it something just in the SIs or is there a flag that denotes it on the committee boat?

Nobody mentioned it at the Skipper's meeting and I didn't see a set of sailing instructions, so I was unsure. I should have asked the PRO at the skipper's meeting. But when in doubt, stay the hell away from the start finish line on all legs, upwind and down.

Which brings up another problem. Where the line was located was too close to the C mark in my opinion, you had to give up the middle of the course going downwind (where the best wind was) to avoid it and still have a good line into C mark. I would rather have seen C mark way down the lake, and A mark not so "up in the corner" where the wind was light and fluky.

Okay a couple of problems Louie had to solve. He was short marks so he could not run the small boats... uh I mean small and spinless boats on an inside course, everyone had to share the same marks. Setting the RC in the middle of the course allowed him to use all the courses if needed. If he goes to the bottom (below C) he loses some courses and anything with a 'B' mark.

Don't forget the kids were doing the Opti thing so if we were in BFE the kids would not get the opportunity to say 'hey that looks cool'.

I will have to agree 100% with the RC placement it really is to close to 'C' (a Louie trademark). I'll bet his thinking is that he wants to make the first weather leg as long as possible. Overall, I think he does do an outstanding job! The only guy I know that comes close to getting off the same number of races is the gentleman that ran the 07' area qualifier... 10 races in 2 days, I get tired just thinking about it.

Farly Brinkly (I hope I got his name right!) he also ran the Alter Cup races in 07 and 08.

I think Louie does an excellent job as well, thankfully he shows up and always gets as many races in as possible, great job, no doubt. The Alter guy at Area D did a great job too, but he didn't have to contend with 4 different fleets starting and finishing all mixed together, just the one.

Louie does a great job keeping everyone straight out there with all the mixed fleets and different courses. You have to pay close attention though as he will (and did) change courses between fleets often. I think that is why some boats sailed the wrong course in a few races.

I don't know about you guys but I prefer a 6 to a 7 every time. I'd rather get in more starts and do more total races than fewer, longer races.

More races good, races less than 25 minutes bad.

I just went back and looked at the times Terry put up, seems most of the 7's (3 laps) on Saturday took Matt about 36 minutes to sail and most of the 6's (2 laps) on Sunday took Matt about 24-25 minutes.

I like the 25 minutes better, but I was the only uni sailing. I don't know that there is much place changing going on after the first two laps anyway, and it spreads the fleet out more.

Not only does each race take at least 10-12 minutes longer (for the fastest boat, even longer for the slowest), but then you also have to wait longer between races for the tail enders to finish. I know this because I crashed once on Sunday, so they had to wait wait for me, but it was only a race 6 so they didn't have to wait as long as if it were a 7. <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/blush.gif" alt="" />

The joys of sailing open.

Well, even if all the boats are the same, you have to wait for the tail enders, right? Matt and Gina are going to be waiting for everyone else most of the time! So that's why I like the 6, 1/3 shorter, less waiting, more racing and it puts more emphasis on the starts, as you have 1/3 less time to dig yourself out of a hole.

Also, sailing Uni as I usually do, it's one less take-down at C mark which is where I lose a lot of time.