There is a chance I'll be able to pick up a Viper without having to sell the FXone first and do the Global Challenge at GYC.

A friend will probably crew for me. Together we'd be about 345lbs. I know we'll be the heavy weights, but if it blows to beat hell we might be ok.

What the speculation on what most teams are going to be weighing in at?

165 through 290.

November weather is a crap shoot in Tampa Bay. Good luck,

I'd bet the range is closer to:

Uni: 160 - 220 lbs
Sloop: 260 - 360 lbs

You really think two up at 295lbs is the highest to be competitive?

I hope you are being a little sarcastic.

I would have to say just from the little racing that I have done, 265-330lbs to be really competitive. That's handling from about 5-15 knots. After 15, having a little extra weight couldn't hurt.

I'll be a little heavy myself with my dad on the boat, 345-355. I'm not to worried about it, this will be bonding time with the pop.

My memory is shot, but I think Wout says you can be competitive up to 350.

With the sailors competing, you will be no where competitive at 340+lbs. At that weight do not expect to be in the top five positions. All the top f16 crews are light weights.

Now that you mention it, I think you might be right.

Well,

You do have a point there.

But, they would beat some of us no matter how much they weighed.


For us mere mortals, I still say the weight range with the sailing skills being equal, 265-330. 330 being on the heavy side and 265 being almost too light. But, there is a team that I have sailed against at 255 that has been very fast in light and heavy air....

My guess is that an ideal two up weight would be about 270lbs.

When I sail with Gina we are about 280. I have raced up to 345 and finished exactly the same position relative to my regular competition in both light and heavy winds. The boat felt a little less responsive, but I did not lose any distance around the course.

At 280 and under I feel we are significantly disadvantaged once the wind hits above 15. At that point we are maxed out on rotation downhaul and have nothing left to do but pinch and sheet to keep it moving upwind. With more crew weight downwind the boat is a LOT easier to handle in the bigger wind also.(provided your crew knows what to do)

If you look at the Alter Cup in 07 the most competitve teams were all plus 310 in weight.

My opinion is anything up to 345 (maybe a little more for the higher volume boats like the Viper and Falcon) is perfectly in the range. Much over 345 and you will suffer a little in the lightest conditions, but they should have a 5 min lower window so it is not like the club races where you have to go out and float.

Matt

Andi Lutz and I won Tradewinds two years ago, we were (guessing on his wt.) at least 350 but it was blowing and we LOVED it! Yes we crashed but so did everyone else.

Last year the wind was quite a bit lighter, we came in second to Matt and Gina, by 1 point.

I wouldn't worry about being too light or too heavy, just sail it as fast as you can, all the time, and then go have a beer.

One capsize will take care of any real (or imagined) weight advantage anyway, so if you want to work on something, work on your boat handling skills.

Tim, that's not really the full story. Yes Matt only beat you by 1 point but when Matt was on the course he beat you every race and you only beat Ben Moon once. Both those teams were considerably lighter than you. When you look at the results a little harder it tells a different story.

http://www.catsailor.com/Tradewinds/TradewindsResults09.html

Dave, I didn't mean to say that there is no difference in speed, heavy vs. light, strong wind vs. light wind, etc.

My point is people worry wayyy too much about their weight and don't spend enough time working on their boat handling skills.

Both Ben and Matt have much better boat handling skills than I do, right up until they hit the marks...

;^)

Agree with Tim. If you think you are slow becouse of ${insert any reason you like here} you do sail slow. The mental aspect of sailing is way underrated and people look for excuses all over the place instead of identifying what they did wrong and fixing it. Once the basic skills are developed, it is your own negative feedback loop (the "blame game") that hampers your development as a sailor.
I guess it is human, but it is not performance enhancing.
As long as the boat does not sink under you, get out there and race. Bugger optimum weight until you are a medal candidate at the Laser, Finn or Star worlds.

Rolf:

The later Carlton Tucker said a lot. "Get you head out of the boat" As you said we need to think what we need to do to make us better, not try to find blame why we didn't do the right thing at the time. I agree with you 100%. I won a LOT at heavy weight (315-320 when everyone else was around 295-300) when I first got started by learning boat handing taught to me by my "A" fleet H-16 crew and TIME on the water!!!!

Doug

Ann and I are around 350lbs (probably a bit more after Christmas!), and I like to think we're competitive.

We do definitely struggle in the lighter stuff, but if it's enough to get one of us on the trapeze we're fine and by the time we're twin-wiring we're laughing.

As Tim says, poor boat handling is far more likely to lose you time than a few extra pies. That's certainly what I keep telling myself, not least because practising sailing is much more fun than dieting

Paul

After every regatta on the drive home I review the races and what went wrong on my boat, boat handling wise, and my starts, mark roundings, etc. I keep a journal and log the wind speed, tides, courses, what went right and what went wrong. Then I go out and work on what went wrong boat handling wise, and before the next regatta I review the journal again to be sure I don't make the same mistakes over and over again, which is easy to do if you don't focus on the mistakes.


After one regatta where I hooked the A mark anchor line, I told my (then crew) Son on the way to the next regatta, "If I do nothing else right today, I WILL NOT HOOK A MARK!". Well later in the regatta, he was on a crash boat and I was sailing alone. The crashboat driver said, "Why is your dad going so wide around that mark?" He said, "Because last time we cut it too close and got hung up."

Oh...and right after I went around, someone came in close behind me and hooked the mark. It was the crash boat driver's husband.

Focus on your mistakes and try to eliminate them. Gary Jobson says, "Sailboat races aren't won, they are lost. Good moves don't win them, bad moves lose them."

Kathleen and I weight 300lbs/135kg, on the last Dutch nationals we did really bad in the lighter stuff against Geert&Raymond weighing about 150kg/330lbs (I hope I'm guessing good, luckily they are 2 men so wouldn't mind too much if I rated them too heavy :-) ).
On the other hand, once we could double trap upwind we were faster. Mostly because our boattrim trim in those conditions is getting really good.
So here clearly the weight was not a key factor.

On the downwind I think weight is even less important, you just have to drive the boat differently. Lighter crews will go deep and a little slower, heavier crews can really push the boat to the end and go for speed.

Let some different configurations take gpsloggers with them on the GC.

Gill

What Gill says, indeed they were faster the moment they could double trap.
We struggle in those conditions. Once we could also double trap (requires a bit more wind) we were about as fast as Kathleen/Gill. I don't know if they have improved somewhere but last year at the GC in Mumbles, with a lighter crew, we didn't have that weak spot, competitive in all wind conditions.
My take on the downwinds is that a lighter crew makes it a bit easier, just a little more time before the bow starts digging a wave when a gust hits. But technique/boat handling remains key downwind.

Geert

Geert,

We surely improved our upwind skills since last year, especially when trapping 2-up. We notice the difference in our local regatta's and also noticed the difference between Mumbles and the Dutch nationals.

Personally I prefer a bigger crew on the downwind. With 150lbs trapping out on the downwind you just can't stuff it. With Kathleen out I still have to be careful in some situations....
But as Geert says, the handling is the most important. We go twice as fast around the course as we did 3 years ago with the same boat at the same weight!