Howdy -



For anyone who might be interested, I thought I'd jot down a few thoughts on how the 4.3 sailed during the Spring Fever Regatta last weekend.



The boat seems well balanced, and it "sails" much bigger than it looks. The hardware is nice and up-to-date tech. My wife and I are small people - I'm about 130 lbs. and she's... well, a good bit less than that. The trampoline never seemed crowded during tacks or gybes, and once I got Leah thinking about "housekeeping" after a turn or rounding, the lines weren't much in the way. The rudders are easy to lock down, and they STAY down - I like the locking mech much better than the Hobie cam system - seems more durable. The crossbar isn't adjustable, but seems to be fine - just a touch of weather helm upwind, very neutral downwind.



The spin sets and snuffs pretty easily - I eliminated some of the metal stuff on the end of the pole (went to spectra), and the bowl is fiberglass instead of carbon - should be easier to repair if it needs it. I need to work on finding the best luff tension and marking the halyard at the cleat to make it apparent when the spin is set.



DON"T PINCH. I'm a pincher, and this skeg boat simply will not point with anything with boards or any uni rigs. As a result, my upwind legs felt PAINFULLY slow - my fault, not the boat's. When Leah would reach over and pinch my leg to get me to drive a little, the boat felt MUCH better.



I have some learning to do downwind with a spin, also. I tried to sail too deep most of the time, and the non-spin boats that I saw at every crossing were testament. Heating it up seems to be a must, though it doesn't "feel" right to me yet.



The committee had us starting in-between some other boats that were quite a contrast - they ranged from the Hobie Wave to the Taipan 4.9s and Nacra 5.2s. Unfortunately, no other 4.3s were racing, so there wasn't anyone to measure performance against... or maybe that was fortunate. My ego is fragile.



Our results for the weekend look bad - it was my first time racing the boat, my wife's first time racing at all, and we brought the boat to Hartwell in pieces. As a consequence, we missed the first race completely (DNS). The second race, I saw us posted as 3rd in class on the preliminary results - didn't see the final results. The third race, we sailed by the committee boat to get the course (course 6), then pulled a rookie mistake - I didn't look at the course board after that - the first start (big boats) got the 6 and our start got a 5... BIG difference. We got a DNF - by the time we figured out what we'd done wrong, we'd have been last anyway. Don't know where we wound up in the 4th race - I caught a glimpse of an elapsed time, but didn't get to see what others in the class had, so the number was meaningless. We pretty much missed that start, anyway - we'd parked down by the pin to talk with our gracious hosts, Nigel and Tammy, when we heard a horn. Figured they were getting ready for the big boats, as we'd been third start for the previous races. We began lazily sailing back toward the committee boat ABOVE the start line, when Leah noticed OUR class flag was up - we were mid-line and going slow with less than a minute to go! We dipped hard and turned all the way around - off the line late, but since we got a time, I guess we dipped enough. It was raining for the whole race, and I was more worried about Leah getting cold than watching my line - we finished pretty far back.



All in all, we had a lot of fun - being a skipper on a small boat instead of crew on a big boat will take some getting used to. Didn't much like sailing in two other fleets' bad air right off the start, but everyone in my start had the same problem to deal with. I'm looking forward to making some of the events where several 4.3s are expected.



Best of all, Leah genuinely enjoyed herself - thanks to everyone who welcomed her to racing the same way I was welcomed years ago. She's just as excited to see everyone at the next event as I'd hoped she'd be. She loves our "little boat" and I can't wait to get it wet again.



John Williams

Mystere 4.3 #75