It is a beautiful day on Charlotte Harbor. Temp in the mid 80's and 8-12 breeze.

I drove by Port Charlotte Beach this morning and several teams are already setting up.

Ding, I'll catch you sometime this weekend with the promised rum.

Have fun folks!

This is the official site, correct? http://usf18.com/events/2015-f18-americas/

Currently showing 35 entries, correct?

Looks like a great event! Hoping you get great weather (and wind)!

EDIT: Will there be any live updates or tracking for us to follow?

Mike

NOAA says SMALL CRAFT ADVISORY Sunday through Tuesday.

Should be sporting!

The Charlotte Harbor folks are already exceeding expectations, they are eager and very nice we really lucked out!

Rumor on the beach is we have a bid for the Outer Banks for the 2016 Championship, yahoo!

Time to go to racing!

While I sit in Tokyo with major jet-lag and wishing I was in FL, I just exchanged a dozen texts with some of my fellow CRAM guys. Sounds like the sh!t hit the proverbial fan today. Many damaged boats. One possibly sunk(?!). Hope all are OK. Apparently big wind gusts over 30. Should be interesting to see the stories trickle in. Since I'm not there to confirm details, I don't want to start rumors, but apparently some of the top contenders were not unscathed.

Holy sh!t batman it was blowing hard. Mike and Tripp broke their mast in a pitch pole on the way out to the course. They on there way to get a replacement and will be on the water tomorrow. Many damaged sails and broken parts. Almost everyone had at least one capsize most had two or more. Only one race today.

Hopefully no injuries, right?

The wind chart is interesting. Average was 15 or less, with gusts under 25, but the gusts were frequent and huge compared to the averages, which is certainly not easy to handle.

Results? Rumored top ten?

Mike

Huge variation in wind speed records at various nearby sailflow sites. Looking at the attrition, I'd guess yacht club wind and on-water wind were two different things.

My boss drove by the harbor this morning and saw the fleet flying downwind. He wondered how they would get back upwind. Flatten out the main, drop the traveler and get a 225 # crew.

Dave, Thank You for the compliment. It is always fun to see other people having fun!

Good point, especially with that direction. But, regardless of the amount of wind, the huge variations between the means and gusts is what typically gets you.

Mike

Charlotte Harbor is shallow and basically goes from east to west. The tide was outgoing and it is still draining the Peace River basin from rainy season. High tide this morning 6:34 AM 2.1, Low tide 3:05 PM .2. East wind 15, 20 and more against tide.

Upwind and laylines must have been real interesting.

Results are here: https://www.regattatech.com/events/CHR/F18Americas15/scoring/showResultsRoster

The charts you reference are probably pretty accurate we all tend to think it's bigger than it really is when we are living it. Water was flat breeze strong and for the most part completely manageable until you needed to jibe. For me, I really needed to hit it just right and I missed the first time. The second time we ate it was when I jibed to pick up a separated sailor. Fortunately he was picked up by a chase boat and that's when I called it. Crew boat and skipper were all in good shape and I was getting out while we were still ahead :-)

Looking forward to tomorrow, still a good breeze but maybe not so much. I didn't bring enough rum to do 1/4 race a day.

Lot's of damage but it looks like everyone is making an effort to get it sorted to be back in the game tomorrow! Spirts appear to be high but I'm not that sociable and my circle is pretty small so I could be completely wrong on that account.

From the description above, I would have guessed that the waves wouldn't be so bad (breeze coming offshore, with the current), but it's hard to say without being there, of course. Thanks for confirming that, Ding.

8 of 28 finished, wow. Good thing they cut it to one race, or that would quickly turn into a deep hole from which to climb.

Hope tomorrow is nicer for you!

Mike

Should DNS get the same score as DNF? Seems like a DNF should be rewarded for giving it a go.

I thought DNF was a finish # of DFL, but DNS was DNF+1?

Sorry to hear you guys got plastered Monday. We had a thoroughly delightful Buzzelli just up the road at SSS... They kept pushing the big wind forecast back, so the nuking 25-35 knots we were predicted to get on Sunday only turned out to be 15-20 which was ideal..

The scorecard in the link above has both as "number of registered + 1". Theoretically, I like rewarding DNF over DNS - how much is debatable. Seems like it used to be that way, but I have not raced in a long time.

Sorry for the hijack.

Per RRS, the default for letter scores such as DSQ, BFD, DNE, OCS, DNC, DNS, DNF, etc. is entries plus one. Any of these can be changed by the SIs.

It's been this way for many, many rule book revisions (aka, at least a decade). The Hobie standard SI template used to use finishers plus one for DNF, but it's been at least a decade (almost two) since that was a standard practice.

The most common thing I see (across various classes, mono or cats) is TLE, which is typically finishers plus one or two. This is for boats still racing, but are too far behind to finish within x minutes after the first boat (all of which needs to be spelled out in the SIs).

Back on topic...

They should be in sequence now, wind looks a bit more manageable than yesterday.

Go Tall Guy!!!

Mike

Yes, the Buzzelli was a blast!!! I was sailing the red Weta.

Hijacks-R-us

Here is some video:

http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/2015/10/19/video-broken-tripod/

Wind chart looks challenging, but not quite as bad as yesterday. Three races scored so far today, lots more letter scores, I'm sure there's more to the story.

Mike