Nacra North America has some nice photos over on Facebook

Touché...

My point was that with more breeze, you can sometimes focus more on speed than positioning. It's harder to get substantial separation in light air.

A 420 or Opti gate with 80-boat fleets in light air is much different than in a windy race. With faster boats, more wind allows even more separation.

True, even when in the lead, you have to always focus on boatspeed (so as not to fall back into the crowd), but not having to worry about traffic and positioning makes life much simpler.

Mike

Ouch. The good news is, Mendelblatts and Bora/Luisa really stepped it up in Races 4 and 5, and are sitting 4th and 5th (respectively) overall!!!

Mike

I posit that the tactic training would end up being the better path.

Tactical decisions still end up being the most decisive in a race, regardless of the average speed of the fleet.

I figure teams can adapt to the learning curve on a new platform (to maximize performance) quicker than they can learn tactical awareness?

Since the US qualified before the OCR. The North American Slot now seems to be a match race between Ramsey of Canada and Figaroa of Puerto Rico.

Along with Paul Hess going for the South American slot... it puts two long time Hobie 16 masters shooting for the Olympic slots on N17s.

Unrelated to this thread, but ESPN is getting all activist-y on the rio water situation.

#riowater was trending #1 earlier today on the twitterz.

I believe you mean Jason Hess from GUA

correct... oops... thanks

Wow... Guliari/Chaffee are sailing great and actually in medal contention. The rest of the US fleet is falling back into the 20s. Peaking at the right time... priceless!



well maybe the sun, moon and stars aligning is even better!

They are sailing reasonably consistently (extremely consistently compared to the bulk of the fleet), and are enjoying the rewards of that.

Mendelblatts got the Q in the last race yesterday. Some interesting protests in other classes too:

http://www.sailing.org/worldcup/protest-summary.php

Mike

yea the dsq seemed silly... a port starboard with another US boat.... they just calculate the boat speed and time and agree with starboard.

Thanks for the link. It is an interesting read.


What do you think is silly about the port/starboard protest? The jury found that Starboard took avoiding action, and given the speeds of the boats and how close they came, it seems evident that Port did not keep clear.

Regards,
Eric

ah sorry....I think Port was being silly.... If they thought they get across by a foot or so...just silly. at speed... with 4 races a day... a collision is a regatta ender... why would starboard be ANYTHING but cautious. Port should have ducked. especially against a US boat... This is a zero sum game for the two of them but starboard has rights.

Port obviously thought that starbord pulled the plug on the cross too quickly and they could make that case in the jury room.

Moreover, Since they chose not to do their circle... It probably wasn't a brain freeze or... failure to spot the starbord boat...

So... just silly of port to push this protest to the jury room and not take their penalty turn.

Just got off the phone with David. Super bummed for him and Arielle- daggerboard ripped a nice hole through their hull today and he is done for Miami and Worlds. Crappy way to end the week.

It is a pretty good technique that most novice judges miss. Especially helpful when you can get the sailors to agree on wind and wave conditions and boat speed. You really don't need expert knowledge of sailing the actual boats with techniques like this. Helps at mark roundings as well.

Mike

Did they hit something, or did the boat self-destruct? Why can't that be fixed before Worlds?

Mike

Yikes, Bora and Louisa got an OCS and a 33 and freefell to 7th.

Meanwhile, Besson ripped off two bullets and is clawing his way up from the depths of the fleet. What was he doing wrong all week before today?

Mike

It wouldn't be high-performance sailing without something like this happening, either. Would it.

https://www.facebook.com/eastonpettibonesailing/posts/721479014618386

Wow! Wait, who polishes their boat at a regatta ???

I've washed mine if it's just been pulled out after the winter, but polished???

I guess that's why they're Olympic contenders and we're not...

Good luck today!!!

Mike

I knew a guy that didn't want his hulls touched at any time during a weekend regatta. Otherwise the skin oils would contaminate the go-fastery of the polished hulls.