Passion X

After the chaos at Cockatoo a quiet moment running down the back of the island

After a wet weekend in Sydney the rain cleared and the Sun shone enough for a pleasant Wednesday twilight race. We made a good start in eight knots of breeze and were first into Humbug but also first into the first patch of no wind. Out of Humbug we were still near the front of the fleet and held that to the corner of Cockatoo where the breeze headed causing the fleet ahead to tack away from the point in starboard. We might have picked our way through except for Jackpot who also tacked away from the point. We had trouble tacking away onto starboard because Joli was overlapped above us so we had to stall until a gap opened so we could escape the chaos. Eventually back on port we had lost Joli, Jackpot and Utopia with the fleet behind also closing. Down the back of Cockatoo we carried wind and managed to round inside Joli with Meridian trying to pass inside us. That kept us close to the Island in disturbed air while ahead Dump Truck took off first into the clear air followed by Jackpot, Much Ado V and Utopia. At this early stage in the race Infotrack was nowhere to be seen. Along the leeward side of Cockatoo we managed to hold off Meridian at the expense of some time on the fleet further out and in clear air. Once into clear air we had an entertaining tacking contest with Joli and Meridian where due to some favourable wind shifts and a bit of covering we managed to hold our own.

On the run back to Long Nose Joli drew alongside where she stayed for the leg while behind Meridian was having troubles which took a long time to fix. Reaching to Cockatoo from Long Nose was not our best leg as Joli slipped away by a couple of minutes and Fireball sprinted away from the tail and came right up to our stern.

Around Cockatoo for the last time we could see Jackpot, Much Ado V, Utopia and Joli not far ahead and in light air. Unfortunately we were not able to find any stronger wind to make any further gains and the last stage through Humbug was in almost no wind.  At this stage Infotrack had already finished in breeze with Dump Truck somewhere in between and as we finished the breeze returned bringing the tail home with a flourish.

On handicap the front and back of the fleet did well with Infotrack winning from Fireball, Dump Truck, Sweet Chariot and Ausreo with Passion X back in sixth place.

On a night like tonight sixth place was a good result and even had we finished alongside Joli who was two minutes ahead we would have gained only one place.

When the progress scores are updated we should be up with Joli and just one point ahead of Utopia with Fireball’s second place tonight bringing them in at fourth but there is still a lot of sailing to go and some big drops coming up as we approach the end of the series.

Getting a favourable lift on the way to Goat Island

Nice full genoa on Utopia

Luffing up to keep Meridian behind. Photo taken from Utopia

Dump Truck gets into the breeze and takes off.

Genoa fully powered up in the light breeze

The fleet is so close yet so far away.

It is starting to feel like the twilight sailing season now that we have had our first decent breeze and a longer course. Before the race the wind piped up to 20 knots and with plenty of gusts we opted for the safety of the No3 jib and the mainsail depowered with lots of backstay tension. At 1803 hours, two minutes before our start time the breeze died leaving us with a slow passage out of Humbug for a run around Cockatoo Island. We played catch up on the inside of the fleet and entered the working phase of the race mid fleet sandwiched between Much Ado V and Infotrack. Pretty soon Infotrack cleared away with good boat speed and we spend a lot of the work dicing with Much Ado V while Joli, Jackpot, Utopia and Dump Truck had a closer race at the front of the fleet.
Lisdillon caught us on one of the many shifts but after we took their stern we experienced a very fortunate lift and cleared Long Nose making up all the ground we had lost to Lisdillon on the last phase.

The series of reaches and runs back to Cockatoo was in variable conditions and we seemed to get our fair share of favourable angles to arrive at the west end of Cockatoo inside Much Ado V and not far behind Utopia and Jackpot.

Lisdillon also enjoyed wind from behind and made ground on the fleet.

After a long time in the doldrums around Cockatoo we emerged into fresh air and took off at seven knots to windward but by now Utopia and Jackpot were well into Humbug.
We have had better transits through Humbug but were pleased to hold out the fast finishing Lisdillon who was enjoying a particularly fast work up the channel.
On handicap it was a well deserved win for Joli from Lisdillon, Dump Truck, Utopia and Passion X.
Our No3 jib was the correct choice for most of the night but there were plenty of light patches, particularly around the end of Cockatoo where there was not enough wind to blow the mainsail under the backstay and a larger fuller jib would have made us more competitive. What did work was frequent adjusting of the backstay to power up in the lulls and depower in the gusts.
Back home looking at the results there was another pleasant surprise waiting as we were elevated to second place last week after the omission of some of the fleet. As usual these events are all about neatness and punctuality and less about sailing skills and we generally do well just by turning up and trying our best.

Much Ado V goes past for the first time off the start line

Infotrack still in sight after rounding Cockatoo the first time

We did well with the small jib held out to windward

Lisdillon crosses on a favourable lift

Much Ado V goes past again on the second Cockatoo Island rounding

We get our own lift along the Snails Bay shore to pass Lisdillon

Catching Much Ado V after a good run down
the Cockatoo Island shore for the second rounding. Utopia and Jackpot not far ahead

The Finish line at last

In the last Wednesday twilight we made good use of the wind shifts on the work to Goat Island up to the last one. The tracks from the chart plotter show good angles and even the angle on starboard going up the Balls head shore look good so what went wrong?
Half way along the tack the fleet was deep against the Goat Island shore in light air and pointing at our stern. Despite our good angle relative to the earlier shifts we should have tacked to cover. Not only would that have protected our gains it would have put us on starboard approaching the mark.
Having missed the opportunity of clear air to tack the next massive lift brought the fleet up and to windward. Back on port trying to make the island we had to take the stern of Utopia losing valuable windward metres and forcing us to pinch to round the island now that we were in a massive header.
The tacking angles show the extreme shift in wind direction and is a good reminder to take what you can when you can.

Caught on the wrong side of a big shift at Goat Island and paying a high price for not covering the fleet.

The take away from tonight’s race is that we did a good start and hung on for a fifth place on handicap against some pretty stiff opposition. The score sheet is currently showing sixth place due to the erroneous inclusion of Much Ado V which if you were to believe the result sheet beat the MC38 Infotrack home by six minutes. I am sure the Beck team rivalry will have that sorted out pretty soon and Much Ado V relegated back to a DNF. That will leave Infotrack only a couple of minutes ahead of Dump Truck which is a pretty impressive performance by the Ker 11.3 considering they had not read the current season course sheet and took a detour. Including the detour they still finished seven minutes in front of Meridian and had three minutes to spare on handicap.
Time will sort out the handicap for the MC38 and team Beck and aside from them the outstanding result on the night was from Meridian who turned the tables on sistership Joli from last week.
We made a well timed start from the club end and allowed for the massive header so we could clear Onion Point in the lead. Once we turned the corner there was nothing until a fresh breeze sprang up from behind and brought Dump Truck and Meridian over the top. We went high and tried to do the same with the next gust but they got their noses around the corner and took off. Dump Truck took off for Cockatoo while Meridian and Passion X headed to Goat Island.
Long before we hit the Balmain shore Infotrack came charging over the top and refused to tack away from the shore line doldrums until clear ahead and giving us dirty air all the way back to the point.
We managed to stay in phase for most of the work to Goat by which time Much Ado V, Utopia and Jackpot had made up ground.
We did well on the square to Long Nose on the shore side of the fleet and managed to round behind just Meridian and Infotrack. Unfortunately the wheels fell of a bit on the reach along the Balmain shore where we lost Utopia and Jackpot.
Humbug was our last chance to make up ground but it was not to be and we were fortunate to hold out the fast finishing Joli to the line.

One of my concerns on Wednesday night was the lack of cooling water in the engine so we were very constrained on how we used the motor. On Thursday while Elaine was at the gym I did a quick dash to the boat and replaced the water pump impellor which had lost a blade. In very quick time the pump was back in action.
A second concern on Wednesday was that the instrument brightness was out of sync and the autopilot was glowing brightly while the wind instrument was dark. Nothing ruins your night vision like a bright light in your face and in the absence of a wind direction how do you steer? Not very well is the correct answer so I checked the instrument instructions and reset the group lighting and here is the silly thing, set it very low so that in daylight they appeared to be off.
The net result was that without a visible warning in the cockpit I left the power on .
Friday afternoon I get a message that the nav lights are still on so we made another quick trip to Passion X to turn the power off. Now after 28 hours of power draw the voltage was still at 11 and the fridge was all but frozen over even with an open top.
Anyway it was a pleasant late Friday afternoon drive and drinks and cheese and bickies on board while we gave the battery a top up.
For good measure I set the group illumination on the instruments a little brighter possibly brighter than the skipper.

Winter in Sydney is better than summer in many sailing capitals with respect to warmth but what we lack for much of winter is wind. When it does blow it can be too strong for sailing so it is truly a feast or famine. We were fortunate that one windy wednesday the racing was held at RANSA where in a depleted fleet we scored a first and fastest but it was our only one for the winter. That was the icing on the cake for the shortened point score series and gave us second on countback from Krakatoa who had an excellent start to the winter series. In the individual post series races I-Super had a blinder for the first race but we got one back on them the next race after which we both lost count of who would have won had the series been continued.
The last race of the series started well for us with a long broad reach out to the South Head and a tight work back to Rose Bay. Fidelis loves those conditions even more than Passion X and was well ahead at the turn and stayed there all day. We held out Hanni until the Point Piper mark at which point Crosshaven broke our overlap and Joli followed close behind. On the reach around Shark island we tried too hard to go over the top of Crosshaven only to sail into the wind shadow while Joli wisely went wide for more consistent wind. A big gust at the mark caused us to round up and we had to do a 360 to round the mark properly. In the confusion we forgot to haul on the backstay and struggled to windward on the last leg to get passed by I-Super by a mere 2 seconds.
We did carry a lot of sail for the wind and while we were super fast on the first reach it is arguable that we could have been faster to windward on the way home with the No3 jib.
Two days later we were rigged with the No 4 jib and two reefs in the main and ready for a blast around the Balmain course in the Friday afternoon series only to have the race abandoned due to the forecast. For the heck of it we sailed the full course with just our No4 Jib and made it around in better time than in many of the drifts. The only bit of excitement was the 40 knot gust which did what 40 knot gusts are supposed to do. The wisdom of the cancellation was proven when shortly after packing the gear away a 50 knot squall came through and did quite a bit of damage around Sydney.
Monday we headed out to Pittwater sailing on the nose all the way from Sydney with the No3 jib and the vang down hard so we could ease the boom down. That proved very fast and stable and was a good start to three days of quiet up in Refuge Bay and the Coasters Retreat areas.
Thursday was a motor back home as the breeze was absent or right on the nose at just a few knots but the trip was exciting enough with whale sightings off of Barrenjoey and later just 500 metres from the North Head. The pod off the heads was in the direct line of our travel and we had to take a wide detour to avoid them. Along with the commercial whale watching vessels and other private spectators we spent 30 minutes absorbed by the antics of the pod.
Friday was the last day of the Winter Afternoon series at Balmain and a good chance to try out the boom down technique we had practiced on the way to Pittwater. The steady breeze favoured the early starters so we had a mid fleet finish but we did pass quite a few and held out Avalon and Irukandji with whom the handicapper had finally come to terms. They both beat us around the course on time but by not enough to pass. In the end this was to be a drop as we had so many sixth places that we had ones to spare and ended up second in the series to Avalon. Our win over Irukandji was due only to their misfortune at running aground in one race and not contesting another otherwise we would have been back in third place. On the other hand we sailed the series with a small crew on many days and no ballast on the rails.
This weekend is the start of Daylight saving time and the commencement of the GFS Twilight series. For Passion X it will be a new experience to race with the trimmed down pin head main and fixed backstay so we are looking forward to the racing.