The 10 Commandments of Boatspeed
No.1 Most boats perform best upwind with a nearly neutral
weather helm. At times, the boat will develop weather helm, especially
when in point mode, but an excessive tug on the tiller indicates that
the boat is badly out of balance. The quick fixes: sail the boat
flatter, raise the centerboard, decrease mast rake or flatten the
mainsail.
No. 2 In most conditions, trim the mainsheet so
that the top batten is parallel to the boom, rather than pointing
inboard or outboard. To judge this, cover the last 10 inches of the
upper batten pocket with black tape. Then sight up the leech from under
the boom, trim to the right spot and mark the mainsheet.
That said, there are times you can break this rule.
When trying to accelerate, develop power in light-to-medium winds or
when greatly overpowered in a breeze, the upper batten can be angled
outboard 10 to 20 degrees.
Conversely, when trying to point extra high in moderate
air, it's OK to slightly overtrim the main so that the batten hooks to
windward in relation to the boom.
No. 3 Figure out what is maximum mast bend, and
then strive to attain it in most conditions. Maximum bend is the point
at which overbend wrinkles (speed wrinkles, inversion wrinkles, etc.)
develop in the lower quarter to lower third of the mainsail. Depending
on the boat, you can bend the mast with mainsheet tension, vang
tension, backstay tension, rig tension, mast blocks, spreader angle or
a combination of all of the above.
No. 4 Every boat has its optimal rig tension.
Find out what it is and maintain it. Most boats sail best with the rig
just tight enough so that the leeward shroud starts to go slack when
it's blowing 10 to 12 knots.
If the rig is too loose, the jib entry will become
quite full. The result is poor pointing ability. Too tight a rig, on
the other hand, is sometimes indicated by overbend/inversion wrinkles
in the entry of the jib - a small scale version of what happens to a
mainsail with maximum mast bend. In addition, if the rig is too tight,
the entry of the jib will be quite flat and the telltales will break on
both sides of the jib at nearly the same time. In short, the jib
becomes hard to steer to.
No. 5 Sail the boat on its lines. Usually, a
boat will not perform when its bow or stern is buried in the water.
Besides the obvious drag, this can affect the balance of the boat and
the tug on the tiller (e.g. bow down creates weather helm). Instead,
position the crew weight so the transom is just kissing the water. The
result is a smooth, undisturbed wake. Watch where the top sailors sit
and copy them.
No. 6 Trim your jib so that, if there were a
batten in the middle of the leech, it would be parallel with the
centerline of the boat. Put a piece of dark tape on this real or
imaginary batten. Only in rare exceptions does a jib ever get trimmed
off this position. One time would be for acceleration - ease the sheet
so the mid-leech stripe is angled 10 degrees outboard from centerline.
This trim is for "first gear" and should match to the mainsheet ease
when the main's top batten is also angled outboard for acceleration.
No. 7 Set your jib leads so that your jib luff
breaks evenly from top to bottom. When the boat is overpowered, move
the lead aft until the top breaks just ahead of the lower and middle
telltales.
No. 8 Set your jib and main luff tension so that
there are always some slight horizontal wrinkles along the luff. In
very light winds, completely relax the luff tension so there are slight
wrinkles all the way from head to tack. Tighten it gradually as the
wind builds, so that in heavy air slight wrinkles appear only in the
lower few feet of both sails.
If the luff tension is too soft, these wrinkles will be
too big. But they'll never be as long or pronounced as the inversion
wrinkles from excessive mast bend or too tight a forestay. Those
wrinkles angle from luff to clew. The wrinkles controlled by luff
tension are much smaller and lie perpendicular to the luff.
No. 9 Every boat has a "sweet spot" - a precise
steering angle for optimum performance upwind. Every boat also has a
groove, which is the range of acceptable steering angles. It's up to
the skipper to learn both. The lower end of this range is for
acceleration. At this angle, both jib telltales should be streaming
straight aft. The luff of the jib should rarely break, but the leeward
telltales should never stall.
The center of the groove is the sweet spot, where the
boat should be sailed 75 percent of the time. Here you should steer so
the weather telltale is slightly stalled. The other end of the groove
is the pinching mode, which is used in breezy conditions, especially in
flat water. This side of the groove is usually higher than simply
letting the weather telltale lift. On most boats you can actually steer
so the front of the jib breaks as much as a foot back from the headstay
for short periods.
No. 10 When in doubt, copy the fast guys!
