ANOTHER VIEW
Here’s two skippers: one, driving his Catalina 22 in a fleet race in the Ortega River, trying to stretch his boat further than his competitors, the other, driving his Maxi-Cruise 65 from Osaka, Japan to San Francisco in less than six weeks before he runs out of viable drinking water. If I were to ask you what was the difference between these two sailors, could you tell me? Better yet, if I were to ask you what they had in common, could you tell me that? Let’s see, a Maxi-Cruise 65 and a Catalina 22, that should be easy. WRONG. Forget the boats, concentrate on the skippers. Each has the task of delivering his boat in good condition, with all the crew on board that started to the stated destination. That’s not it, however. The answer is a little more basic than that: each is trying to get the most out of his boat.
How many times on the St. Johns River have you been fighting a current, or foul breeze to get back to your slip, or get to a protective cove to anchor before the afternoon thunder-bumper rolls through? The former happens to me ALL the time, the latter is more common during the summer months but it happens to all of us. Ever wish you could tweak your boat a little more to get just a little more speed out of her? What? You’re a cruiser? You don’t care about speed?
While that may (or may not be true) on the St. Johns, offshore it can make a difference. You may not think much of the half knot you can add to your boat speed by swapping a three bladed prop out for a two bladed prop, but over the space of a two week run, you’ve just put your boat another whole twenty four hours in front of where it would be if you left on the three bladed prop. The amount of speed you can get by tweaking a leech line to remove the trailing edge flutter may not be noticeable, but offshore, after two weeks, it could be the difference between continuing on, and having to swap out a sail because it has just shredded itself.
Ever thought about this stuff? Nope!?! Maybe that’s the reason you keep seeing the flat end of other boats instead of the pointy end. Don’t like racing? Don’t blame you, it’s frustrating, unrewarding work. Especially if you don’t pay attention to the details of speed. Want to know more? You should, and you can. Simply attend the ADOPT-A-RACER cruise and walk away with a wealth of go-fast, safety, and common-sense approaches to help us all get more out of our vessels, and enjoy our sport more, whether we’re cussing up a storm on the race course, or cussing out a storm a few miles offshore. The skippers in both positions have more in common with each other than any of us ever realized........