‘DARK REALITY’ FOR AMERICAN MAGIC
A late call to switch boats from the one-design AC40 ‘Magic’ to the developmental LEQ12 AC40 ‘America’ led to a near-three hour delay for NYYC American Magic on Wednesday and rather scuppered their day as squally conditions blew through and left a nasty sea-state and winds around the 5 knot mark. No ideal for flying, the LEQ12 struggled for lift-off on starboard into the swell and in a session that lasted just over two hours, only managed half an hour of flying time.
INTERVIEW: PAUL GOODISON, HELMSMAN, NYYC AMERICAN MAGIC
Paul Goodison put a positive spin on the day and spoke about learning new things every day but summed up the day as: “I think a lot of it is just down to their waves and how your surging. Obviously as you’re dropping down some waves, even if you're not going so fast, half the boat releases just naturally depending on if you’re in the peak or the troughs so you’re able to take off quite early at some wind angles and wave angles whereas when the breeze shifts around a little bit, then all of a sudden it gets a bit harder to release the boat so you’ve got to get a lot more speed to be able to get the thing out of the water.”
Paul also reviewed the last two weeks of sailing adding: “I think we've been pretty fortunate the last two weeks we've been here sailing we've had some fantastic conditions and done a lot of great sailing and today is a little bit of a dark reality that maybe this is what's in store for us - a little bit bigger waves a little lighter wind and some really tricky sailing conditions.”
American Magic will be back out on the water on Friday.
Recon Notes: A two-boat session with pre-start manoeuvres was planned for the day and 2 buoys were dropped. We rolled out @10:15H with ‘Magic’ (OD) first out but they changed plans once the mast was up, derigged, rolled her back in and got ‘America’ (LEQ12) out on her own.
Dock out was @13:10H, crew on one tack was Slingsby with Menninger and Goodison with Campbell on the other. Gibbs, suited up, was on stand-by on the chase boat along with Gulari and Calabrese, not in sailing gear.
After a long main hoist, again, plus some waiting due to an outbound GNV ferry @13:50H we were out of the Port and upwind sailing on STB tack @24kt BSP. Conditions were wind 6-8Kt @130º and some confused seas (1m wind chop @3.5” and 1,5m combo swell @6” from 120º and 30º).
Take-off speed was 12kt but they ventilated 7 times shortly after take-off, having to restart again on 4 occasions. Then they held on take-off until hitting 18kt BSP and never ventilated again. The boat never sailed settled in these conditions, they were constantly over-correcting ride-height, windward heel and hull height (which fully touched the water regularly).
The wind dropped to 3-5Kt, after 30’ of @14kt BSP displacement mode sailing trying unsuccessfully to take-off we stopped @14:40H. Chase 4 pulled alongside and they had a 10’ briefing to resume sailing @14:50H on port tack. Again, they couldn’t get America on the foils so they stopped @14:52H for another briefing and what it looked like a crew change (in Gibbs, out Campbell).
The wind picked up a notch to 6kt and @15:00H we resumed upwind sailing @25kt BSP on STB tack, with 12kt take-off BSP again and completed the only one tack of the day, touch & go. We stopped @15:10 and restarted sailing on port tack @15:20H for 6’ not foiling as the wind dropped to 4kt. They stopped, had another briefing, @15:35H attempted sailing again but couldn’t get her on the foils so they called it a day and towed back to Port. Dock in was 16:22H. When I asked Goodison during the interview, he blamed the obvious port tack take-off difficulties on the wave angles and not on the different foils PT/STB. Lea Sitjà
Dock-Out: 1310 Dock-In: 1622
Conditions: 13:50H 6-9kt @130º/ 14:40H 3-5kt @130º/ 15:00H 6kt @115º/15:35H 4kt @105º. Wind speed measured 8ft above sea level using a handheld anemometer.
Weather AM: Overcast with light rain.
Weather PM: Sunny
Sea State AM: Beaufort 4
Sea State PM: Beaufort 5
Onboard AC40 LEQ12 Today:
Helms: Paul Goodison / Tom Slingsby
Trimmers: Michael Menninger / Andrew Campbell (replaced at 1500 by Riley Gibbs)
Sails Used:
Mainsail LEQM1: 2 hours 5 minutes
Jib (J2-1): 2 hours 5 minutes
Total Tacks: 1 – 0 foil-to-foil, 1 touch & go, 0 touchdowns.
Total Gybes: 11 – 11 foil-to-foil, 0 touch & go, 0 touchdowns.
Recon Notes:
America was on foil for a total of 30' (20 and 10 minutes respectively). We sailed a total of 24.5NM during 2h05'
Take off speed: 25 knots at 150° TWA (True Wind Angle)