Sailing Logic Blog
Monday, 1 September 2008
RORC Madeira-Cowes Race Report No 8 - Homeward Bound......
Fantastic news this morning.... Puma have got the expected winds and is rocketing along at the moment, averaging between 11 and 12 knots. They had around 350 miles to go at 0730am, and this will start reducing at an alarming rate going at this brilliant speed. It is interesting to note that Change of Course, who were only a few hours behind Puma and Pen Azen at one stage have now dropped back considerably as they have not hit the south westerly winds at present..
Pen Azen we think are around 20-25 miles ahead of Puma, which means that it is going to go down to the wire as who is going to win class and the race on handicap. By our calculations there are only minutes in it! How exciting!! British Soldier finished last night sometime around 8pm we think, but unfortunately the their tracker seemed to get stuck at 12 miles to go, so we assume they are in safely, and congratulations go to them. They left 4 days ahead of Puma and Pen Azen, so with an eta expected early hours of Wednesday morning, we hope that Puma will have jumped ahead of them on corrected time.
Pen Azen is a J122 which means she is 12.2 metres long with a waterline length of 10.55 metres. Puma is 11.6 metres long with a waterline length of 10.40 metres which means that she is a little shorter and in these conditions should be fractionally slower, as the rule normally is the longer the water line length in a following sea means a quicker boat. However, Puma is wider than the J122's which means in the conditions that the yachts are in at the moment, gives them a slight advantage as they have more wetted area, thus giving them more stability and hopefully that little bit of extra speed. Think of the yachts as giant surfboards and you won't be too wide of the mark.. so Pen Azen is slightly longer, Puma is slightly wider...which will give the yachts the best advantage, its too close to call. The Reflex 38's in general really relish these type of conditions - flat seas, wind behind the beam, surfing along quite happily. Go Puma, go!
All is very well onboard. They have had another Queen disco experience last night when they found out where they were in relation to Pen Azen and British Soldier. Those of us who were in Madeira and witnessed Puma leaving will remember the crew dancing, singing, and laughing to the tune of 'Don't stop me now', well they are at it again. With whoops of joy coming from the helm when they top 15 knots boat speed, life onboard has just changed to one of upbeat anticipation. They are in no doubt that they have to keep racing hard right up until the finish line, if they want to be in with a chance of go ahead of Pen Azen. It will be a very nail biting time tomorrow evening waiting for Pen Azen to finish and then counting the minutes until Puma appears over the horizon. We will keep you updated as often as we can right up until the finish......
Posted by Philippe Falle at 9:00 AM
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Fantastic news this morning.... Puma have got the expected winds and is rocketing along at the moment, averaging between 11 and 12 knots. They had around 350 miles to go at 0730am, and this will start reducing at an alarming rate going at this brilliant speed. It is interesting to note that Change of Course, who were only a few hours behind Puma and Pen Azen at one stage have now dropped back considerably as they have not hit the south westerly winds at present..
Pen Azen we think are around 20-25 miles ahead of Puma, which means that it is going to go down to the wire as who is going to win class and the race on handicap. By our calculations there are only minutes in it! How exciting!! British Soldier finished last night sometime around 8pm we think, but unfortunately the their tracker seemed to get stuck at 12 miles to go, so we assume they are in safely, and congratulations go to them. They left 4 days ahead of Puma and Pen Azen, so with an eta expected early hours of Wednesday morning, we hope that Puma will have jumped ahead of them on corrected time.
Pen Azen is a J122 which means she is 12.2 metres long with a waterline length of 10.55 metres. Puma is 11.6 metres long with a waterline length of 10.40 metres which means that she is a little shorter and in these conditions should be fractionally slower, as the rule normally is the longer the water line length in a following sea means a quicker boat. However, Puma is wider than the J122's which means in the conditions that the yachts are in at the moment, gives them a slight advantage as they have more wetted area, thus giving them more stability and hopefully that little bit of extra speed. Think of the yachts as giant surfboards and you won't be too wide of the mark.. so Pen Azen is slightly longer, Puma is slightly wider...which will give the yachts the best advantage, its too close to call. The Reflex 38's in general really relish these type of conditions - flat seas, wind behind the beam, surfing along quite happily. Go Puma, go!
All is very well onboard. They have had another Queen disco experience last night when they found out where they were in relation to Pen Azen and British Soldier. Those of us who were in Madeira and witnessed Puma leaving will remember the crew dancing, singing, and laughing to the tune of 'Don't stop me now', well they are at it again. With whoops of joy coming from the helm when they top 15 knots boat speed, life onboard has just changed to one of upbeat anticipation. They are in no doubt that they have to keep racing hard right up until the finish line, if they want to be in with a chance of go ahead of Pen Azen. It will be a very nail biting time tomorrow evening waiting for Pen Azen to finish and then counting the minutes until Puma appears over the horizon. We will keep you updated as often as we can right up until the finish......