2008 Beneteau 40.7 National Champions! - Get the basics right...

Goal setting with North Star - Scottish Series 2008

Ambition Racing- the first 1,000nm on the Class 40

 

2008 Beneteau 40.7 National Champions! – Get the basics right…

The weekend of 10 & 11th May saw me stepping forward and racing on the bow for the first time in a serious regatta for 12 years.  I joined Challenger and a Hyde sails team for the Beneteau 40.7 National Championships. Blistering light wind speed from our new Hyde D4 sails, some inspired layline calls and tight boat handling led to us being first over the water in the first two races despite being one of the slowest boats on handicap, a 2nd in the final race of day gave us a 5 point lead overnight.  The Sunday saw a slightly stronger breeze making it much harder for us to hold our handicap on ‘Love Shack’ whilst they scored two first we recorded a 4th and a 2nd taking the National title to the last race. 

The quality of the top of the fleet provided very close racing and we were crowned “2008 Beneteau 40.7 National Champions” on a count back of 2nd places as we both held 2 x firsts. 

From a coaching perspective this has proved the basic philosophy that success cannot be achieved without ensuring the basics are covered – Preparation, Boat Handling, Boat Speed and Tactics. 

Preparation:

Gareth Williams (owner) ensures his boat is as well prepared as possible for each event and Challenger is undoubtedly one of the best prepared, un-modified 40.7’s in the country. For this season a new carbon pole, full height pole hoist and an aramid backstay all contributed to ease of boat handling and therefore speed around the course, and a new suit of Hyde sails proved to be very fast straight out of the bag.  The rig, sails, deck gear, hull and foils were all well prepared, set up and in great shape so going into the event we had absolutely no excuses from the perspective of preparation, if we didn’t do well it could only be our fault!

Boat Handling:

As most of the crew only met on the Friday afternoon and sailed for a couple of hours it is without doubt that we would have been even stronger with more practice.  But with a core framework where each crewmember knew and understood their roles and responsibilities we were confident of being able to manage the boat in any situation. 

The closeness of the racing and congested mark roundings put a premium on solid, dependable and consistent boat handling.  Confidence in our abilities and a high level of skill and experience ensured each individual contributed their utmost and we gelled as a unit straight off.  We were able to accelerate our training and get up to speed immediately because we knew our individual pieces of the jigsaw, knew what the picture needed to look like and knew how the pieces should fit together.

Boat Speed:

The new sails were fast and having the guys who designed the sails on board ensured we were able to get the best out of them. Unrelenting focus upwind and downwind ensured we were getting the best out of the boat at all times.

Tactics:

A talented afterguard talked their way around the course making great decisions; especially some of the layline calls in strong tides.

All in all a well prepared boat that was sailed fast around the optimum track – more time together would make us a much stronger team but just getting the basics right saw us crowned 2008 40.7 National Champions.

 

 

Goal Setting with North Star - Scottish Series 2008

Once again I was back aboard the 40.7 North Star for Bell Lawrie Scottish Series.  This year we entered the very competitive IRC Class 2 and spent 4 days training before the first race.  The crew had limited racing experience and limited experience of spinnaker work, as one crewmember said “I’ve never even seen a spinnaker in real life!”  Richard Smith (the owner) was ‘dipping his toe’ into IRC racing and wanting to see how he, and the crew enjoyed it before looking at investing in optimising ‘North Star’ and purchasing race sails.  We knew we were going into the event in a boat that would struggle to sail to it’s handicap so it was vital that we clarified our goals for the event to ensure we came out recognising our achievements.

Setting an outcome goal of “winning”,  “getting in the top 10” or even “top half of the fleet” was unrealistic, and although “not coming bottom” was more achievable it was not particularly motivational.  The problem with outcome goals like these is that they depend upon factors that we cannot control.  We cannot control how well or poorly our competition sail so hitting these targets may have been due to failings by our competitors rather than good sailing on our part.  So, to measure our performance, we needed to focus on our own sailing and tune into the aspects that contribute to skilful boat handling.

We worked on individual roles, laying the framework for each crewmember to understand how they contribute to the teams overall performance.  We broke down the mechanics of sailing into simple models where each individual could recognise how and where their contribution fits.  The result was that we definitely created a crew “greater than the sum of its individual parts.”

I was very pleased with the way a group of predominantly inexperienced sailors listened, focussed, understood and delivered.  Going around the course in 15 to 20+ knots of wind we put together not only creditable boat handling performances but in many instances better boat handling than some of the crews that have been sailing together for years.

Two distinct factors created this success.  Firstly, the coaching that created a clarity of understanding of the task overview and breakdown of individual roles and secondly the focus, application and execution from each individual on board. 

Overall, we were able to get onto the racecourse and punch above our weight.  With 4 days training we went out and put in boat handling performances that were as good as, if not better than, many of the fleet.  This was achieved because each member of the crew understood and accepted responsibility for their particular role, each member of the crew applied themselves to their contribution as well as they could. 

We focussed on our individual roles and did our bit well - there is nothing complicated about good boat handling.

I’m already looking forward to Scottish Series 2009!

 

 

Ambition Racing – the first 1,000 nm on the Class 40

Ambition Racing have been full time on the water since picking up ‘Mowgli’ early May, the first 1,000nm have been a steep learning curve for all and everyday is proving to be valuable.  The old adage that it takes 10% of the time to get 90% of the performance and 90% of the time to get the last 10% of the performance is ringing true.

Boat handling has been the focus of the first phase of the training starting with the basic mechanics of each manoeuvre – tacking, gybing, hoisting and dropping the full wardrobe of sails. The mechanics of sailing are simple and straightforward and success relies upon correctly executing a definite process and shorthanded sailing emphasises the importance of preparation and efficiency of execution.  Problems onboard any boat have a tendency to compound themselves and escalate so a priority is to try and prevent errors occurring in the first place and ensure that any situation is managed and responded to in a calm and considered way – Victoria and Jeremy do not have the luxury of another 10 pairs of hand to bail them out when things start going wrong! 

Mowgli is now becoming very recognisable on the Solent with a growing fan club amongst the children who commute to school on the Isle of Wight ferries!