[Sonar] Race Course Congestion

[tbrown9163 at comcast.net]

Unfortunately in the given S27.9 situation that Bert is describing,   it was on the first windward leg where the split Trapezoidal nature of the course didn't help.

My guess is that the J22's falling back into the Sonar fleet I don't think we can do much about.    However with the S2,'s it appears to be mostly a matter of common courtesy.   This boat in question was quite obviously not in the game.

--
Thomas M. Brown 
"Maximizing Business by Minimizing Surprises" 
~~~~~~~_/) ~ _/)~~~~~~

-------------- Original message -------------- 
From: Bert Foster <Bert at apexq.com> 

> Hi Becca, 
> Yes, I'm chairman of the RC and have been working very hard to reduce 
> congestion. The wind yesterday was fluky and the fleets got more 
> mixed up than they have all season 
> 
> We Sonars have been on the same course all year with the S2 7.9s and 
> not had much of a problem as they start 9 minutes ahead of us and 
> should be a much faster boat. Yesterday we tangled with two S2 7.9s 
> all race. I hailed one, "Wind Dance"; "what are you doing back here 
> with us and don't tack on our air" They replied "sorry, we only have 
> a small jib and wanted to come to play anyway." They then herded us 
> beyond the windward mark lay-line and gassed us all the way into the 
> mark. Its hard to know what to do with a boat so far off the pace 
> they end up more than 9 minutes behind and badly bothering other 
> fleets. One would hope they would make a special effort to not gas 
> the smaller boats and to generally stay clear. Frankly it was a mess 
> at the very close Sonar finish with those two badly sailed S2 7.9s 
> gassing all of us. I was reported to me that "Wind Dance" sailed 
> through the finish line of the right course as some of the Capri-25s 
> were finishing. Boy, were they mad and they sought me out to sound off. 
> 
> The S2 7.9 is particularly difficult because they are a big fast boat 
> that throws a very large wind shadow. Then they are very hard to get 
> around or away from when they are sailed poorly, because they are 
> still fast. When they are sailed well, they are "GONE'", and not a problem. 
> 
> We also had problems with some J-22s because the wind was so fluky, 
> the bottom half of their fleet fell back into the Sonars. That 
> hasn't happened much this season as they have often times sailed the 
> right course, in the stronger winds earlier, its wasn't much of a 
> problem even when they were on our course. 
> 
> When we changed the starting order and put the S2 7.9s first, Tom 
> Elsen, the S2 7.9 fleet captain promised us their boats would do to 
> us what they did to us yesterday. Lets hope he can clean it 
> up. Part of the problem is that even when a boat is that far back, 
> their competitive juices flow and they tend not to give way. 
> 
> Regards, 
> 
> Bert Foster 
> Chairman RC WYC 
> 19150 Park Ave 
> Wayzata, MN 55391 
> h 952-473-2240 
> w 952-544-1100 
> c 612-281-9999 
> 
> 
> 
> At 09:53 AM 6/4/2007, you wrote: 
> 
> >Bert, 
> > 
> >Are you still on the RC? I don't think the committe boat planned 
> >well to put the S 2.79, 22's and us on the same race course 
> >yesterday. Too much traffic...can we address this for the future? 
> > 
> >Becca 
> 
> _______________________________________________ 
> Sonar mailing list 
> Sonar at lists.wyc.org 
> http://lists.wyc.org/mailman/listinfo/sonar 
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