GBCA Discussion Forum

We made it.  See, here's the GBCA burgee flying high and proud in Kaneohe Bay.  Quite the experience.  Definitely more challenge and adventure than vacation or sunset cruise, but that is what we expected.  The Rum Races and Harvest Moon were really good practice for us.  Crazy thing is Chris is already talking about what we can do better in 2016. 



Oh, and Moore 24's were designed and built to race to Hawaii.  I would guess they have 30+ crossings.  No special modification are needed, you just need to be hard core to be sitting practically in the water and/or sleeping in a cave for 13 days to take one.  The first of the two Moore 24's this year won their division and was the first PHRF boat (Monday/Tuesday starters) overall on corrected time.  They killed it.  Amazing boats really. 

Sorry if this is a na?ve question, I just haven't been around Galveston Bay to know better.  Will the oil spill eventually impact the waters that we typically sail, east of Clear Lake?  I have no concept of how far widespread the spill will become.  We had plans to go sailing to this coming weekend.  Don't worry or dumb idea?

Thanks for the great photos! 

And where are the 109's? 

I'm excited about the possibility of starting at the same time as other boats.  It can be pretty lonely back there for the first part of a pursuit race. 

Hoping for breeze-on.  We need the practice.

Any sneak peeks on whether we'll have pursuit or traditional starts?  Course length?  Looks like a pretty typical winter GB day on Saturday weatherwise.

I see divisions on the reg. list, so presumably traditional starts... 

Well, we've been teaming up for a long time now, so there isn't a lot to hear.  We actually met for the first time to do a Jack & Jill Double-Handed Race back in 1995. 

The video is from an early version GoPro.  I believe I did upload this one in HD.

Quote from: GCushing on February 21, 2014, 05:07:55 PM
Looking forward to it. Hope it is on the longer side.

Second that.  We need all the practice we can get. 

Is the start the traditional type by division, fastest division last or? 

I did use GRIBS and route optimization before HMR (mostly as practice for Pacific Cup, although this year there wasn't anything to it.  The resolution is sufficient.  I think I used a NOGAPS (or the new name that I forget - Navy product) that had higher res which is known to handle near shore winds better than the typical GFS output. 

PredictWind could be a good source for Bay type resolution, it just isn't cheap. 

They are the same GRIBS and if all you looking for is a GRIB viewer then there are number apps and and simple software packages that can do that for free.  But Expeditions forte is combining the gribs with polars for route optimization.  There are very few options for that and Expedition is the Cadillac (Telsa?) version. 

I think it is back to the original poster.  What information exactly are they trying to get?

I'm not sure you can justify the cost of Expedition for inshore racing.  Expedition's price tag is primarily due to its excellent ability to get GRIBS and combine the weather information with your boat polars to provide optimized routing.  That routing algorithm is what makes Expedition worth the cost for offshore racing.  It is also a good tool to generate your own polars.  It is a very popular piece of software for a race like TransPac or Pacific Cup where there is a range of hundreds of miles that you might sail. 

If you are just looking for weather data and buoy racing then iNavX and iRegatta is a very inexpensive way to do that.  Even still, the weather data in GRIBS is usually too coarse to be very useful for inshore racing.  It might tell you what sails to bring for the race, but it's not going to tell which side of the course will be windier. 

iRegatta is pretty cool.  Time to go to the start line, laylines, VMG, course to the next mark, a strip chart of wind direction, boat speed relative to polars, etc...  It really gets useful if you have your instrument data connected to a WiFi MUX type device so that iRegatta is getting all of the instrument data.  You can build your own polars too. 

Weather4DPro is another interesting app.  It is a good way to see GRIBS and with some effort you can get your boat polars in there and it will also provide optimized routing.  Not as sophisticated as Expedition, nor as robust, but it is cheap, and convenient because all you need is a tablet.

Maybe I should have put this at the beginning.  What information exactly are you wanting for Race Week? 

For high resolution weather data that could be useful for inshore racing on longer courses PredictWind could be helpful.  There is a subscription for the high res data (which also includes current data).  A subscription isn't cheap, but for a short period (ie a Race Week) it is a lot less than Expedition. 

And the results are in.  3 second credit for the smaller headsail.  The smaller spin doesn't garner a credit.  There really isn't a credit available for smaller than class size spins, but there is a penalty for larger than class size spins (ie J105's with 110sqm kites instead of 90sqm class kites.  I'm fine with that.  Like I said, we went with the smaller spin primarily for handling purposes since we sail Double-Handed and long-term we'll be getting a Downwind Rating from PHRF NorCal which does recognize spinnaker size for the Downwind Ratings. 

All good. 

Thanks PHRFGB (Jay) for looking into it and making the change. 

Quote from: Bee on January 28, 2014, 04:52:02 PM
I did not think you were complaining, but I was surprised to find the 81% for both your and my kites.  I should think this big of a difference would warrant more then 3 secs/mile --- just not sure about the 120% headsail.

At the moment my 81% kite hasn't warranted any change.  Neither has the 120% headsail as my rating is exactly the same as 2013 when I measured in a 150% headsail and full size kite.  That said, it is all under review by PHRFGB.  Maybe there was a mistake in my 2014 rating.  Should know soon. 

They currently owe us 3 seconds.  As it currently stands for the 3 second penalty Rebecca gets a carbon mast, 150% genoa, big class size kite, and no roller furling.  I think Aeolus has roller furling, but I'm not positive.  We obviously have roller furling and an aluminum mast. 

I've seen examples of the mast alone being a 3 second difference and the roller furling being a 3 second difference. 

By the way, PHRFGB did call me today and they are looking into my rating. 

And, to be clear, I am not complaining.  I am only stating facts (to the best of my knowledge) and asking a simple question.  This is not a life or death decision for me.  I will be perfectly fine regardless of the outcome. 

A picture is worth...  Any wonder why we are downsizing or Double-Handing?