Sailboard Headquaters Melbourne Cup weekend.
We finally got the wind we were hoping for today, Monday. From 10 am we had 15-20 knots for the 'all in' slalom races and a great deal of fun. After a few races the wind ramped up to a solid 20 to 25 knots and further racing was abandoned in favour of speedsailing. After another hour or two the wind got into the mid to high 20's with gusts to 30 knots or maybe slightly more. By this time the tide was running in but not hard enough to produce the dreaded whoopdedoos. We sailed right through past high tide but the angle was SW making for a quite tight course so max speeds just over 40 knots were about the best.
I had heaps of things I wanted to test and compare but by the time the tide was dropping at about 6pm I was spent (The slalom racing did me in
). I got some done though, sailing two boards (CA40 and IS50), 3 fins (Lockwood proto. assy. 23cm, KA 20cm assy and TM48 20cm), and two sails ('09 and '07 5m Koncepts) and really, the main difference was whether I got a good gust or not on that run.
Craig Hollins and I tried a speed run on the Starboard Gemini Tandem but the best we could do was just over 25 knots with a 6.6m and a 5.8m Koncept and a 44cm fin. Man that thing is stable through the chop! It just eats it up as if it isn't even there!
The other highlight of the day, or I should say evening, was Craig and Mat speed sailing at NIGHT! Craig has sourced some great LED lights for his helmet and they worked really well. It was still SW and 20-25 knots but pitch black dark. We tried to get some photos but I am not sure if they turned out usable yet. At one point Craig came in and said he had just done a 36 knots run!!
This concept really has some great potential!
The whole weekend has been a blast with lots of activities including SUP demos on the main surf beach on a loverly sunny offshore Sunday in lovely 2-3 foot rollers, a great surf sailing session this afternoon and talks, demos and inspiration from three time world freestyle champ Ricardo Compello!
Not to mention the Tennis club hall rocking and rolling on its old stumps under 200 feet at the Saturday night spit roast party. I think I can safely say that a good time was had by all.
