Today was another day of light air practice. We again worked on light air speed and technique. Little by little, we seem to be figuring out some better ways to sail the boat in the light. Tomorrow, the breeze will play ball a bit more and should allow us to do some practice races against other boats.
On another note, part of this job means that we all have to travel on planes. Some people can travel in planes easier than others. On our boat, we have several grinders that don’t always fit in plane seats very easily. Take a look at this photo of the tight squeeze Newbrook had on the last flight into Sardinia.
Practice Begins
The Bella Mente team arrived in Sardinia a couple of days ago. The first 2 days were spent working on the boat and getting it ready for this event. Yesterday was our first day on the water and that was spent looking at most of our sails and a few small changes. Today we worked more on our light air boat speed and spent a couple of hours straight line sailing against Stig. It was another light air day with the breeze not getting about 9 knots.
Little by little, the rest of the boats are coming in and the crews are arriving. Racing doesn’t start for quite a while so we have some time to work on many aspects of the program. We will again work on windward leeward sailing tomorrow and continue to work on our light air performance. The list is long for things to do. We still have all our furling sails and coastal set up to look at and work on. The boat also has to get weighed which is usually a bit of a fiasco.
We have quite a bit more practice to get through before the regatta comes about but it will do us some good.
Doogie
Sailing today
After some long days in the yard, we got off the dock around noon today. We had to check the systems, mast, and generally make sure the boat was back together ok. It was forecast for a small building sea breeze but instead we got a strong offshore breeze that peaked at about 28 knots. All seemed ok with the boat.
The breeze then backed off to about 15-17 knots and we continued working on a little boat handling and boat speed. We did a few practice starts and a 1 lap race against Shockwave. We have one more day tomorrow to get ready for Monday’s racing so we will continue to work on boat speed and boat handling.
Doogie
The Bella Mente team compound. 2 40 ft containers, 1 20 ft container and another 20 ft container that we are renting.
Keel off
As is visible in the picture, we have taken the keel off and are doing a small modification to the boat before the racing starts. Tomorrow will be a full day to get the boat back together and service all the parts. The whole team will be participating with everyone taking on various responsibilities.
Palma, here we come!
Well, it has been a couple of weeks now since the Newport Bermuda Race and the team is now gathering in Palma de Mallorca, Spain for our next event, the Copa del Rey.
The boat is scheduled to arrive on the 11th and unloading it the same day. After that, it will be flurry of activity to get the rig down, make a few small mods, perform some service on the boat, and get it cleaned up and put back together. The target is to have her sailing again in a couple of days. So stay tuned for more news as we gather the team again and prepare for some inshore racing.
Racing coming soon
This weekend is the NYYC annual regatta. Friday will be the Around Island Race, followed by 2 days of windward leewards on Saturday and Sunday. The last couple of days we have been working towards getting the boat ready for inshore racing. That means getting our string line system functional and all the little inshore systems sorted. We have been working on mark rounding’s, sets, pre start maneuvers… The team is looking forward to finally racing the boat and seeing how we line up.
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