Here is a picture of Bella Mente on her way to the west coast. If you look closely, you will notice that the boat is angled over a couple of degrees. This is to ensure that it is not too wide on the roads.

Just a quick picture of the added scoop John Von is standing in a hatch on the addition. We’ll work on getting John more aerodynamic for the race.

The boat has been lengthened with a scoop and will be shortly be on its way to San Diego. The keel, mast and bulb are already there getting worked on and race ready. Once the boat arrives, it will be a flurry of activity trying to get it all assembled in time. Thomas and Ryan have been working overtime to get the scoop attached, faired and painted. With those 2 guys in charge, we are sure to get a nice result. Thomas is a bit of a perfectionist!
In the mean time, R&D is going well with the new boat. A few of the boys will meet up next week to discuss cockpit layout and systems. We are also working on getting our crew sorted for the 3 west coast events.

Stay Tuned,
Doogie

Take a look at this video of us at the 2010 Maxi Worlds in Sardinia.
http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=194113867282285&oid=139883939381163&comments&ref=mf

Just a quick update. After Key West, the boat left for Palm Beach by 4pm Friday. The boys get her to Cracker Boy, boat out of the water, rig down and started the work. The rig was disassembled and shipped to San Diego where Pirate and Sammy are there now unloading the mast. The scoop is almost on the boat and nearing completion. Once that is done the boat will follow to San Diego and continue her mods. Bella Mente will be calling Driscoll’s home for the next month or so.
Doogie

We sailed 3 races today in winds of 10 knots and under. To be honest, I can’t remember every race in every detail. Our scores for the day were 2,2,2. So better but not enough to win. We tied for second but lost the tiebreaker so we finished 3rd overall, with Numbers winning and Shockwave in second. We seem to have been able to make the boat go a little better in the light but this is still our weak point. Our mark rounding’s were clean. One leeward mark rounding was a small struggle when we had an issue with the string system. The string system has been quite reliable this week allowing us to take the kite down 1-2 boat lengths from the bottom mark. Our sets also improved this week, which had been a weak point for us. How did we make them better? Lots of little things: better turn downwind, less friction in the kite going up out of the hatch, better sneaks on the bow.
Overall, we sailed better as the week went on but we know we could have done better. A few mistakes here and there cost us a few seconds which in some races was all that kept us from winning.
However, now we are off to distance racing. Pirate and the boys are taking the boat back to Palm Beach right now where it will get modified for the West coast. It will have a scoop added to it and then shipped to Driscoll’s in San Diego. We will reassemble the boat over February and March. The rig will get shipped separately where it will be maintained, checked and reassembled in February. Our first event on the west coast will be the Cabo race in March. We have plenty of work and mods to do before then.
Stay Tuned,
Doogie

https://bellamenteracing.com/bellamente/164/

We sailed 2 races today in very light air.
For both races we again sailed with a reduced crew, taking 4 people off the boat.
The first race we started at the right end and were a little late but got to the line at full speed. We sailed well on the beat and rounded the mark with a clean set. We sailed clean and were able to keep the boat moving through the light air. We worked on some better staysail furl timing to improve our inside gybes. We were able to hold our time and finished second in the race behind Numbers.
Second race we had a good start but struggled to find our way. For most of the race we seemed to hold the same position. Shockwave hit the top mark at the first set and they fell behind us as they did their penalty turn. The race course was a 5 legger and on the last beat we went left while the rest of the fleet went right. We found some better pressure and came from behind to win the race!
So overall today was better but we still have some work to do. Tomorrow will be a good battle and hopefully we sail 2 races. The forecast is still for some light air so we will have to work hard.

We only had one light air race today.
We made some small changes to the boat and sailed with 4 less crew in order to lighten the boat. We started at the pin and were lucky we were not over. We sailed all the way out to the port layline and followed Titan into the top. We had to duck Numbers on as they rounded the weather mark. We went ok on the run but were still not able to pass Numbers. We had a clean leeward mark rounding and worked our way up the beat again. Shockwave seemed to struggle in this really light stuff, a little like we were yesterday.
Our gybes were costly and we probably gybed too much on the first run. This is probably where we lost our time on Titan. We finished third in the race. Better but still not good enough.