Evening regatta on the american west coast
Hi First 30 fans,
I just wanted to share with you my first racing experience on the First 30.
I had a blast with this boat last night for our first race.
We delivered ‘’Invictus’’ to her owner last week. After having a lot of big powerboat, Tim, the owner, CEO of a big corporation, decided to learn sailing and have chosen the First 30 (the biggest fun dinghy on the market according to him) to learn sailing and go to Catalina island with his kids. We went out only once before with Tim’s full family the week end before, doing almost 7.8 knots average on reaching during all afternoon.
PHRF west coast gave us a provisional handicap of 69 (not really favorable but we will have a meeting with PHRF board next Tuesday to finalize our handicap for the season).
Most important was to compete and see how boat was performing. After all my rides with my First 40 Naos2 , I was very excited to steer with a tiller (like on my First 31.7 that I still have in France since more than 10 years).
Wind was established between 10 to 14 knots. We had upwind and downwind leg…. Good start and we were playing in real time with J105 and First 36.7. Upwind, boat was really fun to drive and it took me few boat length to realize that the boat needed to sail low with a lot of speed and when we find the right heel angle (around 16 degrees) , boat accelerates and start to point. Then mainsheet tension is key because you actually play with backstay in real time !
At the upwind mark, wind was established at 14-15 knots and we were in the middle of the fleet with 36.7 and J105 (with a non-experienced crew even not playing with mainsheet), fighting with them in few boat length.
Downwind, we hoisted the A2 on the bowsprit. Doing 7.8 knots at 145-150TWA. Crew was not experienced enough to install the pole to open the spinnaker and optimize VMG. But we were still fast despite the cup of champagne going around the cockpit.
Overall, we finished in the bottom of our calss with our 69 handicap (J109 : 78 and 36,7 : 81) but I was very satisfied by this super-cool boat.
Buzz really started around the FIRST 30 and we were asked a lot of question during post-race dinner at California Yacht Club. Twin rudder ? no backstay ? T-keel ?
The First 30 is a very good boat to promote sailing and reach new customers who wants to have fun and want real accommodations. That boat is the best combination between fast/stable cruising and fun racing.
My local plan is really to start to build a one-design fleet locally. 3 boats will be racing for the summer and hopefully 4 or 5 before end of the year.
Don’t hesitate to ask me if you want more details. I have keel and rudder templates available if you need. I will make some pictures of kelp window and the preparation of the boat.
Enjoy attached pictures (next boat will be red and green and other one orange for Long Beach Boat Show in September).
Best regards
Charles
| This entry was posted by Patrice Martin on 23 May 2011 at 11 h 16 min, and is filed under First 30. Follow any responses to this post through RSS 2.0. |
