2017 Chronicle #3 - Copenhagen and Lake Garda

Here is our final chronicle for our 2017 European trip.

Celebrating 4th of July at the Copenhagen Hard Rock Cafe

F-18 World Championships Copenhagen

Ryan and I were the first boat to arrive at Vallensbaek, Denmark other than the local boats at the club. Vallensbaek is a suburb of Copenhagen about a 20 minute drive outside the city. We arrived a week before the event and had three good practice days including one in more than 20 kts of wind. On one of the practice days we returned to the wrong harbor because the coast looks very similar. We then had to turn around and head back out into the heavy wind to find the correct harbor which we did within a short while. After we had our boat setup a Polish boat arrived and we had a good training day with them the next day. They had a new Scorpion F-18 built by Exploder in Poland. There were about eight of these new boats at the championship including the ultimate winner.

We also had several days and evenings for exploring Copenhagen and enjoyed the city very much. We also had several nice visits with Henrik Kuesler (our former exchange student), Marie Louise and their new son Karl who is six months old.

F18 Worlds Opening Ceremony with flags of all competing countries

Racing Day #1

There were 124 boats so we were split into two 62 boat fleets. The first two days of racing was to qualify for either the gold or silver fleets for the finals (last three days of racing) but your score carries forward from the qualifying races with one throw out for the qualifiers and one for the finals.

The first day was light with wind about 6-8 kts. In the first race we had a good mid-fleet start and found a good lane to tack to the right. Our boat speed was not feeling good and we finished 22nd. For the second race we had another good start but got rolled by a boat shortly after the start. We were then seeking clear air and only finished 32nd. For the third race the wind was up around 10kts. We had a good start off the line and great boat speed. We were up with the leaders and doing well rounding the weather mark in 7th place. We were able to hold that position for the rest of the race. At the end of the day we were clearly in gold fleet point territory.

Racing Day #2

The second day was a miserable day with light wind and rain. We were on the water from 10:30 am until 6:30 pm with a long wait for more wind after the first race. We had finishes of 28, 19 and 17. Though the day was very frustrating we had managed to qualify for the gold fleet and were in 37th place.

Racing Day #3

The wind was up today ranging from 18 to 23 kts. We had a great first start and good upwind leg. We rounded the weather mark in top 20 and had an awesomely fast reach leg. After we set the spinnaker were going fast but had a slow boat in front of us. As we tried to pass the boat to weather we pitchpoled. Ryan flew way forward superman style into the water. I hit the dagger board really hard with my ribs and fell on the boom bending it slightly. We got the boat back up but the trapeze bungee was broken so we went in to fix it. Went back out but had missed start #2. For start 3 we were more at the leeward end of line and had a great start. Boat speed was excellent off the line. As the leaders tacked to the right we went with them. We were in top 10 at the weather mark and then had an even stronger double trap reach leg. At the reach mark we set the spinnaker. We were a little slow going downwind maybe because of the shorter trap bungee. We had another good upwind leg with good boat speed. We finished 15th so we were happy with our comeback but two DNF scores hurt a lot.

Finland Boat Pitchpole Capsizing (similar to what happened to us)

Racing Day #4

1st race was very heavy wind 20-25 kts. We had a terrible start and were buried behind boats in bad wind. It became a survival race since many boats capsized and we placed 52. For the second race also had a terrible start but wind had moderated a little. We placed 40th.

Racing Day #5 (Final Day)

When we arrived at the club there was no wind and they put up a shore postponement. Steve took the opportunity to check out the Danish medical system for his hurting ribs. The doctor confirmed no broken ribs and gave him medication to sleep better at night – all at no cost. Steve got back in time as they were lowering the postponement flag.

For the first race we had a great start to leeward end of the line but there was a general recall. For the recalled start with the black flag up I was ahead of the neighboring boats. We ended up being called over which means we had to sit out the race along with eleven other boats. When it was time to start the second race we got a good start more towards right middle of line. Pointing angle was not as good as normal. We struggled and ended up 52nd. For the last race we sailed a reasonably good race but still not pointing like normal so finished 40th. Since we had one DNF and one black flag disqualification that we could not throw out we ended poorly in 52nd place for the Championships.

The overall champion is Mischa Heemskerk from Netherlands. He was sailing the new Scorpion F18 built in Poland and also had a deck sweeper mainsail designed by Mischa like some A-Cats have been using. He claims that he can point better and there is not as much righting moment to counteract with weight with this design of sail (since more sail area is lower). He had an impressive win in the finals with seven 1st and one 2nd place which was his throw out.

The second place boat was Patrick Demesmaker from Belgium sailing a C2 who won the European Championships last year in Brest, France. It is interesting that the 4th and 5th place boats were also Scorpions. Mitch Booth from Spain switched from normally sailing a Wildcat to the Scorpion and the 5th place boat was the Greek “Red Bull” professional team that won Kiel week this year.

There was also one other team from the US our friends Brett Bingham and Trent Stewart from Utah who were sailing in their first Worlds using a 2011 Nacra Infusion borrowed from the Nacra factory. They qualified for Gold fleet and finished 57th.

Brett Bingham and Trent Stewart (the other American team) in front of their Nacra Infusion

F-18 World Championships Videos:

Go to www.YouTube.com

Search on “2017 F18 World Championships”

You will get the following six videos:

Practice Race & Opening Ceremony:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYf5wgzezWE

Regatta Day 1:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7LkVI9VVfjQ&t=33s

Regatta Day 3:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ecHpeoLa2w

Regatta Day 4:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZjm87_XqxM

Regatta Day 5:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xm_mYy1Nnuc

Nacra Championships Lake Garda Results:

After cold conditions at Copenhagen it was nice to get to warmer Lake Garda. Lake Garda is known for having strong morning winds out of the north and then strong afternoon winds out of the south. Because of this it is a great training venue because serious teams can get two good practices in each day. While we were there two US Olympic teams in Nacra-17’s were practicing with teams from Argentina and Brazil.

There were only ten F-18’s that showed up for the regatta but there was a very large fleet of 29 Nacra-15’s sailed by youths. So we still had a lot of traffic management issues with the N-15’s being on the same race course but with a separate start. They also had the F-18’s and the eight Nacra-20 Carbons start together which made having clean wind off the starting line very difficult.

Lake Garda race area before wind comes up

The first day we were the last fleet to start so we had to work ourselves through the slower boats. It was fairly windy around 18 – 20 kts. It was difficult to tell how we were placing. We had finishes of 2 – DNF – 2. For the DNF we were having problems on the boat and did not finish the race.

For the second day they changed the sequence of starts having us start first. This made it much nicer to race and we had finishes of 3 and 2.

The third day we sailed no races because the wind was so light. Because of this experience the race committee decided that we would start racing at 8:00 am on Thursday so we would take advantage of the morning northern breeze.

I was at the boat at 6:00 am to get it ready. The R/C started promptly at 8:00 in a nice 15 kts northerly breeze. For the first race we had bad wind from Nacra-20’s off the line so fell behind and finished 4th. In the second race shortly have raising the spinnaker the halyard got fouled up the mast on the jib halyard hook. I then gybed to try to clear the problem but in the process we capsized. After righting the boat we finished the race and placed 5th.

For the final race of the day we started at the committee boat end of the line and tacked out quickly to get clear wind from the Nacra-20’s. The strategy worked and we were first around the weather mark. We then held and increased our lead for the rest of the race. Also since it was the last race of the day we were the first boat back to the club to avoid the long lines to get out of the water. After the racing Ryan was interviewed by the video team!

For the final day the R/C called for another 8:00 am start. This time the northerly wind only held long enough for one race where we placed 4th. It then died so the R/C sent us in for a beach postponement until the southerly wind comes in around 1:00 pm. They send us out at noon and the wind came up strong right on schedule. The final two races are in 18-20 kts of wind and we place 4th in both races. It is enough for us to hold on to an overall 3rd place finish.

In the second race of the day while we were sailing upwind a Nacra-15 from the UK was sailing downwind under spinnaker. The teenager sailing the boat is the spitting image of Harry Potter. We had the right of way but the N-15 did not see us. I noticed him at the last minute and could not avoid a collision. It was a “T-Bone” collision with Harry Potter but luckily our starboard hull was high in the air so the N-15 went under the hull just scraping the bottom with his spinnaker pole. We almost capsized from the force of the impact. His spinnaker pole broke and then his boat got free from us. We continued the race without an impact on our score. He was able to go in and replace his spinnaker pole before the next race. He was very apologetic afterwards and will pay for our boat repairs since there was some gelcoat damage in the bow area.

End of European Tour:

Given the boat damage that I could not arrange to have repaired this year (the Nacra dealer was on vacation) we have cancelled further racing. The boat was returned to Denmark storage. Overall Ryan and I drove 6,300 miles (10,100 km) through five countries in Europe (Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Austria, Italy).

For the last two weeks Ryan went touring to Amsterdam and Paris on his own and I spent a wonderful 4-day weekend in Berlin with my daughter Emily. We walked throughout the city, climbed to the top of the Berlin Cathederal dome, visited the Sachenhausen concentration camp and the Russian-German museum where the German surrender document was signed with the Russians. We also enjoyed good German cooking every evening.

Emily climbing the German Reichstag (Parliament) Glass Dome

Ryan and I will return to the US on August 16 with Ryan going to a wedding in Chicago and I will return to San Diego.

Many thanks to Finn and Britta Kuesler who will be storing my boat for another year on their farm and who were host for us for five days while Ryan and I practiced in Sonderborg. Also many thanks to my cousin Frank Reidelhuber for storing the car and taking care of the car registration and maintenance during the off-season.

Next on the sailing schedule with be the Americas Championship in Long Beach, California. There are 39 boats registered from US, Canada and Chile and I will be racing with Matt Morris again. It will be nice not to have to drive far for this event and to be able to do practicing and preparation in San Diego!

And after this sailing is over Alida and I will be heading to Hawaii for the last half of September during her fall school break for a well deserved vacation for Alida. We will spend five days on Oahu and then seven days on a cruise ship around the islands.