Thursday, October 13, 2022

Well it has been a while since I did a blog update and a lot has happened. Nicholas and I completed the weekend pre-Worlds Regatta which was our first time sailing together. Nicholas is an excellent teammate with a lot of experience and we are getting along very well. This regatta was used to get our boat handling and team work in synch. There were 20 boats racing off and on so it was not overall a good test but we did finish in 6th place. Lars and Olin Guck who had beat me in Newport was first with the Pete and James Melvin in second. It was nice wind all three days and good preparation for us.

We are now at the end of day 2 of the World Championships. We have 63 boats racing representing 12 countries and 4 continents. We did get one race started yesterday around 3:30 but the wind died and the race was abandoned and we were sent home. Today we never hit the water due to lack of wind and thunderstorms coming through the area mid day. So tomorrow will be the beginning with a good wind forecast of mid-teens. We may sail up to five races to gain some ground so it will be a long day. Nicholas and I are looking forward to getting out on the water. This evening we have a dinner cruise with all the other competitors which should be fun.

They will also have real time race tracking available to view at: https://tractrac.com/event-page/event_20221003_FWorlds/2483

If you want to check results before I have a chance to post them here go to: https://www.f18world2022.org/results/

Saturday, September 24, 2022

I regret to announce that Steven Leuck will not be sailing with me in Florida due to a back injury. Steven had been sailing with periodic back pain during most of the summer in Europe and it got more severe during our racing in Newport. Upon his return to San Diego his doctors are saying that he has a spinal disc issue. He is undergoing therapy and further diagnosis. He will be greatly missed in Florida. Also in August Steven achieve a milestone to be the crew that has sailed the most regattas with me - 31 regattas totaling 83 race days since October 2020 surpassing Matt Morris’ record of 28 regattas.

Luckily through a referral I will be teaming with a Canadian sailor, Nicolas Tosi from Gatineau, Quebec. He is a 26 year old Nacra-17 crew who is in training to compete for Canada in the 2024 Olympics and he has also crewed on F18s. In fact, our paths crossed at the 2019 F18 North American Championships in Detroit, Michigan. He has also raced in the St Bart’s Cata Cup like myself and raced several times in Clearwater, Florida so has more experience that I for that location. He is about the same weight as Steven so our boat set up should be the same as for our previous regattas. We will be meeting in Clearwater on Wed, Oct 5th and will have five days to practice and sail the Worlds warm-up regatta before embarking on the world champions which are from October 12 - 16.

Monday, September 12, 2022

During my R&R period in upstate New York I was invited to sail with Brennon Blodgett in a long running catamaran regatta at his home club on Lake Canandaigua, one of the Finger Lakes, in western New York not far from Rochester. Brennon is a member of Mission Bay Yacht Club and owned a F18 which he recently sold since he is deploying overseas with the US Marine Corp in October. This is his final at-home leave before deploying. This was a handicap regatta with ourselves as the only F18, several Hobie 16’s and Hobie 14’s and a good fleet of Shark catamarans. On Saturday we started out great with a first place but then in the lighter wind struggled with finishes of 5-6-9. We were the fastest rank boat on handicap so had to beat all the other boats by several minutes to win. On Sunday the wind was stronger which we enjoyed and came on strong with finishes of 1-1-2 and ended up winning the regatta by only 1 point over a Hobie 14.

Monday, September 5, 2022

Steven is now back in San Diego and I am at my daughter’s house in upstate New York. We have a month until the next races start in Clearwater, Florida for some R&R (rest & recreation). I will head back to San Diego for nine days in the second half of the month. Our next races are the Clearwater Red Gear Racing regatta on Oct 8-10 and then the World Championships in Clearwater October 12-16.

Below we are posting the best pictures from the USMHC in Newport. You can view all the pictures and a write-up of the regatta by going to:

https://www.ussailing.org/competition/championships/2022-u-s-multihull-championship/

and clicking on the Photos and Final Report.

Sunday, August 28, 2022

Just want to share the final results below. Will post pictures and more in a few days.

Saturday, August 27, 2022

For the third day of the Alter Cup we had different conditions from the previous two days making it totally different racing. Today we raced on Narragansett Bay again north of the Newport bridge. The Northerly wind started at around 9 kts and kept declining during the three races that were held. There was also an extremely strong tidal current of at least one knot that was perpendicular to the starting line which made it very difficult to start. Also it was extremely favored to sail to the left side of the course up wind so there were few chances to take advantage of wind shifts to pass boats. During the third race the wind was dieing so the race committee shortened the course and finished us after completing one lap instead of the normal two laps. Because they thought it would be a long time before the sea breeze came up the cancelled further racing for the day.

We had a more difficult day with finishes of 6-5-6 but are still in the lead by three points but that could all change tomorrow. The race committee discovered that they had made a mistake in the Sailing Instructions (SI) stating that there is only one throw-out race. The Notice of Race (NOR) stated that there are two throw-outs so the SI’s were amended today to provide for a second throw-out race once we have completed 12 races. At this point we have completed 11 races so the throw-out is not yet applied. If we complete one race tomorrow it will juggle the scores around a lot.

The weather forecast for is very light but from the east to southeast so it will be more similar to Thursday’s racing. We will start promptly at 11:00 but no races may start after 3:00 pm. We can have a maximum of four more races. See today’s accumulated results below.

Friday, August 26, 2022

On the second day of the Alter Cup we sailed in the ocean with stronger wind but not as strong as predicted. The first three races were in wind 10 to 14 kts and the final race was 15-16 kts. There were a lot of choppy waves so to keep the boat moving was tough. Tomorrow the wind forecast is very light (under 5 kts) which is our class minimum wind to race so it is possible that we could have no races or only a few. If the wind comes up we are scheduled for 4 races tomorrow. See the total results below now with one throw-out applied (the race in parenthesis). There is only one throw-out for this regatta.

Thursday, August 25, 2022

First day of the United States Multihull Championships (also called Alter Cup) were light to moderate wind (8-11 kts) with four races sailed on Naragansett Bay. There are 19 competitors including three former USMHC Champions who are currently in 2nd, 3rd and 4th place. We had a good day but there are three more days of hard racing with 11 more races. Tomorrow’s wind forecast is windy with 15-20 kts but then Sat and Sunday are very light winds. There will be one throw out race for the series of 15 races so a lot will change once the first throw out race is incorporated into the results tomorrow. See our results below.

Monday, August 22, 2022

We have just completed our first regatta back in the US in Newport, Rhode Island. It was the New England 100 race which consisted of two long distance races over two days. On Saturday the race was 35 nautical miles and on Sunday 25 nm. But, in order to sail the course due to many tacks and jibes the distance sailed is much longer. One of the competitors tracked sailing 96 nm over the two days. Newport is a very historic and scenic location and it was great to sail by old forts and huge mansions along the coast. Saturday the wind started out light but by mid afternoon there was a strong thermal breeze in the mid-teens so it was very fun sailing. There are also strong currents around Narraganset Bay which had to be factored in to the tactical decisions on where to sail. There were a tremendous number of lead changes with many opportunities to pass boats and be passed due to the different geographic winds and current. On Saturday we finished in 5th place but were a little disappointed because in the beginning of the race we were in 3rd place for a while. Todd Riccardi was in first place. Three local sailors who knew the course very well were 1, 3 and 4th. Charles Froeb and Matthieu Marfaing, the other California sailors present whose boat came out on my trailer, would have placed 2nd but they missed knowing where the finish line was and sailed to the wrong location. By the time they figured it out and sailed to the finish line they had 16 minutes added to their time which is a huge handicap in a raid regatta where scoring is by total finish time. Though this location was not as challenging for navigation as other raids that we have done there were several rock hazards and at least two boats had damaged daggerboards after the weekend - one on Saturday and one boat on Sunday. Again, Steven did a great job navigating with Navionics charts on our iPhones though the phone once shut down due to overheating and another time was hard to operate due to water on the case.

On Sunday it was a shorter course but the wind also was much lighter with the thermal breeze never developing. Again it was very tactical to find the better wind pressure and angles. Also on the return trip down Narraganset Bay everyone had to make a strategic decision on whether to sail east or west of the large island (Gould Island) in the middle of the bay. Before the racing many of the locals had said that there is better wind on the western side of the bay. We had a great down wind start for this race and felt we were doing well but by the time we got to the first mark we were shown how difficult this race would be because many boats jibed after the start and came into the mark ahead of us. Then the first part of the downwind leg we were out of sync with the wind shifts and fell to the back of the fleet with only a few boats behind us. Then we started to figure out when to jibe and slowly worked our way near the front of the fleet by the time we turned the furthest mark to head back to Newport. Then it was upwind sailing where we had better boat speed. Steven was again doing a great job looking for the wind and the best sailing angles as we moved up and started passing boats. Through this process we ended up going east of the island and as we started to approach the finish line we saw few boats around us and wondered were everyone was. Had they already finished or were they behind us? We had a battle with Mike Easton going to the finish with him finishing about a 1.5 minutes ahead of us (he had finished behind us on Saturday). We still had no idea how we did until we arrived at the beach and saw only 4 boats there ahead of us. Turned out we finished in 5th again but three of the boats in the top five from Saturday had gone to the west of the Gould Island where there was little wind and they finished much later than those who sailed to the east of the island. Charles Froeb had another excellent race finishing in 2nd place. If they had not missed the finish line on Saturday they would have won the regatta. Finals results are 1st place Lars Guck and son Olin, former Alter Cup Champion and two locals who sailed an excellent event, Skip Whyte who was in 7th place on Saturday but sailed to the front of the fleet on Sunday was 2nd place. Skip is the winningest US Olympic Sailing coach in US history. In third place was Mike Easton, several times F18 national champion and US Olympic sailing squad member. We were in 4th place only 18 seconds behind Mike on total elapsed time.

We now have three lay days until the US Multihull Championships start on Thursday. It will be four days of racing through Sunday with 20 boats competing for the Alter Cup trophy. It will be intense with many excellent sailors present. Currently the weather forecast for this period is no rain but lighter winds. Hopefully the thermal breeze develops all or some of the days.

Monday, August 15, 2022

The final regatta of our Europe leg is now complete with 10 regattas in 5 countries, 34 race days, 89 races, 243 competitors, and 11,000 miles (17,500 KM) behind us. From May to August we sailed against all of the best F18 sailors in the world all around Europe. It was a great experience and we learned a ton. We are driving back to Steve’s cousin’s house reminiscing about our favorite towns we visited and which regattas were the most fun. It is not over yet though because we still have the New England 100 and US Sailing Alter Cup in Newport, RI.  

Movenstein regatta was our final event of the summer in Europe. It was a two day regatta with 13 boats on the starting line. The first day was delayed due to the race committee not having their marks ready on time. Once we started we completed 4 races over 5 hours due to other fleets on the same course taking much longer to finish. The regatta had A Class catamarans, F18s, Musto Skiffs, and International 14s. After the first day we were in second behind Sven and Jesse Lindstaedt and 1 point ahead of Daniel Paysen who beat us in the Scharbeutz regatta earlier in the summer.  The second day was also delayed even though we had plenty of wind to sail. Once we started we battled back and forth with Daniel but he ended up besting us by 1 point.  We learned what we could have done better and where we could have improved which is important for our upcoming regattas in Newport. During the award ceremony we received a signed F18 flag from the Movenstein F18 fleet as a thank you to Steve for supporting F18s and being such a great competitor so often in Travemunde having raced there nine times since 2015. A picture of us racing was placed on an advertisement poster for an upcoming regatta so they gave us a copy of that as well.

We fly to New York on Wednesday and then drive to Newport, Rhode Island on Friday for the next regatta.  The New England 100 is a raid type event with other catamarans participating but we will have our own start as a class. The US Sailing Multihull Championships for the Alter Cup is equivalent to the F18 nationals this year and is put on by US Sailing every year in a different type of catamaran. Our next blog update will be after the New England 100 race is completed.

Friday, August 12, 2022

We have now done practice sails for the past two days in Travemunde. We have had nice 11 knot sea breezes which is more than we expected. Unfortunately we had a mishap yesterday when returning to the launch ramp by breaking our starboard rudder. Luckily the local Nacra dealer has a replacement we can purchase. We are preparing for our final regatta in Europe before flying back to the US next Wednesday. This will be a small regatta with 14 boats registered including one from Poland. The weather forecast for the weekend is light wind but hopefully the sea breeze will come up to provide good racing.

See new pictures posted below for the Costarmoricaine Raid.

Monday, August 8, 2022

We have now completed the Costarmoricaine Raid.  It will be hard to describe everything that happened over a very eventful five days.  Let me get to the bottom line first – we finished 3rd out of nine F18s (there were fewer boats than expected).  Two F16 Vipers also competed in a separate class.  We sailed 188 miles in 18 hours 30 minutes and 1 second.  Though there were five races this regatta is scored by adding your sailing time for all five races.  We finished only 9 seconds behind the 2nd place boat – Arthur Boc-Ho from France who was the Costarmoricaine champion in 2019 and 29 minutes 38 seconds behind the first place boat – Nicolas Touchot from France who won the regatta by a good margin but we almost beat him on the fourth day of the regatta.

The first day was very light wind and hot.  Luckily the wind improved as the day went on but it was a constant battle to get to the most wind pressure.  Just before the finish we managed to get ahead of the 2nd place boat in a lot of current which was sweeping us both into a mark.  About five boats all finished very close together after racing about 29 nautical miles.  We were at the Island de Brehat just of the coast.  The island is very beautiful with no cars allowed.  Our campsite was about 1.5 kilometers from the boat storage so we walked through out the island.  We had the typical late French dinner at 8:00 pm.  The food provided on this raid was awesome with a full French dinner each evening and a continental breakfast every morning.

The second day the race was much longer and led us into the open English Channel where the waves were much larger and the breeze was stronger. We rounded a huge lighthouse and some rocks and sailed 9 miles toward another island that we raced two laps around. The current and wind were very difficult to read and created some exciting battles. Once we finished the second day we met the mayor of the town Perros-Guirec who was a huge supporter of the regatta. We also received a souvenir picture book for being firstcomers to this city via the Costarmoraciane raid.  We then camped next to our boats on the beach.

The third day was forecast to be the windiest for the regatta.  The race organizers were worried about two of the less experienced boats and recommended they not sail that day for safety reasons.  Some of the teams were nervous about going out.  It turned out that even though it was fairly windy at 15-20 kts the big issue was the huge waves and they came from several directions and some even formed pyramid like peaks.  The waves were due to the wind going against the very strong tidal currents.  We had a difficult time in the waves but did well.  We finished 2nd but there was no finish line set up.  There was a race committee boat in the area so they estimated our finish time along with the other boats.  There were two issues which caused the race committee to not be on station.  First was the Austrian boat hit a rock very hard with their daggerboard which broke.  It also jammed the daggerboard into the hull so they could not pull it out.  After a short while they realized that the one hull was filling with water and the boat was at risk of sinking so they found a sandy beach to sail the boat onto.  So the RC was helping them.  Also because of the steep waves the RC boat could only drive about 7 knots while we were race at 12 to 18 kts.  This was also the longest race at 41 miles and the RC had clocked our speed at one point at 21 kts.  We all were super tired at the end of this day and set up camp in the public park overlooking the beach in Saint-Quay-Portrieux.

For some of the days the RC has the option to pick a shorter or longer race course.  For the fourth day they polled the fleet and almost everyone wanted the shorter race course except Steven of course.  So we had a 31 mile race instead of a 39 mile race.  And one other point is when we give the distance of a race that is a straight line going from each of the required race way points.  The actual distance we sail can be much more due to upwind tacking and downwind jibing adding 25-40% to the distance.  This was a beautiful sailing day we call “Champaign sailing”.  Good wind 13-16 kts, sunny skies and good competition.  One amazing thing about this regatta was how often there were position changes among the fleet.  You could never get complacent with a good lead because around the next corner there was something that mixed things up.  On this day we ended back at Erquy so it was nice to be able to access the trailer and car with all our gear.  We slept again in tents near the beach.

The final day was the shortest distance at 27 miles.  It was another champaign sailing day with 11-14 kts.  There were a couple of places on the race course where the current interaction with the wind waves caused a washing machine effect with very rough seas but these areas were short distances and not as severed as on Friday.  We knew we needed to beat Arthur Bo Hoc or be very close to him at the finish to win second place so we focused on him.  For the first half of the race which was upwind the lead went back and forth a few times but we were generally faster and in front.  At the half way mark we rounded in front but he was close behind.  At one point he jibed to go toward the shore and we did not cover expecting the stronger favorable current to be further off-shore.  Then about 5-10 minutes later when we jibed towards the shore we found he had passed us.  He was having good downwind boat speed but right near the finish he and another boat had some unfavorable wind shifts and we were able to catch a lot up to them.  We almost caught up enough shy of nine seconds.  The coastal scenery on the final day was most incredible with lighthouses and the Latte Fort castle right on the coast that we sailed by.  But most of the time we had to be focusing on the waves and wind to keep driving the boats.

This is one of the classic F18 raids that has been going on for 30 years.  Steven and I are super glad that we were able to experience it and we had the best weather that Brittany can provide with five days of sun, no rain and warm temperatures. We are now going back to Travemünde Germany for our final European regatta. Then we fly to Newport for another raid and the US Multihull Championships for the Alter Cup trophy.

Wednesday, August 2, 2022

We have now arrived at Erquy, France for our next regatta and the boat is all set up ready to go. It is a five day raid (long distance races) along the coast of Brittany on the English Channel. There are 11-12 F18s and two F16 Vipers signed up from the USA, Austria, Belgium, and France. The Austrian boat is the same team that won the Murter Raid in Croatia in May which was our first regatta in Europe this summer. Similar to the Stockholm Archipeligo Raid we are racing to different locations every night. Our first stop is on an island off the coast and the other 4 stops will be in towns along the Normandy coast. The area is notable for its incredible tidal fluctuations of up to 14 meters (42 feet).

We are required to have all of our safety equipment on the boat including flares, signaling mirrors, VHF radio, paddle  and navigation tools. We will be navigating using the same Naviaonics iphone charts application that we used for Stockholm and Croatia’s raids. The navigation for this event should be easier than for the Stockholm raid.  Each day of racing is between 30-50 nautical miles with a couple different courses that the race committee can decide between based on the forecasted wind.  The winner is determined by adding the elapsed time it took us to sail the course each day and whoever has the shortest time is the winner.  This means that if you have a big lead one day it is very helpful for your overall standing.  The race starts on Wednesday at 11:00 and we race through Sunday.  As of now the weather forecast is perfect with every day having wind 10 – 20 kts.

The regatta organizers will be providing breakfast and dinner every day so we are only responsible for our lunch. We will be sleeping in a 3 person tent placed on top of the F18 trampoline every night so we are hoping for no rain and soft sandy beaches. This means that we will not be posting updates until Sunday night after the end of the event.  The race organizers transport our camping gear and spare parts from location to location using vans.

Saturday, July 30, 2022

We had two hours of shore postponement before we were sent out to sail five races. They increased the number of races today because it is forecast to have very poor wind on Sunday and we may not have enough wind at all to race. The wind was a little lighter than Friday and we were sailing well in the shifty wind. We had many little battles with boats during the races and had finishes of 4-1-3-3-4 so moved into third place only 3 points behind Mikko from Finland. We hope we can sail two races on Sunday to try to eliminate that gap.

Friday, July 29, 2022

See below for the results after two days of racing with eight races completed at the Travemunde Week. We have 19 boats racing from four countries (Germany, Denmark, Finland, USA). The first day we had a shore postponement for three hours waiting for the wind to develop but it finally came in at a nice 8 to 12 knots. Our first race started around 3:30 pm and we did not finish racing until 6:30 pm so it was a late day. It is nice to have a venue that is all about the racing no matter what time of the day. The race officers attitude was: we have wind in the late afternoon and it is light until after 9:00 pm so we will get the four scheduled races completed. We did well with finishes of 3-4-1-1 and were in first place at the end of the first day.

For the second day the wind was already up in the morning so we started on time at 11:00. The wind kept building up to about 14 kts but the waves were bigger so it seemed like a stronger wind. Overall our boat speed was good in the stronger wind but we struggled with going the right way and tactical situations with other boats so had finishes of 4-6-4-5 which dropped us to fourth place overall. We expect to get four races tomorrow but on Sunday the wind forecast is very light so we might not have any races at all. Tomorrow evening the German club is holding a BBQ for the F18 racers.

Monday, July 25, 2022

We are now driving toward Travemunde for our next regatta which starts on Thursday.  It will be a four day event with about 19 boats registered and will be part of the Travemunde Week festival which attracts millions of visitors to the seaside suburb of Lübeck, Germany.  In the meantime we have finished our non-sailing recreation period with a two night visit to Munich.  Steve’s cousin Arnold gave us a great tour around the city which Steven loved.  Steven could not specify what he liked the most but I believe it was the surfing wave on the river through the English Gardens.  We also got a tour of the 1972 Munich Olympic stadium just outside the city.  This was Germany’s second Olympics where they created a huge Olympic village that is still lived in by individuals.  The Olympics were also the driver to build the Munich subway system.  The sailing for both German Olympics were sailed in Keil. Then we went to Zweibrucken for two nights to clean up the cat box where we store all the sailing gear, get our clothes washed and enjoy two good dinners with Frank.  It was very hot in Zweibrucken but we are glad that it is cooling off now that we are heading north.  In ZW we also got all our gear together to be ready for the Raid Regatta in France where we will be camping and sleeping on the boats on the beach.  We checked our 3-person tent out and it fits perfectly on the trampoline of the boat so we should sleep well providing it does not rain.  We are very excited to start sailing again and finish out the Europe section of the summer over the next three weeks.

During Travemunde Week results should be on-line at:  https://www.manage2sail.com/en-US/event/a61ed22e-c817-459a-8a58-9188a8098163#!/

 Saturday, July 16, 2022

The past couple of days have been relaxing lay days for us as we are in-between events. The itinerary for our off time is Croatia, Italy, then Germany. We had to come down and have our vacation within vacation in Croatia because of European Visa requirements. The first city we stopped in was called Zadar, just north of where we sailed the Murter Raid in May. We got to do some nice hikes and saw Murter from the top of a nearby mountain which gave a cool perspective on where we had sailed. One of the days in Zadar we rented a powerboat and explored the islands in the area. There were some super cool military tunnels that the boat could fit into as well as a sunken ship that was just under the surface. The sunken ship was super cool to dive down and look at given the insane clarity of the water. We then took the scenic road to the next Croatian city named Jadranovo. It is a very small beach town. Even though it is small in size, it packs a ton of tourists into its small beach coastline with tons of boat rentals and swimming in the area. We explored the coves and nearby islands by foot today and plan on renting a power boat to explore by water tomorrow. After this we go to Trieste for a couple days then back to Lake Garda to pick up the F18. We will stop by Munich shortly then go back to Zweibrucken for two days before heading to the next regatta at Travemunde, Germany on the Baltic Sea. We are very much looking forward to that event.

Friday, July 8, 2022

Today was the last day of the European Championships which started early with an 8:30am start. Overall it was a very unusual Lake Garda day with a decent morning breeze which died after the first race and had us waiting on the water for almost 4 hours. The first race we had a great start and good upwind tactics and rounded the entire first lap in the top 10. Then we lost a large group of boats on the final reach leg and downwind by missing a small breeze line. The finish was unfortunately not recorded because we were UFD (over the starting line too early) for the first time this summer and were disqualified. After the end of the first race we went into postponement until the time limit of the day which was 3:30pm. We placed 31st overall out of 88 boats.

Overall it was a great regatta for learning and having this many competitive boats to race against is always the best practice. We identified some improvement points in our sailing and are looking forward to the next event at Travemunde, Lubeck, Germany July 28 - 31.

In first place was Ravi Parent and Severin Gramm from the USA sailing a Nacra Evolution (same as our boat). They sailed a great regatta winning by a small margin after the only race today. For the first time in F18 class history for European Championships the Stars Spangled Banner was played as the winner was announced. In second place were Brett Burvill & Max Puttman from Australia sailing a Windrush. Brett is the owner of the Windrush company ad Max is the owner of the New Generation sailmaking company. They battled adversity with the current supply chain problems. Their new Windrush boats that were supposed to be used for this regatta are sitting in a shipping container in the port of Trieste, Italy and will be delivered next Monday. So they borrowed a Windrush boat from one of their customer’s in the UK and raced it in this event. Third place was Patrick Demesmaeker and Gilles Tas the top placing European team and former European Champions in 2016 sailing a Goodall Akurra. The finishes by type of boat are:

1 Nacra Evolution, 2 Windrush, 3 Goodall Akurra, 4 Nacra Evolution, 5 Exploder Scorpion, 6 Exploder Scorpion, 7 Nacra Evolution so there was good representation by all the top builders of F18s.

Thursday, July 7, 2022

The first day of the finals for the Europeans was standard Lake Garda weather. Wind shifting to the south promptly around noon and building rapidly to 18 kts plus. We started on time again and were racing against most of the 44 best F18 racers in the World. The race course was very congested because everyone was so good speed wise that we did not get the gaps between boats that we had in the qualifier series. The formula for success was to race to the cliffs on the right and then tack to the first weather mark. We sailed four races today with three of the races consisting of three laps. Steven was dead tired by the end of the day. In race two we capsized while rounding the last mark shortly before the finish but we righted the boat and still finished the race in 36th place. Overall our scores were 26-36-27-22. There were many capsizes during the races. In one race there were several boats converging on the right leeward gate and one boat capsized with its mast hitting another boat. We managed to go around the mess. The top three boats (Australia, USA and Belgium) are all within 2 points. I believe this regatta will come down to the last race tomorrow to determine the champion. They have announced that racing starts at 8:30 tomorrow morning in the northerly wind so it will be a totally different day from today with three or maybe four races. So off to bed and we will provide an update tomorrow.

Wednesday, July 6, 2022

The final day for the qualifying series was almost a typical Lake Garda wind day but it did not get as windy as we expected. The wind ranged from 8 to 14 kts. For this day of racing we were seeded in the “Blue” fleet so had a different set of boats to race against and the races started on time - unusual for Italy. In the first race we sailed very well and placed 8th. In the second race we did even better getting to the first weather mark fighting with Mitch Booth (ast year’s world champion) for the lead. We ended up third in that race. For the final race of the day we had another good start but our mainsheet got jammed right after the start. By the time we fixed the problem we were in last place a good distance behind the fleet. We got going again and had good boat speed up wind and worked our way around large groups of boats downwind. It was a long battled but we managed to move to a 21st finish out of 44 boats. At the end of the day we were scored 27th out of the 88 boats so we are in the “Gold” fleet for the finals. Our scores carry forward so our task will be to move up in the rankings during the final races. Since this was the second time we had a problem with the mainsheet jamming we are replacing it with a different line that we know cannot jam so that we do not have that problem again. We hope to have 3-4 races today and 3 races tomorrow. Ravi Parent/Severin Gramm also from the USA had a great day with finishes of 1-2-2 so he is currently in first place overall followed by Patrick Demesmaeker from Belgium and Mitch Booth from Australia. The other USA team Charles Froeb is also in Gold fleet placing 41st.

Tuesday, July 5, 2022

Monday evening a tremendous thunderstorm blew threw the sailing club. Thank goodness we tied our boat down well but one boat was not tied down so it went flying through the air and landed on its mast which bent it and hit another boat’s spinnaker pole guy line and broke it.

We rose at 5:30 in great anticipation for the start of the first races of the European Championships. We arrived at our boat with sky barely light to get the boat ready to launch for an 8:30 start. We have to wait for permission from the race committee to go on the lake (for safety reasons) and they did not raise the delta flag until 8:00. All boats were not launched until 9:15 so we had a while waiting on the cold lake with the wind continuing to build from the north. By the time they started the first race it was over 20 kts. Three races proceeded very orderly with the wind decreasing each race a little but it was great racing . We had very satisfactory finishes with 14-15-14 out of 44 boats. They then started the fourth race where it was obvious the wind was decreasing and had high potential to shift 180 degrees to the south. We completed two legs and were in about the same position as the previous races but then the wind shifted and the boats behind had a big advantage. We dropped to finish 36th in that race but the race is being protested by other competitors so we will hear tomorrow the results. During the racing there were a couple high speed crashes between boats including someone’s brand new Akurra getting run into and crushing the hull. Tomorrow we return to a normal starting time of 1:00 with hopefully a good southerly wind to complete 3 or 4 races for the qualifying series.

Monday, July 4, 2022

We officially have 88 boats entered into the European Championships. On Sunday our boat was weighed and we were 180.3 kg only .3 kg over the minimum required weight so we are happy. Steve and I weighed in at 157 kg (345 lbs) crew weight 7 kg over the minimum which is a very good weight for this regatta. Today was supposed to be the first day of racing but we first had thunderstorms in the area so they postponed racing. Then they decided to send us out but shortly after about 20 boats were on the water the wind became very strong over 25 kts and boats were capsizing so they told everyone to go back to shore. About an hour later they decided to cancel racing for the day. Now they have scheduled the first start for 8:30 tomorrow morning so we have to get up at 5:30 to be ready on time.

After measurement we took the day off of sailing and explored the surrounding scenery. We drove over to Campione which is further south of where we are currently. In previous years Steve has sailed out of Campione and knew about a cool waterfall hike near the sailing club. It was beautiful with a nice shaded path to a very cold natural river. The waterfalls were nice to swim under and the cold water was very refreshing in the hot Italian sun. After the hike, we walked in the opening ceremony with 13 other countries and they announced the official start to the regatta and gave some speeches.

Today for the fourth of July we went for “America” hamburgers at a restaurant close to our apartment with one of the other American teams.

Friday, July 1, 2022

It has been a hectic past two days also with nice social events in the evening so sorry for no blog updates. The German nationals have just finished after 3 days of racing. The final day of racing on Thursday was the first real Lake Garda day in terms of how the wind is supposed to be here. We had every condition possible over the last 3 days including thunderstorms with 30 knot squalls, races abandoned due to no wind, sunny and 20 knots, and races where it was very shifty and difficult to sail. The event was a practice regatta for a lot of teams leading up to the European Championships so it was a very competitive regatta. We had a lot of minor boat issues throughout the event which caused us to lose only a couple boats but it was good to figure out the problems during the smaller of the two regattas. On Wednesday we had finishes of 5-13-16 and on Thursday finishes of 16-16-15 in the stronger wind. Overall we finished 16th.

There were several protests including situations where some boats did not sail the proper course by rounding the off-set (reach) mark. The marks of the course on Lake Garda are all robots (called bots) because the lake is over 350 meters (1,000 feet) deep and it is difficult to anchor conventional buoys. The bots maintain their position using GPS signals and a small electric motor. Sometimes the bots will fail or will have a hard time maintaining their position in high wind and waves. In those cases a race committee boat takes over and flies a “M” flag indicating the boat is not the mark of the course. This confused some people and they failed to round the mark resulting in racing a shorter distance. Some boats voluntarily dropped out once they realized their mistake and others had to be protested and were disqualified.

The event was won by a French team Cedric Bader, followed by Mitch Booth tied on points. In third was Allan Norregaard from Finland then Ravi Parent USA in fourth and Brett Burvill from Australia in fifth. Of the top five boats there were two Nacra Evolutions (1,4); two Scorpions (2,3) and a Windrush (5) showing that the top boat manufacturers were all very competitive. The top two German boats were the Sach Brothers in 6th place sailing a Goodall Akurra and Manuel & Fabian Wunderle in 7th place sailing a Nacra Evolution.

We should have about 90 boats for the Europeans compared to 37 for the German Championships. Due to the large number of competitors we will be divided into two fleets. The first two days will be the qualifiers to determine who makes the “Gold” top tier fleet with the remainder of the boats in the “Silver” fleet. Wednesday through Friday will be the finals with the Gold and Silver fleets. The next couple of days will consist of weighing the boat, fixing a couple small things, and getting mentally ready to deal with a 45 boat fleet of F18s.

Tuesday, June 28, 2022

Today was the first day of racing for the German Championships. It was a very weird weather day - not the typical Lake Garda. First we had a shore postponement of the scheduled 1:00 start because the wind had not yet shifted from the north to the south and the race committee was not sure it would shift. Also there were thunderstorms in the area that they wanted to make sure we were not caught in. Finally around 1:40 they said to go out and be ready for a start at 2:45. We were the first boat to get into the water and went for a sail towards the starting area. The wind kept building to over twenty knots. Since we had a lot of time we sailed up the course towards the cliffs on the west side of the lake. When we got close to the cliffs the wind was extremely strong I estimate close to 30 kts. When they got ready to start I told Steven this was more of a survival race to get around the course. We were late to the start line but at the favored end and had a clear lane to head to the left. Our boat speed was good with all the settings to the max for heavy wind. I decided to favor the left side of the course instead of the typical going into the cliffs which most of the fleet did. We had a big shift left shift so when we tacked to go to the weather mark we looked very good. We ended up rounding the weather mark in second place and held our position downwind but boats were catching up to us. On the second up wind leg we were more than half way up the course and looking to be in the top three boats when the race committee canceled the race. I am not sure why. Even though the wind had died down at that point there was enough wind to race but maybe they saw the wind shifting back to the north. The wind did then shift to the north so they had to set a whole new race course. When they started the second race we ended up going to the wrong sides of the course and were doing poorly but the wind was very heavy including thunder and lightening in the distance. At one point it rained extremely hard on us. There were at least three capsizes that we saw and one boat’s mast fell over. There were at least two broken spinnaker poles. We finished 19th in that race. Just after we crossed the finish line I noticed that my mainsheet was not working correctly. I could not ease the sheet to let the sail go out which is very dangerous in those conditions and can easily lead to a capsize. We examined the block and found one of the lines had jumped the sheave and was jammed between two sheaves. We tried to fix it on the water but could not so I decided that we needed to sail back to the dock and miss the last race of the day which was scored DNC - Did Not Compete. Eventually once we have sailed five races this score will be excluded. A French team is currently in first place and Ravi Parent from USA is in second place with finished of 2-3.

Tomorrow we have a 1:00 start again with more thunderstorms possible each day this week.

Here is the link to the regatta website where results should be posted if you want to check before I can update this blog:

https://www.circolovelaarco.it/regate-lago-di-garda-2022/deutsche-f18-klassenmeisterschaft Go look at the Notice Board where the results get posted.

Below are the results for the top 12 boats from today.

Sunday, June 26, 2022

We have now had five great days to practice on Lake Garda. The wind has been its typical style coming up around noon from the south and building to the teens and one day over 20 knots. We have been practicing our heavy wind maneuvers and feel ready for the two championships. The trampoline is fixed and everything is working well in the boat. Today we sailed against many boats and tomorrow there we be even more boats sailing but we will go out only for a short practice. The German Championships starts on Tuesday. The format is three days of racing with 3 races per day and a maximum of nine races for the regatta. There are 36 boats registered so it will be larger than the Italian Championships and much more competitive. Many boats are using this as a practice race for the European Championships so we have representatives from 13 countries with 10 German boats, France 6, Australia 4, Argentina 3, Sweden 3, Italy 2, USA 2, and Austria, Estonia, Great Britain, Switzerland and Chile all with one boat. The caliber of the non-German fleet is very high so it is unlikely that a German boat will win this regatta and they may not even be on the podium but one German team - the Sach Brothers could be contenders.

Below are some pictures I found on-line of us at the Italian Championships last week.

Wednesday, June 22, 2022

The last couple days have been prep for the upcoming events; the German National Championships and the European National Championships. On Monday, Steven Leuck singlehanded the F18 from Brenzone to Arco in the northern part of Lake Garda. It started out very light, but picked up to be a great ride toward the north end hitting almost 15 knots. During the Italian Nationals we noticed some wear on the trampoline of the boat as well as some wear on the rigging of the boat. Because of these issues, we had to take the trampoline completely off of the boat and bring it to a sail repair shop nearby. We went to a rigging shop in Riva Del Garda to get a new mainsheet, new spinnaker sheets, and some other miscellaneous lines. Today, we spent the morning putting the boat all back together in-between rain showers. With a couple delays in getting the new lines, we missed the morning wind and the afternoon wind was almost zero, so we did not get to sail. Tomorrow we will start practicing for the German Nationals with a morning sail possible. With the Europeans coming up 3 days after the finish of the German Nationals, it is more of a training event to make sure everything is dialed in, works properly, and that we are feeling fast and healthy. The European Nationals will be the largest event we have sailed together with almost 90 boats registered. It will be a great test of our ability sailing against some of the best sailors in the world. We will also be joined by two other American boats - Ravi Parent from Florida and Charles Froeb from San Francisco.

Sunday, June 19, 2022

Today’s Lake Garda wind was even more normal getting up to 14 kts. We had a start at 12:30 and two relatively windy races and they increased the course to three laps which provides more opportunities to gain and also lose if you go the wrong way. The first race was very tough for us being on the wrong side of the course for several wind shifts so we finished 13th but turns out they have a second throw-out race. In the final race we finally got the correct side of a wind shift on the third leg up the course and finished in 4th place. There was a lot of changes in places. Our Finish friends were in 2nd place overall yesterday and dropped to 6th place. We dropped one more place to end up in 8th place. Overall it was good practice for us to get ready for the German Championships in a week followed by the European Championships. Tomorrow Steven will sail the boat to the northern Lake Garda club for the next two events helped by the Finish team’s crew while I drive the trailer and beach wheels to meet them. Hopefully the next couple events are classic Lake Garda winds and we can get some fast laps in on the boat. Overall a successful weekend with a lot learned that we will apply to the coming regattas.

Saturday, June 18, 2022

Today the Lake Garda breeze turned on from the south like clockwork around noon and built as the afternoon progressed. The wind was still very shifty direction wise and changed in velocity from 8 to 13 kts but due to the good wind they decided to run four races. The starting line was very difficult because it was too short so everyone had to fight for a good start. We had two general recalls followed by black flag starts where anyone over the line is automatically disqualified. One dramatic moment happened in the last race on the downwind leg when we were on a collision course with an Italian port tack back. We were on starboard tack so had the right of way. The Italian boat successfully avoided hitting us but in the process lost control and capsized. At times we did very well once being in third for half the race and top five but the trickiness of the wind resulted in finishes of 8-7-10-7. At this point one race is discarded so that is our 10th place finish. We are in 7th place overall but only 10 points behind 2nd place so a lot could happen tomorrow when two races will be run in the afternoon.

Friday, June 17. 2022

As predicted the first day was very light wind but we did manage to complete three races though in two of the races they shortened the course from four legs to three. The first race did not start until around 2:30 so there was a lot of waiting in the hot sun. Steven and I sailed almost a perfect race for the first race of the day. We were the second boat around the first weather mark and then passed the leader on the downwind leg to lead for the rest of the race with a considerable margin. It is nice to start a regatta with a solid first. The next two races we had some missed calls and finished 8th and 7th. We were surprised when we found out we are in 2nd place overall but it is still very early in this regatta and anything can happen especially with lighter wind. There are three races scheduled for tomorrow at 12:30 but most likely we won’t be able to race until 2:00. Hopefully there is some proper Lake Garda breeze in our future. Even though all of the races were light wind today, we are pleased with our light air performance and have come a long way since we started sailing the Nacra Evolution.

If you want to check on-line results go to: https://www.racingrulesofsailing.org/documents/4316/event It is all in Italian but you can probably figure out which link is the results. They post results after each race.

Thursday, June 16, 2022

We are now at Brezone sul Garda on Lake Garda for the Italian National Championships. We had a nice practice sail yesterday but the wind was lighter than normal for Lake Garda. Today we could not sail at all because of lack of wind. Also the forecast for the next three days is not so good so we shall see. It is supposed to be a three day regatta with 29 boat entered. Besides many Italians there are also three boats from Germany, one from Finland and USA (us), The Italian team that practiced with us in Greece is also here with a brand new Scorpion so it is nice meeting old friends. We helped out a German team who broke their spinnaker pole at the regatta in Italy by bringing a new pole to them from the northern German boat dealer. Due to the current supply chain shipping problems their quote to ship the pole to Munich was 700 Euros but the German dealer knew we were going to Lake Garda and could easily take the pole with us on the trailer.

Sunday, June 12, 2022

The second day of the regatta brought on more wind. The wind was again very shifty and changed velocity a lot varying from 5 kts to 19 kts. Shortly after the start of the third race we were doubled trapezing when all of a sudden the wind died and we both got T-bagged into the water and nearly capsized the boat to weather. That set us back and in that race we placed third. The other highlight of the day was when the predicted rain came which caused the wind to die. It was not only raining but had large pieces of hail so we had ice falling on our boat. The last race of the day was a shortened course due to the wind shutting off so we were then sent back to the harbor. We were lucky that we were able to get the boat derigged and all the gear stored in the cat box relatively dry before the thunderstorms arrived. On Sunday we sailed six races and had five firsts and one third. The goal of coming to Denmark this weekend was for some solid training against other quick boats and the regatta delivered just that. The conditions here were super tricky and tactical which forced us to focus more on communication and boat handling. Overall we learned from this weekend, which was the goal, and will have some new tricks in store for the next month on Lake Garda.

Saturday, June 11, 2022

We just completed our first day of the Copenhagen regatta held at Skovshoved Sejlklub in Charlottelund. This was a small regatta with four F18s, seven A-Cats and four Waspz (a foiling boat similar to a Moth). As expected the wind was extremely shift and Steven had a lot of fun figuring out the best places to sail with about an 80% accuracy rate. Also the wind velocity changed a lot from 7 kts up to 13 kts. The race committee was committed to running as many races as possible so we completed eight races in one day with each race averaging about 1/2 hour or less. The final race ended up being the final race because the wind shifted 180 degrees which frustrated Jan & Penny since they were in the lead and the shift enabled us to catch them. Overall we had a good day with results of 1-1-2-1-1-1-2-1 Penny and Jan are in second place. We are expecting more wind tomorrow and 6-7 races to be sailed.

Wednesday, June 8, 2022

Our Danish friends Jan & Penny told us about a regatta in Copenhagen this coming weekend.  Since the regatta we had scheduled to attend in Lindau, Germany was cancelled we checked to see if we can make it happen.  It will be a small regatta but in a new venue where I have not sailed before and we want to support the small but dedicated Danish F18 fleet.  It will be a two day event Saturday and Sunday.  The weather forecast is for rain both days (typical for Denmark) but nice wind 8 – 18 kts.  Results should be posted at:  https://portal.manage2sail.com/sailor/event/7ea5b380-b7ce-4e06-abf6-e561e180882b

We will also have a chance to visit our former exchange student Henrik Kuesler and his family on Friday.

Monday, June 6, 2022

When we arrive at the beach the wind was from the south-south-west at 8 to 24 kts.  With the wind from this direction it was a whole new ball game.  The wind is coming off the land so it is very shifty with dramatic changes in wind strength in flat water.  The first race was very windy and we had great boat speed getting around the course in second place behind Sven.  In the second race we were back a little more and then fouled the second place boat on a spinnaker run so did a 360 degree penalty turn on the first lap.  We had two laps to catch up and managed to finish in 6th place.  The final race was similar conditions with more extreme shifts.  Steven was calling the puffs and where to sail perfectly and we rounded the first weather mark in 1st place.  We then had five more legs to hold off the competition with Sven coming close several times but at the final weather mark we rounded significantly in front and had a great spinnaker run to our first 1st place finish of this European season.  So we ended the regatta on a high note and Steven loved calling the tactics with the shifty wind.  We maintained our overall position and were awarded 3rd place trophies for this event.

From the crew perspective:

Going into the final day of a regatta you always have certain competitive thoughts going through your head about how to beat the boat in front of you, as well as not lose the boat behind you. Today was one of those days where everything worked out nicely. We sailed the boat to our full ability with minimal errors and went the correct direction on the race course which always feels good. Overall this regatta was a great experience for us to learn and improve but also gave us the confidence moving forward in the summer that we can beat the top of the fleet. Super excited for what is to come in the near future.

Sunday, June 5, 2022

The first two races today were with moderate 8-10 kts of wind and the final two races were heavy wind 13-18kts.  We were very consistent with finishes of 4-4-4-3 and remain in 3rd place but only four points ahead of the fourth place boat.  We expect three races tomorrow with another 10:30 start.  There are seven boats that are from another sailing club (Movenstein in Travemunde) who decided to sail their boats over every morning and return in the evening.  The sail averages about 1.5 hours so these folks are having very long days on the water.

Saturday, June 4, 2022

Today we sailed the first of three days in the Scharbeutz regatta.  We were expecting very light wind but were pleased to get a respectable 8-11 kts of wind.  There are two starts in this regatta with F18 and a few other spinnaker catamarans starting first and then Dart 18 ft catamarans starting second.  The Darts can be sailed either singlehanded without a jib or doublehanded with a jib.  We had 16 F18s in the spinnaker division and about 21 boats in the Dart division.  Our good friends Jan and Penny from Denmark are also here so we are the only two non-German boats racing.

The first race was the lightest and the left side paid off in the northerly breeze.  We went over to the right sooner than a number of boats so lost out and finished 6th.   In the second race the wind picked up a little and our boat speed was very good both upwind and downwind.  We finished 3rd.  The third race was very similar wind wise and we rounded the first weather mark (of three laps) in first place with excellent boat speed using the new 1D mainsail and jib.  But on the final leeward mark rounding I made a mistake and we lost two boats and finished in 3rd again.  On the final race it was only two laps with lighter wind and a lot of choppy waves we finished third again.  Overall Sven Lindstat and his son Jesse are in 1st with 5 points also sailing an Nacra Evolution.  2nd Place is Daniel Paysen with 9 points and we follow with 15 points.  We may still get another 7 races sailed so it is still early in this regatta.

Tuesday, May 31, 2022

Sunday, May 29, 2022

When we arrived at the sailing club the wind was blowing strong offshore. They had set 11:00 as the time for the first start but we were not sure if the wind would still be blowing then because the forecast was for light wind with the off-shore wind fighting the thermal on-shore wind. Luckily the off-shore wind was still holding and we started the first race shortly after 11:00. It was twice around. On the first lap we were in about 6th place but then for the second lap we went to the right side of the course expecting a wind shift which happened so at the second windward mark we were in third place which we held to the finish. There had been a number of boats over the starting line for that race and even though two boats finished in front of us one was disqualified so we placed 2nd. We then had about an hour postponement while the two winds were battling but about 1:00 the thermal wind came in strong continuing to build. In the second race of the day we placed 4th having very good boat speed in about 14 kts of wind. For the third race of the day the wind built even a little more to about 15-16 kts so it was an exciting race. With more wind the race committee decided on sailing us on three laps which was good for us. At the first windward mark we were in 6th place. At the second windward mark we were in 3rd place and by the final windward mark we were in first place having good boat speed and Steven calling excellent tactics. But an error of not protecting our inside lane to enable us to jibe when we wanted to caused us to sail to far to the right and then three boats passed us on the way to the finish. That was a big disappointment and a hard learned lesson (again) but we were very happy that our boat was going so fast. This was the most fun and windy day so far on our European trip this summer. Overall we placed 4th just off the podium only 4 points behind the winner. Also if we had held our first place position in the last race we would have won the regatta on a tie breaker. So per Kostas’ training in Greece we are learning from our mistakes.

Tomorrow we hit the road to start driving to our next event in Scharbeutz, Northern Germany. It will be a three day regatta next Sat through Monday.

Saturday, May 28, 2022

The first day of racing at the Italian regatta in Calabrone was a disappointment with very light wind. First they postponed the start until 2:00 pm due to lack of wind. Then we did start a race but the wind was between 4 and 7 knots. We started relatively well but then went the wrong way a couple of times and had a very poor finish. We then had about an hour postponement waiting for more wind. They finally started the race and we had a good start second boat from the leeward end of the line. We were one of the most left boats and were doing very well (but going slowly) towards the first windward mark. When we were about 200 meters from the mark and looking like we would be in third place they cancelled the race. Then we “won” the most important race of the day back to the beach being third to land. This means we get to the showers, bar and can relax sooner. We have a total of 21 boats which is a very good turnout and I am impressed with how many younger sailors there are . Tomorrow’s forecast is also for light wind so we will see.

Thursday, May 26, 2022

We spent last night in a small Italian village north of Bologna and had a great pizza dinner.  Today we are driving to Calambrone on the Mediterranean coast close to Pisa for our next regatta which will be Saturday and Sunday.  We will be sailing out of a sport village called Oasi del Mar (Oasis of the Sea). 

Wednesday, May 25, 2022

Now an overview of our adventurous drive going through fsix different Balkan countries with a boat.  From the challenges of getting through customs with so many questions about the boat to dealing with corrupt police pulling us over to get a bribe (called coffee money).  When we entered Greece which is an EU country when I said that we are going to “sail” the boat in Greece they thought I had said to “sell” the boat in Greece which got them very excited about boat value and other issues.  Once I got them to understand we were going to “race” the boat and then take it back to Italy there was no problem and they immediately let us through.  When we were at the clinic Danny said it would be best for us to take the ferry to Italy to avoid driving through the Balkans again.  I agreed but once we started to check into ferries found that they were totally booked for trucks (and we take the space of a truck) to June.  So another adventure to drive north through North Macedonia and Serbia.  We have just crossed the border back into Croatia so we got through these two countries with minor difficulties.  We did get pulled over in North Macedonia by two police officers attempting another shakedown but I now was more familiar with the routine.  One officer once he saw we were American went back to the police car not wanting to shake us down but the other one persisted with working towards asking for a bribe saying it was going to be a 250 Euro ticket.  But as I kept talking to him about racing all around Europe representing America with the boat he lost enthusiasm and said we could go.

One of the biggest issues when traveling with the boat is finding a place with parking.  We slept last night in a small town in Serbia close to the border.  It had a perfect courtyard for parking the boat and we had a plain but comfortable room for 28 Euros ($29).  We were the only people at the hotel so had our pick of room by the very friendly owner.  We went for a walk to explore the neighborhood and when we returned we found the hotel owner washing our car which was very dirty and definitely needed it.  What great hospitality!

Monday, May 23, 2022

First before talking about the clinic I want to mention that today is my father, Don Stroebel’s 90th birthday!  He is one of the biggest fan’s of this blog and follows every update.  Happy Birthday Dad!

Now for some information on the clinic which we completed today.  The clinic was run by Kostas Trigonis and Danny Paschalides who are sponsored by Red Bull and whose race resume is very long including F18 World Champions, F18 European Champions, Tornado World Champions (3 times) and Olympics for Greece in Tornados.  A Tornado is a racing catamaran used in the Olympics for several decades that is very similar to a F18 but larger.  There was one other team at the clinic from Palermo, Italy who have just purchased a new Scorpion F18 so were there to learn details on sailing that type of F18. 

The wind did not come up until 2:00 pm or later each day so we spent a few hours each day in chalk talks and hearing about their philosophies toward racing and how to continuously learn from your errors.  They also went thoroughly over our boat making recommendations for improvement.  When we went on the water we did straight line boat speed drills with the Italian boat both upwind and downwind.  Danny was in the rib power boat yelling at us about improvements.  For three of the days Kostas sailed another F18 with a local crew who is very good so we could have three boat races.  For the four days that we sailed the wind was lighter (5 to 10 kts) than we were expecting.  It was probably good for us since Steven and I do not do as well in lighter wind.  On the last day we had one session where the wind increased to over 20 kts for about ½ hour which was challenging but a lot of fun.  Overall we were sailing very fast beating Kostas and the Italian boat in a lot of the races.  Half the days we sailed with the new 1D sails that we bought in Hungary and half the days with our Nacra Performance sails.  Doing a clinic like this can be very humbling because Danny and Kostas were very good at noticing every mistake we made and pointing them out to us.  The clinic also significantly improved our teamwork and gave us confidence that we have a lot of boat speed and just need to work on applying the winning formula that Kostas and Danny taught us.  Their key focus is either win the race or know why you did not and then apply that lesson learned to work towards winning the next race.

Tuesday, May 17, 2022

Because of the early finish on Sunday we were able to pack the boat for the road before dinner. Monday morning we headed south on our next journey to take the boat to Thessaloniki, Greece to train with the former F18 World Champions for four days. First we crossed into Bosnia & Herzegovina to transit to Montenegro where we spent the night. Today we crossed into Albania where we are spending two nights before heading into Greece on Thursday. Bosnia and Montenegro were major challenges due to small roads and customs bureacracy to bring a boat into those countries. At times I was not sure that we would not be turned back at a border but we have made it through. Albania has been more accommodating and appears to have progressed significantly since being under a severe communist dictatorship which ended in 1991.

Sunday, May 15, 2002

In the morning the wind was the same as we experienced on Friday so were expecting a similar day. The race committee announced that we would probably do only one race with no races to start after 1:30 pm. We had a prompt noon start with about 8 knots of wind. We had a good start towards the leeward end of the line and good boat speed. We were prevented from tacking to the right but that turned out to be advantageous. We tacked on the port tack lay line to the windward mark which had to be rounded to starboard. We managed to round the mark first with several boats length lead and immediately set our spinnaker. It was a tight reach and the wind picked up a little so it was an exciting spinnaker run. The next challenge was to find the correct time to lower the spinnaker to head up into a narrow channel to get out to the open water. Steve was focusing on the Navionics charts on the iPhone (while trimming the spinnaker from the trapeze). He called the spinnaker drop perfectly and we headed upwind towards the narrow channel. We managed to extend our lead when we entered the channel but we had to be careful not to hit any rocks or shallow water. We had to tack a few time and had our dagger boards up higher than we normally would have done. It was nice having a good lead here so we could just focus on not hitting anything. Once we go out of the channel we continued to the next mark which was an island. During this period we extended our lead but then the wind started to die significantly. With where we were it made sense to keep going straight more to the right side of the course and we were going from wind puff to wind puff. We noticed that the boats behind has very getting lifted and able to sail more to the left side of the course which made us nervous. Steven did an excellent job of calling the tactics to sail towards areas of more wind pressure. When we finally crossed the fleet our lead had decreased but we were still in the lead. We then rounded the next island and set our spinnaker. The wind now was stronger and we were moving fast again with the spinnaker towards the last island to round to port. We noticed the Italian boat was next behind us and moving very fast. Right as we were rounding the last island they passed us and stayed in front for the short distance to the finish line. We were disappointed to be passed so late in the race but very happy with the second place finish. The race committee indicated to go back to the harbor where we found that we had successfully moved into third place overall. The Austrian team that won the regatta sailed very smart and had good boat speed placing 3rd in the final race. The Italian team were last year’s champions and proved that they had exceptional boat speed. Raid type regattas with long distance races have their own character and challenges. Knowing the waters is key and I believe it would be hard to win a raid regatta sailing in that area for the first time. The top two boats had sailed this regatta last year so maybe I need to return next year to try again?

Saturday, May 14, 2002

Today started out with the off-shore Bora wind blowing pretty strong in the morning. The locals said that was not a good sign because this wind would battle the normal sea breeze (similar to a Santa Ana in California). They were correct because by the time we started the first race around 12:30 the wind was very light. We did a port tack start on the very favored end of the starting line but in the process with battling with a Croatian boat to keep them from getting room at the mark we were over the starting line by about one second so we had to return to start again. This put as back in the fleet but we managed to catch up by the first weather mark we rounded in sixth place. The wind was very light and shifty. We almost made it into the front pack of boats but then entered some areas where there was no wind. End result was that we finished after the 30 minute time lime for finishing after the first boat so were scored Did-Not-Finish (DNF). Because the first race took so long they skipped doing race 2 and went straight to the race 3 course but this was very confusing because we were in a different starting area. We had a good start in good wind (about 10 kts) and were the second boat around the weather mark with a starboard rounding. We raised the spinnaker and headed east right after the first place Austrian boat. We figured to follow them that they surely knew what where to sail. The wind increase to 13-14 kts and we had a double trapeze spinnaker run that was a blast. We were holding fairly even with the Austrian boat when we noticed that the Croatian boats were going much further south but we decided to stay with the Austrian boat. So when we rounded the island we were in the second half of the fleet and a little later the wind started to die. End result was that we finished in 10th place beating the time limit by only one minute. The Austrian boat finished 9th and is still in first place overall. We have dropped to fourth place but the results will change a lot once we have a sixth race which is when a drop-out race is applied to the scoring. Last year’s champion Italian boat had a good day and moved into 2nd and the French Cirrus R2 moved into third. Wind forecast for tomorrow is very similar so we will see what happens.

Friday, May 13, 2022

Today was the first day of the 7th Murter Challenge Regatta. The first race was delayed by about 30 minutes because of boats being late to the start line, but once the racing got underway it was close and competitive. Sailing through the islands of Croatia was incredibly beautiful as well as tactical and strategic the entire day. We only saw between 5-10 knots of wind, but had a ton of fun on all of the races. Three races were scheduled for the day, all long distance navigation races, and with different starting points around the Adriatic. The first race was a a long reach to the end of an island then a reach back on the other side. We ended up 2nd in that race with the top positions changing many times. The second race was across the channel to the islands in the distance. We had a good start and for the first part of the upwind crossing were were amongst the top three boats. But about half way across the other boats were sailing must faster than us and we dropped to 9th place as were entered the island area. As we raced up wind through a long windy channel where the wind funneled through, Steven did an awesome job of calling the tactics and before we knew it we were in second place by a good lead. We then rounded a small rocky island and set our spinnaker to the finish line were we held our position. Due to light winds, the last race was mostly downwind and got cut short in the end. We finished 4th in that race. After the finish we still had about 8 miles to get back to port and ended up being towed for half of it.

We have not seen official results but believe that we are in 2nd place with 8 points. The leader is a boat from Austria with finishes of 1-3-1 so have 5 points. Tomorrow is forecasted for light winds, but we will find out .

Thursday, May 12, 2022

Today we headed out for our first sail in Europe this year. We departed the beach about 12:30 with 8 knots of wind with crystal clear water and warm blue skys. The Navionics was working well and we found the water depth not nearly as treacherous as the Swedish Archipelago last year but we had an unusual problem that did not occur last year because of the air temperature in Sweden. Here our iPhone which is in a black water proof case started to over heat and shut down. Steven had to splash cold water on it to cool it down. Later in the day it was not an issue once it was windier and air cooled. We had an very fun experience as we were sailing towards the open water. A large 50 foot power boat passed us close by doing about 15+ knots throwing up a huge surf like wake. We got into his wake and were able to ride the wave for 10-15 minutes doing the his same speed. He finally slowed down so we lost the surf wave. And Steven thought there are no surfing options in Croatia. The rest of the sail was fun and we tuned for a while with an Austrian boat. We got back to the beach around 3:00 pm without any problems with the boat so we are ready to go for tomorrow.

This evening we had the skippers meeting to inform us about the racing to come. We have seventeen boats that will race representing seven countries: Croatia, Austria, France, Germany, Italy (including the defending champions from last year), Switzerland and USA. The plan is to have three long distance race legs each day, wind permitting with a total distance of about 40 nautical miles. In the event that a long distance race is not feasible they will run traditional windward/leeward buoy races but their desire is to do the long distance race. Each day the races will be different and we will be informed of the race course at a 9:30 meeting. Tomorrow the first race starts at noon. We are excited to start racing tomorrow.

Wednesday, May 11, 2022

A lot has happened the last six days. After picking Steven up at Frankfurt we had a good drive part way to Denmark and then arrived in Demark Friday afternoon to get our boat. We had a wonderful meal in Sonderborg with the Kuesler family, the first time since before Covid. On Saturday morning we departed with the boat for a long drive to Croatia. We took four days stopping in Leipzig Germany, Brno Czech Republic, Balatonfuzfo Hungary and Zahgreb Croatia. Today we rigged the boat and are almost ready for our first test sail of the boat since last year. There are already four other boats here with everyone else arriving tomorrow (Thursday). Tomorrow we have the skipper’s meeting when they will tell us about the courses since long distance races are involved. We have three race days (Friday through Sunday) with eighteen boats entered (the maximum allowed). This evening we downloaded the Navionics charts for the Adriatic Sea to our iPhones so we can practice using them tomorrow.

Thursday, May 5, 2022

My wife and I completed our cross-country trip in six days traveling 2,900 miles (4,600 km) to our daughter’s home near Poughkeepsie. After a nice weekend with our daughter and two grandkids my wife and I left to drive to Detroit Michigan another 650 miles. I was dropped off at the Detroit airport to catch my flight to Germany and my wife proceeded to her Michigan cottage on Lake Huron. I am now in Germany and will pick up Steve Leuck at the Frankfurt airport in a few hours. We will then start our drive north to pick up the boat in Denmark. On Saturday morning we will start our drive towards Croatia.

Saturday, April 23, 2022

My wife and I have started our cross the USA trip to pre-position two F18s near Newport, Rhode Island for the US Multihull Championships so they are ready as soon as we return from Europe in August. Two days of driving have taken us close to the Texas border and already about 1/3 of the way to our destination in New York. Today we visited my brother and his wife for a few hours near Albuquerque, New Mexico. I was worried because we had high winds along our route through Arizona and New Mexico but fortunately they were from the west giving us a good tail wind so the rig handled well. A special bonus from this tail wind was my gas mileage was about 2 gals per mile better than previous trips with the pushing action of the wind.

 Sunday, March 26, 2022

Steven and my last warm-up regatta together before departing for Europe was on South San Diego Bay with good 8 - 12 kts of wind and flat water. On Saturday our upwind boat speed was a little off the pace but by moving mast rake back on Sunday our boat speed was improved. James Orkins and Michael Risoer sailed a very good regatta so took first and we followed with second place. I still have one more regatta in San Diego that I will sail with Cole Baker since Steven will be in Chicago coaching high school students for a month. Then I depart for Germany on May 2nd and Steven will follow me there three days later.