RTIR Kite Fest!

[Greenheart]

It certainly was spectacular, and definitely a "kite fest" for those who turned the corner. I only wished I was taller than the grass.

Does anybody know if this vision of beauty was the classic Lutine, that I have admired so much at her Hamble mooring?

It was such a pleasure to see so many fine yachts making use of the light wind, I even managed to forget they were racing.

 

[laika]

the shutdowns just allowed the slower boats to catch up.

But not the 8:10 starters who didn't get to the needles before the tide turned...



Out of interest...has there ever been a stand off with two or more boats vying to win the tenacity cup?

Astute viewers of the above image will note from the position of the sun that the boat I was crewing on was not *actually* last and we were far too interested in reaching the folly for last orders to worry about a prize. Huge thanks to the folly staff who still served us food after 10 and the water taxi guy who recognising our dire need picked us up from the boat rather than making us clamber over a raft to the pontoon...

 

[flaming]

But not the 8:10 starters who didn't get to the needles before the tide turned...

Yes... Our evening plans were a BBQ with friends who started in that start at their house... We were quite relieved to hear that they'd failed to get out of Hurst so the BBQ was lit when we got in! Heaven only knows what time that BBQ would have been if they'd made it past the needles...

 

[dragonvc]

We were in ISC7 and were in the 46 finishers inISC8 only 17 finished.The last half mile to the needles was very tough after the tide changed trying to pick up anything from those doing well,I think our mistake was not getting tight enough to the needles where there was a good back eddy but not a lot of wind.After getting past the needles barely 40 boats were following annoying but we were ahead of top 10 finishers before that last half mile.Unable to set spinnaker until well into freshwater bay Then went well and wriggled through with multiple gybes at St Cats made good progress passing boats to the finish.Of the eight RTIR races completed this was the most disappointing for it all falling apart at the needles yet all the rest of the race sailed well,thank goodness we had rations on the boat for a meal and a spare gas bottle which should have been shipped ashore.Next year got to do better.

 

[Iain C]

Well that didn't work out as planned for us in the dayglo green fleet!

Our start was 0800, and even though we managed to claw our way through Hurst and up the Shingles to the Needles, we decided not to go round them...it would have been a rounding at 1430 at best. Realistically the 2200 cutoff would have been a very tough target, and we would have missed out on the whole race village/band/beer/buzz thing.

It's a shame, and I think that may possibly put the kibosh on it for next year for me. Whilst the ISC can't control the weather and the tides, they can control the start time. IMHO they really should have the fast stuff starting in foul tide in light winds to give the slow boats the maximum chance of getting around. There may be all kinds of reasons why this might not work that I can't think of right now, but I'd like to see two potential start times for the sequence, depending on whether the wind forecast is light or moderate/strong. No reason why this could not be announced during the weather briefing on the Friday night (which never went out "live" as promised anyway). The results page for the slower ISC classes makes pretty terrible reading...very low numbers of finishers for many divisions. If numbers for the faster classes are way down for 2018, what will they look like for slower classes in 2019?

Still a nice day on the water and a great sail back to Cowes with the kite up, but just not feeling the #raceforall thing to be honest!

 

[flaming]

And yet ironically it was a small boat race. The first 55, yes, 55.... In IRC overall came from group 3. I suspect they just didn't get the park ups that the earlier boats got.

And in ISC the winners came from group 8.

 

[lw395]

Many peoplehave said over the years, the start times are a gift to slower boats.
Whatever you do, the tidal will be foul around some of the course for most boats.

I think the fastest boats starting first is probably the only way, it's bad enough overtaking lots of boats which should be going faster than you, the fast boats overtaking 1000 slower boats would not be great for anyone IMHO.
Maybe they could compress the sequence a little, but getting all those boats onto the line and away can't be done with a much shorter interval, and the congestion at the Needles could be even worse than it sometimes is. In previous years, I've felt the number of numpties per acre in the starting area has been the worst thing about the race, it's a relief when the gun goes and most people are at least trying to go the same way.
I think however you fiddle with the start times, if you get significant periods of sub 10 knot breeze, somebody is in for a farce.
The major USP of the race is that it's usually different from last year, the random influence of weather and the vagaries of tide mean nobody feels they've had a bad day just because they come 512th or whatever. It's a shame that half the entrants didn't finish, but sailing on calm days can be like that.

It's not like a Bav32 is actually a small boat, look at it from the POV of a Sonata.

 

[lw395]

And yet ironically it was a small boat race. The first 55, yes, 55.... In IRC overall came from group 3. I suspect they just didn't get the park ups that the earlier boats got.

And in ISC the winners came from group 8.

Exactly.
A lot of Impalas and so forth that started at 7:30 did remarkably well.

 

[flaming]

It was a crazy slow race though. the MOD 70 went round in 8 hours 34 minutes. That's an hour and half slower than my best time in a 37 foot cruiser racer...

 

[Iain C]

I may know my onions about dinghy racing, but I'll happily admit to knowing very little about yacht racing so I'll gladly be educated by my more learned fellow forumites. I'd also agree that having the slow boats starting first would be a disaster...there's far too much muppetry in the "cruising" classes for faster boats to be able to safely or fairly make their way through those fleets. We do the same thing at my dinghy club...fast stuff starts first, although "lapping" is common sailing something like a 49er.

Whilst I appreciate that some of the best scoring boats came from the lower classes, I think there's a big difference between a stripped out purple flagged race boat and a purple flagged Centaur. And I take the point on Sonatas...although I reckon in the really light stuff they will probably sail rings around a B32 anyway up until the point the B32 gets in more breeze and powers up enough to overcome the huge weight difference.

I appreciate you won't please all of the people all of the time but the stats don't lie...just look at the proportion of the fleets that retired as you move down the classes by "speed". But I just don't see why light wind start times would not be workable...all I'm saying is leave the start sequence unchanged in terms of gaps/fleets etc, just go into sequence 90mins or so earlier if it's light breeze to give the slower boats a chance, and make the call if it's sequence A or B by 1800 on Friday so people can plan accordingly (including alcohol intake!)

I'd also re-iterate that we did get to the Needles before turning around, so I'm not thinking of this from a purely selfish point of view, but there was a vast number of boats behind us that just never made it past Hurst. Looking at all of Division 8, 160 boats entered generating approximately £20000 in revenue for the ISC, yet only 17 finished. I bet if those boats had been away at 0640 instead it would have been a very different story but people may start to vote with their feet if they are asked to pay £120 to sail from Cowes to Hurst with very little chance of completing if the wind is very light.

On the flip side, the early arrival into Cowes meant that we had the best social/partying experience by far...the band were absolutely brilliant.

 

[laika]

And in ISC the winners came from group 8.

As dragonvc noted though...only 17 boats from group 8 finished. As for those first 2, neither have any tracking info which is a shame. The winners were near us in the needles channel and from the look of them I'm not surprised they did well on the downwind. Their elapsed time was impressive but the handicap was also huge. The boat which came second though..how they managed 10:33:47 elapsed?? blimey. Then there were the rest of us. As Iain C says, there's a massive difference between a stripped down pocket rocket and the "ordinary" folk like us doing a once-a-year race in a cruising boat.

Looking at the tracking replay this morning, hard luck on "Miranda" which seemed to reach the finish just a few minutes too late.

Did anyone see a boat reversing from the needles about 13:30 BST, apparently at full speed under motor with the sails up? I wondered if they'd been holed in the bow but the crew didn't look especially concerned

 

[jac]

It's always going to be a compromise though as whilst you may get past the needles you then pile up trying to go east in the light breeze. Not so much of an issue i'll grant you but it still makes for a slow race and you have to declare a limit at some point - I think sunset is a reasonable one.

The other issue about alternative start times is that the decision of when to move it all forward will cause controversy. Taking a typical day when the wind starts gentle then builds as the day goes on, you could face the charge that the start is even more biased against the early starters struggling down with a F2 whilst the later boats get a nice F3-4 becoming solid 4-5 as they turn the corner.

I'm not sure if the start sequence could be shortened with classes starting at 5 minute intervals, not 10. It might be ok in IRC when most boats are competent and are used to starting and can be reasonably certain of clearing the line within 5 minutes. In the smaller ISC classes particularly I suspect that a 5 minute interval may leave a few class 7 back markers not far from the line when class 8 starts!

 

[lw395]

I think you have to admit that there is a huge spread of talent and experience in the RTIR.
If you look at the ISC starters from 8AM there are notable finishers in Contessas, which are not exactly lightweight modern stripped out flying machines.
First time I did RTIR, I did not do well against other boats of my OD class.
The people who walked all over me had been Solent racers for many years and done many RTIRs.
I'd done a few as a crew and crewed a few Cowes weeks, so wasn't a complete newcomer to the Western Solent.
It's a pretty special race over a very demanding course and not something a dinghy sailor can just waltz into and expect to do well.
I suspect the average crew member on the top ISCR boats has done the race half a dozen times, and that's just the cruiser class.

 

[flaming]

It's a 50 mile race.

To do that in 14 hours and finish in the time limit you have to average over 3.5 knots. On a day when the wind is light and full of holes that is always going to be a challenge in a small heavy boat.

By my quick calculations the small boats in the last start had just over 3 hours to get to the needles before the tide changed. They had between 2 and 3 knots of tide with them for most of that time, the strongest fair tide on the course and about 15 miles to run. So they needed to average about 2.5 - 3 knots through the water, in a period of time where the wind was probably the most reliable it was until the sea breeze finally kicked in about 5pm.

I think in this case it was probably a good thing that those boats did not have more time to get round the needles, as in the prevailing conditions I don't think very many of those who failed to get round the needles would have finished inside the time limit. Certainly if it's taken you more than 3 hours to get from Cowes to the Needles with a fair tide, and a strong tide at that, it's likely to take you more than 6 hours to get from the needles to Bembridge with less fair tide... So you may well end up punching tide on the South side of the island as well.

This debate is had every time there is a light wind RTI, but at the end of the day there are just plenty of small cruising boats that are not really capable of sailing 50 miles on a day where there is little wind.

 

[lw395]

This debate is had every time there is a light wind RTI, but at the end of the day there are just plenty of small cruising boats that are not really capable of sailing 50 miles on a day where there is little wind.

But there's a significant pool of talent that knows how to do well in a slow boat in RTIR.
The Bav32 is a faster boat than many that did well.

All in all, about half the boats in a 'less than completely serious' amateur yacht race finished in adverse light conditions.
Where is the problem?

 

[Iain C]

lw395 this was my 10th RTIR and I'd like to think even with what is to me a newish boat, I can get reasonable speed out of her and we do a reasonable job around the corners too. I'll fully admit to not knowing all the little tricks and secrets of the Western Solent, but we soon found some of them, albeit a bit late in places. We were studying various plotters and working to a fully marked up racing tidal atlas too, and keeping a good eye on clear wind and not getting into any pointless boat on boat battles. And as I said, we did eventually get to the Needles, so retiring was very much our decision, not something that was forced upon us because we physically could not get there unlike the bulk of Division 8.

My point is that for Division 8, if only 10% of boats finished, and as far as I am aware at no point was anyone actually becalmed in the Solent, would an earlier start have been fairer and more in keeping with the "#raceforall" mantra? What is the mark of success of the race...entries, finishers, or revenue?

 

[laika]

about 15 miles to run.

Fair calculation. If it wasn't for that pesky wind direction....

 

[flaming]

My point is that for Division 8, if only 10% of boats finished, and as far as I am aware at no point was anyone actually becalmed in the Solent, would an earlier start have been fairer and more in keeping with the "#raceforall" mantra? What is the mark of success of the race...entries, finishers, or revenue?

The mark of success is people having fun. To be honest, taking 11 hours to go round in a 37 foot C/R, and getting a pretty good (in class) result, was actually pretty close to the having fun vs enduring it border.

On a small slow boat that could have taken over 14, very hot, hours, and ended up timed out, I cannot imagine that you would still be having fun. And the needles is the point at which you are in effect committed.

At some point you just have to recognise that not all of the boats / crews who entered were actually suited to sailing round the island in those conditions.

 

[flaming]

Fair calculation. If it wasn't for that pesky wind direction....

Well yes, but you still only need to net VMG 2.5 - 3 knots through the water. If you could not do that on Saturday morning you were extremely unlikely to have got round before the time limit even if you had another hour or more to get round the needles.

 

[Iain C]

But there's a significant pool of talent that knows how to do well in a slow boat in RTIR.
The Bav32 is a faster boat than many that did well.

All in all, about half the boats in a 'less than completely serious' amateur yacht race finished in adverse light conditions.
Where is the problem?

lw395 please re-read my posts. You seem to be focusing on me, and my B32. I'll say it again. I got to the Needles. I could have gone round. I may have finished within the time limit, I may not have done. We had a discussion around the crew and decided to pop the kite, go to Cowes and party instead and had a very good weekend.

I'm giving stats on Div 8. I'm not in Div 8. I just felt very sorry for a lot of people behind me who never even made it past Hurst and didn't even have a choice to make.

I'm asking a question if the race could have been improved via a light wind start sequence. You seem to be taking a slightly elitist yacht racing stand point. If you think that if out of a fleet if 160 boats, only 17 finishing is perfectly acceptable and doesn't need a constructive debate on forum, then so be it.