Jan and I ran a 33 mile recce for our Lakeland 50 attempt last weekend and in the aftermath of that my immune system seems to have gone on strike. I have spent the past 2 days off work trying to get better but it simply hasn’t worked.

Some good has come out of all of this however. Tired of being the highest IRC rated endorsed Sunfast 3200 we could find we had our sails remeasured. The result of this was a drop of 3 dots and a new rating of 1.002. This seems more aligned we the other Sunfast 3200′s I know of.

Anyway, I am off to lay down and wish all those taking part tomorrow fair winds and a safe passage

The first of the two races, the Pattinson Cup started on Saturday in Burnham-on-Crouch and finished in West Mersea. The 2nd race, the Ralph Herring then raced back to Burnham-on-Crouch on Sunday. The early hours of Friday and today were spent doing delivery trips from/to Suffolk Yacht Harbour.

We had 3 people on board for both races, myself, Jan and Neil

The Pattinson Cup

After a reasonable start in the River Crouch the course took us out of the river and saw us beating towards the Whitaker Beacon.  Getting from Sunken Buxey  around the Whitaker Beacon saw us tack 4 times. We then bore away and headed towards Wallet Spitway. At this point we should have been paying more attention and hoisted our Code Zero but by the time it had dawned on us we did not think it was worth it. As we moved into the Wallet the wind speed gradually increased. The wind over tide made the wallet a little lumpy and our beat towards Wallet No 3 and then on towards Diffusers was slower than we would have liked; it was the only time we regretted not having enough crew to sit out on the rail.

It was then down hill all the way after Wallet No 4. We hoisted our symmetric spinnaker and grinned as NINJOD sped down the waves.

Expedition (our navigation program running on the laptop) records all the data while we sail around the course. The top true wind speed recorded was 28.4 knots and our top boat speed was 14.7 knots

We finished 3rd in class and 5th overall. We were pretty pleased with the result but all knew we could have done better. Over dinner and beer that night we agreed we would try harder the following day.

The Ralph Herring

We had a really good start; us and the higher rated Titian were first to cross the line while the some of our class (Class 2) got themselves into a bit of a pickle. By the time we had reached North Eagle we had caught up some of the Class 3 boats that had started 10 minutes before us. As we passed through the Spitway we hoisted our Code Zero and our speed increased.  Fay J, the J105 hoisted the asymmetric spinnaker and passed us but everyone else in class 2 remained behind. The fetch towards Barrow No. 3 saw us put more distance between us and those behind and we also managed to close the gap a little on Fay J. However, as we turned and headed downwind towards the finish Fay J popped their assymmetric spinnaker up again and we simply could not catch them. Our spinnaker ride home was an exciting and speedy affair.

Data out of Expedition tells us that the top wind speed for Sundays race was 22.91 knots and our top boat speed was a pleasing 12.1 knots.

We had set out to improve of the results of the day before and we managed to pull it off. We finished 2nd in class and 3rd overall. The 3 of us were exhausted after the two days racing.

Full results for both days can be found here.

We had a good start but I chose the wrong downwind sail to take us out of the River Orwell. The asymmetric spinnaker went up but I should have gone straight for our symmetric spinnaker.

Surrounded by other competitors we were forced to gybe however seconds before we did our lazy sheet fell off of the prodder and vanished under the boat. This meant that although we had gybed we could not sheet the sail in.

Things then went from bad to worse as is in the mayhem that followed I got smacked on the head by the mainsheet system during an uncontrolled gybe. The block on the fine tune had done what it always does and had got far to high (towards the boom). I really need to resolve this as its very dangerous.

By the time we had sorted all of this out and I had come off the helm for a bit to hold my head in my hands, curse and take some tablets we were dog last on the water by a long way.

Things did improve, we managed to catch some boats up and even pass a few. Our upwind performance was good, very good. Assuming we can steer clear of disasters and I start making the correct sail choices I am confident things will improve..

Jan, Neil, Tony, Phil and our new guy Ben were all on board in fresh conditions with a average wind strength of 17 knots true and a few bigger prolonged gusts.

Yesterday morning at 09:00 UTC Jan and I set off aboard NINJOD on our first proper offshore outing. Our plan was to log at least 125 nautical miles and use the trip as a) a learning experience and b) our log submission for our Triangle Qualification cruise. The Triangle race requires that all competitors have covered at least 125 nautical miles at sea aboard the yacht they intend to compete in, the yacht must be also be in the configuration one intends to race in ( i.e all equipment etc. must be on board).

The plan was to head towards the coast of Belgium, leaving the Cork sands off of Harwich to the north on our outward journey and to the south on our return. At 09:26 UTC we spoke with Thames Coast Guard and logged our passage plan. You basically explain what you are up to, where you are going and how long you are likely to be. It was the 1st time I was asked for NINJOD’s radio call sign, fortunately I had written it down as I still only remember the old one.

The wind and the boat speed rose steadily throughout Saturday morning as we sped along passing the Rough Towers and Sunk Light. By the time we were passing South Galloper the sea state was moderate and the wind speed had increased to 20knots true. We were happy reaching at speed with our sail plan as full main and our No 2 headsail.

The shipping lanes were very busy when we arrived at them. Fortunately our AIS system gave us all the information we required, it also gave the ships we were crossing at right angles with all the data they required. I chatted with a couple to confirm that they were happy with what we had planned; it all went off without a hitch.

At this point I feel I should mention how very cold (and consequently uncomfortable) we both were. The northerly breeze was biting and as fast as we had left Harwich we were looking for extra layers of clothing to put on. On top of this neither of us was feeling very good. Even before I had got on the boat I had a stomach issue and as fast as we had left the marina Jan felt a little sea sick. I note from the log that at 15:55 UTC, having laid down for a while, Jan finally succumbed and took a couple of sea sickness tablets.

At 19:00 UTC with the sun dropping we finally reached our destination, the north most point of a car park for ships off of the Belgian coast. We then turned around and began our journey home. We opted for a 2 hourly watch cycle throughout the night which worked well although I might have to question Jan’s comments in the ships log.. apparently at 21:08 UTC I was snoring..

The wind dropped as the evening progressed. At 02:01 UTC we were crawling along with a true wind speed of 3.6 knots. It was still bitterly cold and the pilot was doing the bulk of the steering so that the person on watch could sit at the hatch and try to keep a little warmer. To lift our spirits and our core temperatures Jan cooked up some pasta. The wind and sun arrived in unison and our progress towards home and warmth began to speed up again.

24 hours after starting we were tied up in our berth in Suffolk Yacht Harbor, we had travelled a little over 138 nautical miles. Looking at the stats recorded in Expedition we saw a top TWS (True Wind Speed) of 26.7 knots and a top BSP (Boat Speed) of 11.1 knots. Our top SOG (Speed Over the Ground) was 9.3 knots.

One of the last bits of kit required for me to tick all of the boxes for boat compliance for this specific event is satellite communications. By some strange coincidence yesterday NINJODs new Iridium sat phone and associated gubbins arrived.

The plan is to now enter one of the official qualification events organized this summer.

The race took us into and out of the River Stour before bouncing back n forth across the club line a couple of times and finishing. After 1.5 hours of racing we managed to place 3rd (again) on corrected time.

Full results can be found here.

It has been a tradition for some time at Haven Ports Yacht Club to race for the Pete’s Pot Trophy each year on Boxing Day. This morning Jan, Neil and I arrived at NINJOD ready to do our best.

There was an impressive 13 yachts on the start line this morning. We had a very good start, in fact I’d go as far as to say it was one of my best starts ever. We were the 2nd yacht around the 1st mark, just off the stern of Kiss (an X35) and just ahead of Cheap Thrill (a Cork 1720). We then hoisted our asymmetric spinnaker and sped off towards the 2nd mark.

We sailed a pretty good race and managed to stay at the sharp end of the fleet for most of the race. The day however was not without incident; at one point we lost a working sheet on our asymmetric, it just opened on its own. It took us a some time to sort it out.

Niggles aside we were pleasantly surprised to be told we came 3rd on corrected time, our 1st significant placing on new NINJOD and in our last race of the year. Our manoeuvres were good and it was nice to mix it up and be competitive in a predominantly fully crewed fleet.

Full results can be found here .  Well done to Roger Harvey on Dash for his impressive win.

NINJOD No 3

NINJOD No3

As we headed out of the river we managed to get some pretty good boat speeds, so much so that I thought the log might have been over reporting. I checked this by looking at our SOG (Speed Over the Ground) and was pleasantly surprised to see we were in fact going well, very well.

As we came onto the breeze and wound in our sails in John got his camera out and got busy snapping. We were enjoying ourselves and then thought we’d pop the CZ (Code Zero) up. After a bit of fiddling we unfurled the sail and watched our boat speed increase to over 10 knots.

Haven Ports Frostbite Number 3

On Sunday Jan, Neil, Will and I arrived on board for 0900 ready to prepare NINJOD for our 3rd race in the Haven Ports Yacht Club Frostbite series. We had missed the 2nd race in the series as Jan and I were busy training in the Lake District for next years Lakeland 50.

The race itself was a little frustrating. Our start wasn’t too bad but our (my) sail selection in our No 3 was the wrong choice, we should have used the larger No 2 headsail.  Knowing we had made the mistake we rounded our first mark, unfurled our Code Zero and then switched the headsails. Unfortunately the choice of Code Zero was also incorrect; we should have hoisted our Asymmetric spinnaker.

In our beat up the River Stour we made good progress and had managed to take back some of the ground we had lost in the early stages of the race. As we turned and ran downwind in the Stour we flew our symmetric spinnaker. We turned left back into the River Orwell and had planned to put our Code Zero back up however a halyard issue prevented us from doing so and consequently lost some of the ground we had reclaimed earlier.

With my poor sail selection and our halyard niggles during the race I wasn’t really expecting anything exciting in the results.  I was however pleasantly pleased to see  that after 2 hours and 13 minutes of racing we had achieved 4th position. Furthermore there was only a 1 second difference between our 4th position and 3rd position and, there was only a 39 second difference between us and 2nd place. I found this all very reassuring and  all I need to do now is get my head around the right sails to use.

Full results can be found here