Dean's Diary- ACWS - Fast and furious becomes old hat in San Francisco
by Dean Barker on 20 Aug 2012
34th America’s Cup, America’s Cup World Series San Francisco 2012 Event One, Open Training day 5 ACEA - Photo Gilles Martin-Raget
http://photo.americascup.com/
Dean Barker, Emirates Team NZ skipper and Director of www.kiwiyachting.co.nz!Kiwi_Yachting_Consultants_and_Nexus_AB, reports from San Francisco, USA from the America's Cup World Series, in which he helms Emirates Team NZ .
20 August 2012: Fast and furious becomes old hat in San Francisco
Again today the breeze was in and we spent much of our practice sailing with Artemis in wind that built from 18 knots through until the mid to high 20's. It is amazing how quickly you become accustomed to the stronger wind conditions and it makes for some exciting sailing.
Today the current was either coming in or slack for the majority of the session which resulted in much flatter water than the previous days. By the end as the breeze built so did the chop and is where life gets interesting in the 45. The boats love to put their bow into the wave in front downwind and with this you get a sudden deceleration and the boat loads up.
This is where the fun begins as you hope there is enough buoyancy in the bow to recover before the boat loads up more and continues into a pitch pole. The harder you push generally the safer you are so you are constantly reminding yourself not to back off. It really is a different form of sailing!
We are going to have a day off from sailing tomorrow and work on preparing the boat forthe racing ahead. We have official practice racing on Tuesday and then racing proper starts for us on Thursday.
All for now
Dean
To read earlier editions of Dean Barker's blog http://www.kiwiyachting.co.nz/dean-barkers-blog!click_here
If you want to link to this article then please use this URL: www.sail-world.com/101153
