J/121 wins Visbypokalen Offshore Race
by J/Boats 2 Sep 2019 05:45 PDT
Visbypokalen Offshore Race © Peter Gustafsson
Fredrik, owner of the J/121 Jolene, remarked on their recent triumph in the annual Visbypokalen Offshore Race.
"I have just concluded a 100.0nm offshore race where we sailed approximately 80.0nm in 16-24 kts TWS at a TWA of 85-120 degrees. We sailed double-headed with the J0 and the J4 headsails. Top speed 21.0 kts! It was a great ride and we won our class. I had Peter Gustafsson's Blur.se crew on board for this race, so read more about it on Blur.se!" In fact, here is Peter's article below.
"Our J/111 Blur.se was being sent to the Mediterranean so that we could do a few bucket list races, like the Rolex Middle Sea Race off Malta and around the famous rocks/ volcano's around Sicily. So, we decided early on not to race in the second half of August. But, we still wanted to get some offshore training, and had heard that Visby Town would be a nice competition.
So many parts of the team (six out of nine of our crew- Peter, Pelle, Mattias, Simon, Jens & Pär) signed on with our friend's J/121 Jolene; together with owner Fredrik we hoped to have a fun time sailing fast offshore on the amazing J/121- a flat-out reaching offshore machine!
I had sailed the boat before, from Marstrand to Falsterbo. Back then, it was a brand new boat and untested. Nevertheless, we also had many discussions with Fredrik about sail configurations and other things.
Fredrik is a great sailor, was also down with us, and drove the Tjörn Runt last year on our J/111 Blur.se.
The delivery sail down from Bullandö to Nynäs was quite tough. And, even the start was in dull weather. A number of starts were run during Friday so that all boats would come to Sandhamn at about the same time.
Just before the start, it also became clear that we would run a shorter course.
After a short passage in light winds, we headed out to sea and could go from LM Jib to J0. And then, combine the J0 with a J4 on the inner forestay. Wow, that was a fast combination. The boat is nicely configured with both of these sails on a case-lock, and 1:3 gear on the tack line.
Here you see how the three sails are in relation to each other. Many good combinations...
In addition, this was a good opportunity for us to train for speed offshore; where you often have to drive the boat against your own boat speed target numbers. It was a good opportunity to collect data on different combinations of J0, jib and J4 in TWA 70-120.
After the rounding at Gottskär, it was basically the same sailing angles back north. This time on port tack. We knew the winds would drop and rotate further aft, so we chose to go low and fast initially. We managed to get a surf up to 20.7 knots! Amazing, full control, cool sailing!
We also had a chance to practice our offshore watch schedule, although it was a short race.
We finished the race at 0237 am, a little over 11 hours of sailing. Fastest boat with full crew!
A completely free Saturday in Sandhamn is a luxury. Simon checks if it is possible to sleep in the storage compartment. Apparently, they did it on the J/121 Blue Flash that crushed their class in the 50th Transpac Race.
Big thanks to Fredrik for sailing with him on Jolene! We are happy to do that again." Thanks for contribution from Peter Gustafsson's Blur.se site.