The Bay Area Multihull Association has put forth an interesting challenge. The have set up a course around the bay where you can race around any time you want and as many times you want to try to get the best time around the course. You can find more information on their website at BAMA Racetrack.
Today, Andrew and I took our first stab at it on JetStream. Winds were good, in the 15 to 20 range, so we were psyched to give it a go. But early in the course we quickly discovered that the currents weren't favorable. I had the feeling this was the wrong choice for the currents but it was the only time so far we had the chance to go out so we gave it a shot anyways. It turned into a lot of upwind sailing, not the best to get the best lap time.
We started up at Blossom Rock heading north to YRA 8. That was a fun, screaming reach, with the boat topping out at 13.4 knots with only white sails. After YRA 8, we had to leave Alcatraz and Little Alcatraz to the north which resulted in a beat up to Alcatraz. We played the Alcatraz 'cone' to avoid the worse of the current and made our way to Harding. Harding was almost a beat, we maybe cracked off 10 degrees.
After Harding we had to make our way Blackaller, which meant crossing the entrance to the bay and the worse of the current. Due to the current it also turned into a beat to windward given the SW winds today.
We got around Blackaller, and finally got to set the kite. At this point we had done a lot of sailing and were looking forward to the spinnaker run. The winds lightened up a bit, but the bay was nice and flat so we played our jibe angles. A third of the way down the winds picked back up and we had a screaming run back to Blossom rock.
We'll be trying again with more favorable current conditions, which should greatly help us improve on our time across the course. This time it took us 1hr 35m 35s to get around the track. Over a 10 nm course (we sailed much more than that) we averaged 6.3 knots. We can do better. Oh, and next time we will probably have new sails as well. Will post an update when the new sails arrive.
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