Back on the Blog !

Oops over a year since the last blog post, I hate sites that don't get regularly updated but due to an immensely busy working and sailing year I have fallen foul of that here so anyone still lurking sorry and I will do my best to rectify that for the coming season !

Our f18 2011 review -

Highs-

Texel week - as ever, great event windy as hell and we had a great start in the TDO actually leading the regatta for the first day after posting a 3rd and 1st against the worlds best.
The main race we survived basically as it was up there as the hardest one I've done and coupled with the fact we finished 11th overall from 500odd starters not too shabby a result either !
Nacra Mk1 world champion on a borrowed boat (thanks Nacra uk) with Charles who normally helms was another highlight of our week.

Ecpr -
Back on the shocker and again performing well in the light stuff, main race lead boat for most of the way out and lead F18 most of the way back until bradwell.
Her indoors winning the colne point race in her Dart 15, absolutely stunning well done sandy !!!

Grafham-
Winning 2 races back to back on the new boat straight out of the box.

f18 euros in gran canaria
The tracking, awesome for reviewing all those decisions - http://www.tractrac.com/index.php?page=eventpage&id=190
Leading the fleet for 90% of race 3 and although dropping to 3rd at the line a great race again against the worlds best.
Surfing the rollers downwind at the event was great fun and it helps having a proper surfing crew on the boat , Tom was basically sailing it himself and we were absolutely smoking !

Lows-
Texel-
After leading on day 1 having a nightmare on day 2 after some stupid errors and a lot of swimming!

Ecpr-
The end of the race for us just after bradwell, after making numerous correct calls all the way out and back 1 wrong decision lost us the race.

Grafham -
Not sailing related but some twats vandalised club property again and ruined it for everyone next year as the event for fast cats has been canned.

Gran canaria-
After posting "that" 3rd getting ashore to find we had been black flagged doh !!!!!
Race 6 another bfd after finishing 8th, why are the black flags always on good races.


We had a challenging year with the shockwave and while we were super competitive in the light stuff the Achilles heel came back to bite us when the breeze was up and after much contemplation we moved on to a new nacra mk2 , the choice as to what new boat was challenging in itself, the f18 class is constantly developing and there are always new boats coming out (cirrus r, phantom) or existing ones being updated (Nacra mk2, Ahpc C2, wildcat), we looked at all the options and felt we needed an all rounder as our results just need to be consistent which is why the choice fell to Nacra early impressions are good but 2012 will prove the test.

Shameless Plug !!!!

Tons of Cat related gear for sale here - please help make some room in my Garage / Trailer Box / Sail Loft !!!!

http://www.northropsails.com/id71.html

GC all done and a win for Mitch.

Not many races completed but a tough last day for William and Oli drops them to 3rd overall a shame as they started so well, Grant gets a second overall with stand in crew after normal crew Robby Jon breaks his wrist the day before the reggatta but Mitch comes thorugh to steal the win.
Results -

1	AUS 285	MITCH BOOTH/MIGUEL PEREZ		6	4	1	1
2	GBR 1263	GRAND PIGGOTT/REA NIES		8	2	3	3
3	AUS 501	WILLIAN SUNNUCHS/OLI EGAN		12	1	2	9
4	GBR 22	STUART GUMMER/RYAN CRAWFORD		23	3	8	12
5	GER 183	JENS UWETONNE/MAXIMILIAN SAID		31	11	7	13
6	NOR 3	HANS-ULRIK GRÜNERT/EIRIK GRUDAL		40	6	12	22
7	GER 273	ROBERT SCHÜTZ/SEBASTIAN KLÄMER		41	7	16	17
8	NED 146	JORDEN VEENMAN/FRAK DE WAARD		42	10	DPG	11
9	NED 10	JOHN MORET/DANNY RADELAAR		43	5	17	20
10	BEL 888	CHRIS SPROA T/LEWIS CRAWFORD		48	DNC	5	2

Gran Canaria - Good start for the British F18 contingent !!

Well the lucky gits who are sunning them selves out in Las Palmas are doing us proud so far, Brits 1st,2nd and 3rd after the first day lets hope they keep it up !!!

Photos and Results  - http://www.rcngc.com/rcngc/webs_eventos/plantilla/index.php?idi=es&cod=sem_olimpica10

JW (Top F18 Sailor) report on his C class Experience - Ta Jon

During the cat open at Weston in early November, I was lucky enough to get a ride on the c class which you will be aware has a single wing instead of a sail.

The wind was around 12 knots with the usual Weston gusts. Paul helmed for the first part and we set off upwind straight away. Getting the camber and the twist right on the wing seemed weird initially, but it all started making some sense after 10 minutes or so. As crew I was playing the camber upwind which is comparable to the cunningham on a soft sailed cat. The speed of the thing was immediately apparent and the

PUTTING THE “C” IN THE WESTON CAT OPEN 2010

Full unedited account of Pauls Experiences sailing the C Class at weston, good write up Paul lets hope to see you at more of our events next year, id say the ECPR and Forts race weekends would give the boat a chance to show its true potential - Bring it on  !!!

Report  From Paul,

Photo from Helen Darvelid  

sent in From Carl @ NacraUK

Last weekend, we finally got to line our C-class INVICTUS up against perhaps the fastest beach cats in the world at the Weston Catamaran Open.

For us it was a chance to do some good racing, show the boat to an enthusiastic audience and get a measure of her performance against the state of the art of the soft sailed competition. It may well have been the first time that a winged craft had raced in UK waters(correct me if I’m wrong). We had a mixed bag of results for one reason or another but overall we came away pretty happy with what had been achieved. Weston did a great job and the event was a pleasure to attend.

We had a few little jobs to attend to before the racing began such as fitting one of our old 2004 dagger boards to make up for the one we lost in Newport RI during the last LAC. We rigged up the boat on Friday with a very bleak forecast suggesting winds of over 30 knots during the day. It didn’t look too bad out on Southampton water but there was a sense that
 there was wind out ‘there’ somewhere. We held back a bit not really wanting to test our luck... but still got as close to sailing as we could before making the final decision. We watched a small but quality fleet go out to race which included Will Sunnucks on his Texel winning Marstrom  M20 which has been souped up

 with a wider than normal beam and a bigger rig. Also out there were some F-18’s, Tornado Sports and even Phil Cotton’s Seacart 30 which  had been invited to play. We

C Class Pics - Enjoy