A panel discussion before Charleston Race Week 2024

[00:00:09] Hello everybody and welcome to Sailfaster. Today's episode was actually recorded a couple of weeks ago in

[00:00:15] Charleston the day before the start of Charleston Race Week

[00:00:18] And I'm really grateful to our friend Sarah Charle Colarusso of Pirate Princess Racing Team fame

[00:00:24] For pulling together a panel of top Charleston sailors at Ashley Yachts

[00:00:28] And that panel included top J70 sailor and coach Madeline Gill Baldridge

[00:00:33] Multi-time Charleston Race Week winner John Bowden, Chris McDonald the co-owner of Melges 32 gear team and

[00:00:40] VX1 expert Jack Jorgensen who was in from California

[00:00:44] I think you'll find it's a great discussion about how to sail faster in Charleston harbour with all its different current streams as

[00:00:50] Well as some you know more great insights into sail and boat handling

[00:00:55] However, I must say the sound quality is not great

[00:00:58] I do apologize for that the recording space was a little more echoey than I thought it would be

[00:01:03] But I do hope you can you can bear with it doesn't spoil things too much by the way

[00:01:08] We have exceeded 10,000 downloads for the sail faster podcast

[00:01:12] So despite all my ums and ours and my dumb questions

[00:01:15] We seem to be creating some compelling content for racing sailors

[00:01:18] Thanks to the great guests that I've been able to have on the series

[00:01:21] Thank you to everybody for listening

[00:01:23] Of course and to those who've emailed me or texted me or shouted over the dock with suggestions for

[00:01:29] Future episodes. I love that

[00:01:30] I'm so glad so many of you are getting some value out of it and thanks to Ray wolf who encouraged me to

[00:01:36] Kick off this series in the first play back to today's episode from Charleston again apologies for the dodgy sound quality

[00:01:53] Hello everybody and welcome to a special edition of sail faster the podcast for those who

[00:01:59] Obsess about sailing faster than anybody else in the race course. We're in Ashley yachts, which is the

[00:02:06] I'm told it's just about all this brokerage in South Carolina

[00:02:09] Ashley yachts has been on the waterfront in downtown Charleston for over 45 years

[00:02:16] So very well established yacht brokerage here represents quality brokerage boats

[00:02:21] Works with buyers and sellers. They're also the southeastern

[00:02:24] representatives of ex yachts Baltic Tofanoe and

[00:02:27] Dragonfly trim around so this is a place to come to when you're looking for any of those or any other boat store

[00:02:33] And you want to go to great Williamson here at Ashley. Thank you for letting us have your office

[00:02:39] I know you're here to make sure that we don't steal anything

[00:02:44] You're very welcome

[00:02:47] Great, thank you great also with me is I'm really upset. I've got my co-host Sarah shell color is so

[00:02:54] So glad to have you here Sarah we we heard from you and the Pirates

[00:02:58] Princess racing team a few weeks ago, which is still I think on most downloaded podcasts

[00:03:03] So you guys must have a lot of friends because it had thousands of thousands of downloads

[00:03:15] So we've got a whole room full of Charleston race week experts here

[00:03:18] So

[00:03:24] We've gathered together a few folks

[00:03:27] Great sailors from the Charleston area and beyond to represent some of our bigger fleets here Charleston race week

[00:03:34] we have

[00:03:35] pretty

[00:03:37] dynamic group

[00:03:39] It's out there in Charleston harbour side that'd be pretty fun to get the perspectives of everybody

[00:03:43] So we'll start off with some introductions first

[00:03:49] The most important sales on lucky dog

[00:03:52] Defending champion how many years have you guys won?

[00:03:56] Yeah, we this we've won it four times in a row. So we're going for number five here lucky number five

[00:04:04] And what are you doing professionally our sales loft here in Charleston

[00:04:08] Been doing that for a few years a lot of professional silver racing

[00:04:13] Trust

[00:04:15] Just general found well grace week. We're also joined by Chris McDonald

[00:04:20] co-owner of moments 32 guillotine in

[00:04:24] American in French. Do you say it in French Chris?

[00:04:29] Do you really

[00:04:32] Say it's a good getting well, it's impressive

[00:04:35] I'm local and

[00:04:38] What do you what do you do?

[00:04:41] put on

[00:04:42] Special events marathons triathlons regalus, etc

[00:04:46] We also have Jack Torvinson joining us from the left coast

[00:04:50] Spent a little bit of time in Charleston in college

[00:04:53] He'll be representing the BS one fleets with big fleet here for the last couple of years

[00:04:59] Jack tell us a little bit about her

[00:05:01] Yes one str

[00:05:04] Yeah, yeah been in the fleet for

[00:05:06] Like three years now or so known the vote for two years. So actually got into the x1 in 2019

[00:05:13] this fence so

[00:05:16] Yeah, I'm like an anniversary for sure. Definitely. So excited to be here. So

[00:05:21] Honey, you do it especially for this podcast. I heard. Yeah just for this

[00:05:26] So now but yeah, it's super excited to be here and

[00:05:30] nowhere better to be so

[00:05:33] Last but not least is Valleyville ball bridge representing J 70 fleets. Um

[00:05:39] She works for sales. She's the North sales designer and

[00:05:44] She will be competing with an all-women's team here at Charleston. We speak. Is that my understanding? Yeah

[00:05:49] sailing with a

[00:05:51] convergence team which is led by Ava Wilson

[00:05:54] Really excited to get out there with a new squad of young eager sailors that happen to be women this time

[00:06:00] But you know really excited so much in girls. Oh

[00:06:03] Right super. Thank you so much again for taking time to be

[00:06:08] Jack to kind of like start with you, you know, you say I'll call you Charleston

[00:06:14] Don't I sail around the country obviously

[00:06:17] for

[00:06:18] Those folks who are coming to Charleston traveling to Charleston as a venue

[00:06:22] What would you recommend for them preparation wise thinking about coming to town

[00:06:28] Getting in my headspace thinking about that

[00:06:31] Yeah, I mean it's you know, just like any other like major race week

[00:06:35] You know might come you know across the country, but you know a lot of current right?

[00:06:39] I think Charleston like a differentiator is

[00:06:43] There's a lot of water moving in and out each day

[00:06:47] but

[00:06:48] You know seems like a lot of sailors that aren't locals figure it out, you know, it's not not Robertson I guess sometimes

[00:06:54] You know don't overthink it a little bit. Yeah, but yeah

[00:06:58] No, it's just you know, just like any other major major regatta really but super fun

[00:07:02] And you know great time of year to be here, right?

[00:07:05] And you know socially really really fun

[00:07:08] So so you're from this is a early season regatta really first big regatta. I think on the East Coast

[00:07:15] I would guess but is that saying you're coming from the West Coast is it early season for you?

[00:07:22] Yeah, I guess for us work. I mean we're kind of an outlier right?

[00:07:26] I have stuff year-round but yeah, I guess it is would be early still

[00:07:31] But yeah, we just came out like the VX fleet. We were just out for the Cardi, you know

[00:07:36] Then they'll just you know, I think everybody was lost event was probably the Cardi race week. Yeah

[00:07:41] So, yeah just coming off that and

[00:07:43] Charleston's a great stop going up the coast

[00:07:46] Do you like look at where your circles gonna be and consider that as far as like strategy?

[00:07:53] For sure actually the VX fleet we were like on

[00:07:57] Circle one historically which is right next to Carolina Yacht Club right in that corner and

[00:08:04] We made a big fuss to get moved to a different circle

[00:08:07] So it yeah, we're on circle to this year with the J 70s and the Meldes 24

[00:08:13] So we had some issues running at ground last year

[00:08:16] Which wasn't wasn't ideal and I think that the breeze should be maybe a little bit more consistent out there

[00:08:22] So yeah, no it comes into play for sure. I think circle one. There's definitely some

[00:08:28] Nooks and crannies in there certain times that pay off where I feel like circle two or three might

[00:08:35] So yeah, it comes into play a little bit so

[00:08:45] Yeah, I campaigned in the G 24 fleet for years and

[00:08:50] Originally we were in circle one and you know, we are slower boats and so it's not as big a deal

[00:08:57] And then at some point we moved to circle four which is no longer. I believe I haven't actually looked at the map

[00:09:03] I just know I'm not in certain form but that was underneath the bridge and it was

[00:09:09] was the last to get breeze and it was the first to lose breeze and

[00:09:14] So it was a very challenging

[00:09:16] cross current

[00:09:18] Course most of the time so we be lobbying hard to get out of that spot

[00:09:23] So John that most right for us have been consistently kind of positioned in the same circle year after year

[00:09:30] No issues there for three-year fleet. Yes, been big fleet dominant three three years

[00:09:35] We have we have in the past

[00:09:38] The last couple years we've got a bit of a downturn in our numbers

[00:09:41] We used to get 30 40 boats and you know through various reasons

[00:09:46] It's taken a little bit of a toll. So we're only 16 boats. I think this regatta

[00:09:52] Last year, I think we're about the same

[00:09:54] A lot of the teams are preparing for the world's in San Francisco

[00:09:59] And so this is not a very similar venue to San Francisco

[00:10:04] So we're not seeing a lot of the good teams using this as a training venue for

[00:10:09] for the world's and I think as

[00:10:12] This is a Maddox 24 fleet. So, you know pretty

[00:10:16] Strong fleet a lot of good sailors in it

[00:10:18] They want to use their time wisely and plan and practice and prepare for the big events

[00:10:24] Which is our world championship every year. And so we've kind of seen a bit of a downturn in

[00:10:30] In our numbers, but you know this year like any other year

[00:10:34] We still have you know three or four boats that are going to be top contenders for the world's and so

[00:10:40] You know, I think the race committee does respect that quite a bit

[00:10:44] And you know this really give us the opportunity as a reasonably fast boat to you know

[00:10:49] kind of put us in a circle that you know, we feel like

[00:10:53] Is is open for us?

[00:10:56] We've been on circle three circle two to sail the J 70s

[00:11:01] And then we've added the VX ones to our circle this year, which is you know exciting

[00:11:06] And so hopefully that goes well, but yeah, I mean I you know as a local person

[00:11:12] I sell them all these places

[00:11:16] So I just said that you're a multi-time

[00:11:19] So yeah, this that affects the your preparation this time is your

[00:11:24] Is your crew like we got this we don't need to do a lot of practice and a lot of

[00:11:29] preparation or

[00:11:32] No, I

[00:11:34] Mean, I think we you know

[00:11:37] I think I've won this event in various boats

[00:11:40] Different times across a big range of fleets, you know, I'm just sales

[00:11:47] You know, we the mouse 24 plates housing the really monster fleets

[00:11:57] 50 votes for the world's here for trust racing

[00:12:02] In preparation for those worlds

[00:12:04] You know, it's kind of like I'm a turn in the boat

[00:12:09] tactician and honestly, I leave it to the tacticians

[00:12:14] me

[00:12:15] Doing that job and so I think it's enough. I think honestly though the last input I can give as a local

[00:12:24] You know the the venue is challenging

[00:12:28] but good sailors still

[00:12:31] Deal with all this the same same stuff everywhere they go and go to cows in England

[00:12:37] It's the same problems

[00:12:38] And so the best sailors still rise to the top and my job as a trimmer is to trim sales the best

[00:12:43] I can and not add to the tactics

[00:12:46] I sell enough really great tacticians. I know my role is to my show

[00:12:50] What are some of like the first two juice that you're looking when you're trying to get traction?

[00:12:56] I'm trying to get off the ground. I think that it's always important to figure out what the end goal is

[00:13:03] Whether that's a short-term goal or a long-term goal and then back out from there. How are you?

[00:13:08] How are you going to achieve it?

[00:13:10] it's sort of easy to just get on the boat and go sailing and

[00:13:15] Say, you know, obviously our goal is to go as fast as we can

[00:13:17] Our goal is to win every single race our goal is to have fun

[00:13:22] But in a real way, I think it is valuable to

[00:13:26] Set a realistic goal and talk with the whole team

[00:13:29] Especially the bigger the team is the harder it can be to really satisfy each person's goal

[00:13:33] And I think it's important to to know what everybody's hoping to get out of it

[00:13:37] So if the goal is to get a couple of top ten finishes throughout the regatta

[00:13:43] Then you can figure out what are the ways that we're going to achieve that

[00:13:46] So we want to be able to get really good starts in a big fleet, which is super tough

[00:13:52] It can be really easy to go out and speed to an upwind for 45 minutes before the first race

[00:13:58] And then you're kind of lost. You don't really know which end of the line is favored

[00:14:02] You're not ready to see where the current is

[00:14:06] you're not really heading the game to

[00:14:09] Start the race well and in a the J70 fleet has over 40 boats

[00:14:13] so I think it's really important to start at the bottom of the pyramid and

[00:14:19] Really make sure that you can start the race well make the right first decision and then the other pieces kind of fall into

[00:14:25] Line after that it's easy to think that your goal is like your dream

[00:14:29] Like yeah, your dream might be to to win the world's but that's not really a tangible goal

[00:14:34] You need to have this like more to-do list style goals in order to make those bigger goals achievable

[00:14:43] Do you find yourself in something about you sort of have to talk people back from that?

[00:14:47] Maybe not talk them back from it, but to to try and think about

[00:14:52] Accessible ways to achieve those more

[00:14:57] Yeah bigger

[00:14:59] Heart to wrap your head around goals to pull it back

[00:15:02] So what are we gonna do in order to get there is the boat capable of winning worlds?

[00:15:07] Well, no, maybe the bottom needs work. Maybe it's a little bit old and it needs a

[00:15:12] Structural revamp, maybe the sails aren't up to snuff. Maybe the rig is old

[00:15:19] you know, there's all these different pieces, so I think it forces you to put a bit of a

[00:15:25] realistic lens on

[00:15:27] Every piece of the puzzle as you look at it

[00:15:34] You'll get back to it you talk a little bit about stuff

[00:15:36] yeah for some reason people love sailing upwind and figuring out the

[00:15:42] really nuanced

[00:15:44] Rig-tune settings and the sail control settings and really making sure that you dial in on the tacks and going upwind quickly

[00:15:55] I do of course value that practice, but so often especially in the bigger fleets

[00:16:02] You make your bed really early if you can't get off the start line

[00:16:06] Well, you're gonna be sailing in bad air

[00:16:08] You're gonna have done six tacks in the first 90 minutes of the start of

[00:16:13] The race sorry just trying to get clear air trying to go towards where you think is the favorite side of the course

[00:16:20] You end up getting

[00:16:23] Pushed around and sometimes you get pushed to the wrong side of the course that you didn't even want to go

[00:16:28] so in order to

[00:16:31] Get your priorities

[00:16:33] right, I think it's

[00:16:35] Do a little bit of the upwind tuning while the race MIDI is setting the line and then for me something that I like

[00:16:42] To do is yeah get some line sites. Make sure you ping the ends of the line do some acceleration practices

[00:16:48] I really like what both Jack and John touched on like local knowledge is great

[00:16:54] It's important, but I think so often it bites us a little bit more than

[00:16:58] It should because you're overthinking the patterns and you're reading too much into the norm that you kind of forget that

[00:17:05] Outliers are pretty common and you're like, well, yeah, the average current here is this but today's not an average day

[00:17:13] So I'm not if I'm gonna get off the start line aiming for average. I've missed this whole

[00:17:19] You know, yeah, we just had a massive rainstorm inland three days ago

[00:17:23] So that's gonna you know change the ebb from all these rivers. So it's easy to let that

[00:17:29] Um

[00:17:30] Lead you astray

[00:17:32] So doing some runs at the line seeing how your acceleration is watching how the current lines are moving across your course if they're

[00:17:39] Super problem. I love that concept of my goals

[00:17:46] Yeah, it was interesting

[00:17:48] Take that

[00:17:50] I'd actually love to go around and see Jack. What are your goals for trust you speak this year of SDR?

[00:17:57] Yeah, it kind of

[00:18:00] Got Malama saying a little bit. I like to make goals like

[00:18:04] Instead of like getting a top five and more just like let's make it like

[00:18:07] Let's start clean and see what happens right then making like in place full

[00:18:12] but it's like stuff we want to work on so I can't like this really like nail these starts it's do a lot of

[00:18:18] Top and distance stuff, you know before the race like they know that so yeah

[00:18:23] Just kind of like nailing and then like also like downwind stuff, you know downwind tactics on the VX is like really huge

[00:18:30] hit other boats and just like

[00:18:32] Knowing, you know our time to get clear air, you know and taking that bite

[00:18:38] You know sometimes taking an extra jive or two

[00:18:41] And stuff stuff like that like fundamental tactics

[00:18:44] But like our team we've been sailing together for

[00:18:47] Like a year and a half now, so it's really cool

[00:18:49] We've like come a really long way and so I think we know what we need to work at as a team on team

[00:18:55] See different trends and stuff. So that's what we're focusing on is like

[00:18:59] Certain things over past events. We've good to start stress for a second. Yeah, it's one

[00:19:04] Do you have like a go-to start strategy? Hey, we always come all tack approach

[00:19:10] Then me no, I think it just depends. I mean it's like for us

[00:19:13] We have that we ping the line right on the Vicarra system

[00:19:17] So a lot of boats I sail don't have you know, we don't hang right?

[00:19:20] so I think on a boat where you're you know have a

[00:19:24] Read out of how many meters you are from the line is you know, it's it's a tool, right?

[00:19:29] It's like using that tool to to help you, you know and using that tool

[00:19:33] And so they doing some like time on distance runs

[00:19:36] using

[00:19:38] Using that is good. It's good to have in your toolbox, right?

[00:19:41] To know like pre start where you're at like hey, we're late. We're late, you know or early, you know, so

[00:19:48] but yeah, we're always like a fan of low density starts and just kind of sailing our own race, but

[00:19:54] Almost thinking now it's like maybe think we need to be a little bit more aggressive and like maybe

[00:19:59] They look more aggressive being towards the paper to underline than low density, you know

[00:20:02] So yeah, there's just things that team things as a team. We're taking into consideration. So

[00:20:07] Great

[00:20:10] Crest what are your goals for race weakness here?

[00:20:15] Yeah, so last year we had too much weight on the boat in people so we're happy to be

[00:20:23] two buddies less

[00:20:25] We we invited a lot of folks and no one's that know

[00:20:31] Oops is right. And so I think we're closer to optimal weight this year, which will help in later

[00:20:37] Which Friday and Saturday look like they might be a little bit lighter

[00:20:41] And it may be a function of that weight, but also

[00:20:46] if we were in kind of a too much below mode last year and so

[00:20:51] Will be definitely Moses 32. I mean bigger version of all these other boats

[00:20:57] we're just trying to stay on plane stay hot stay fast and

[00:21:01] Even through the jobs and we I felt like again

[00:21:04] It could be a function of weight, but our one of our goals is to stay fast through the job

[00:21:09] Usually we're fast off the line

[00:21:11] Tom Luttrell choppy is great at driving

[00:21:15] And is usually incredibly aggressive sometimes more so than needs to be but that's what we love him and

[00:21:21] He's good at coming off the line. He's usually in a great position. So our starts are usually strong

[00:21:27] And so it's just

[00:21:29] Making sure that we follow tactics that we kind of laid out from the get-go so like

[00:21:35] not switching things up too much and

[00:21:38] It's a boat full of locals. So we have that battle of you know, not reading into local knowledge too much but

[00:21:47] But I mean the boat is a good boat we got brand new

[00:21:51] Nor sales on there so that should help us this year

[00:21:54] We had 12 year old sales last year so that hopefully helps us go a little bit faster downwind and upwind

[00:22:01] but yeah, our I think our real goals are

[00:22:04] for holding our lane upwind and

[00:22:07] speed through jobs

[00:22:09] Tom went so you talked about your sense that you were selling such a low vote last year

[00:22:15] Was that sense or did you look at data to see afterwards? I mean by data we looked over and

[00:22:22] We were low and slow

[00:22:27] It was also a little strange last year because we had I mean this year we have a great fleet of 32

[00:22:32] So we have 10 32 switch I believe

[00:22:35] Dare say it's the largest

[00:22:37] Well, I think it's one of the largest fleets like in a few years in the US

[00:22:42] Like there's just not a bunch of large 32 fleets anymore

[00:22:45] You have to go over to Italy to get into that these days. And so

[00:22:50] Yeah, just looking over watching

[00:22:52] and

[00:22:53] we had the mum thirties or a mum 30 and some cape 31 which were sailing very different angles that were in our start that

[00:23:03] Caused our VMGs were the same our sailing angles were not and so it caused issues

[00:23:09] Every other technique so we had to be cognizant of that which is a little abnormal in one side

[00:23:16] So Chris tell us a little bit about like what's up why are all the numbers use here

[00:23:22] What what is this big convergence of all the knowledge started to use here at this time?

[00:23:30] Reason for this

[00:23:32] Were you guys involved with this? I

[00:23:35] Didn't I didn't have a lot to do. Okay, there was some people locally

[00:23:40] Just started make phone calls

[00:23:43] This was in big with your foremost into the Charleston

[00:23:47] We made an attempt at hosting a second regatta later on a month later in Charleston here

[00:23:53] For people to leave their boats here to reach out. I don't know if that attracted some people

[00:23:57] I don't think it has attracted people to stay right?

[00:24:01] It has gotten it's got my good group of boats here and having I used to race Marcus 32s

[00:24:07] And you know, I did the probably the last great worlds in San Francisco where we got 30 bucks

[00:24:14] It's not super excited to see this book come back. It's a fun boat and it's just kind of becoming

[00:24:21] Just like a great local phrf machine and if they almost unfair

[00:24:26] Yeah, and if they come back to one design, it's it's gonna be a real kick in the pants

[00:24:30] We race these boats really hard and it's funny that you know crisp and all boats are here

[00:24:36] All about taste to risk against when we're risking the boats hard

[00:24:40] Yeah

[00:24:41] when you pull out some of the pieces of the boat like

[00:24:44] You might find some battens or whatnot like and they have the old boat names on them

[00:24:52] Yeah, I'm fascinated by that I'm fascinated by I kind of like the longevity of some of these sport boats and

[00:24:59] Maintaining that as a team

[00:25:01] Is

[00:25:04] It difficult it's funny first of all, is it kind of a pain

[00:25:09] I mean are these are they kind of like really hard?

[00:25:13] big time but on these boats because they were I think the joke at one point was there the

[00:25:19] the smallest boats that billionaires couldn't afford because of just the

[00:25:24] Arms races that went into the fleet and whether it be racing sales pros for parties afterwards

[00:25:30] I'm jealous. I wish I'd been a part of that piece of mystery, but uh

[00:25:36] Unfortunately, I was not

[00:25:38] But yeah, they they all have been raced very very hard

[00:25:44] And a lot of the top pros now, you know, they're still racing have been a part of that

[00:25:50] And so the beauty of it for people like me who are not professional sailors

[00:25:56] We have professional sailors around that can give us great insight into how to make boats go fast so

[00:26:03] You know, there's tuning guides and then there's what actually happened on the boat right, you know

[00:26:08] I'm it seems to be sometimes and a lot of classes. They are very similar

[00:26:13] But again, I was in the G24 class three years the tuning guide which and what pros are doing very similar

[00:26:19] they're not necessarily the case in the 32 and

[00:26:22] like the

[00:26:24] The ram pressure and you know, just all of the stress you're putting on that boats

[00:26:30] Insanity like the fact that more of them have not folded in half is beyond me

[00:26:36] So should we to Charles when they speak in to expect the kind of numbers in August 32s?

[00:26:41] I think if they can put any good races and having fun parties and I mean

[00:26:47] I put on races for a little not necessarily. Yeah several races and I always tell people

[00:26:52] Numbers create numbers

[00:26:54] You know, we've always you know, we're a we're a herd species

[00:26:59] and so we like going to things that are bigger than ourselves and

[00:27:03] So the bigger an event is the more people go to that event and make it even bigger it feeds with itself

[00:27:09] So as a class grows

[00:27:12] It will grow more because of that. I

[00:27:16] Think that 32 is like a boat where you suspend a million foxy or racing it

[00:27:21] For a trailer bull 32 foot boat. Yes was seem to be quite insane

[00:27:25] now you can pick one up for 50,000 bucks and you know take all your mates to a regatta and

[00:27:30] You know have a good weekend and you know, and then race it at home pH or F

[00:27:35] And beat the crap out of everybody's is pretty stunning. So I think it's a cool opportunity for a lot of people

[00:27:40] I think we're seeing the boats, you know

[00:27:43] Coming back around and just the same boats that we used to race

[00:27:47] Samba pot teams here for the first time

[00:27:50] I

[00:27:51] Think that was raised since the last world since in, Mississippi

[00:27:54] So it could us to these guys who are getting on these boats

[00:27:58] Well, I'm telling you go and they're still cool now

[00:28:02] That's really interesting. There's sort of been revivals

[00:28:04] But once the top people get rid people put all the money and now they're becoming sort of great value

[00:28:11] That's really interesting the second revival all of those. Hey, well most of them are coming with ten sets of sales

[00:28:18] Now they might not be great sales, but you can go out and pH RF on them

[00:28:22] You know you can get around a race course on them and you'll probably beat up on some people again

[00:28:27] 12 year old sales last year is what we had on the boat

[00:28:30] And he's a cumulative problem prior. Yeah. Yeah, they just again that arms race that they had

[00:28:37] You know trailers and trailers full of sales

[00:28:40] The Mavis 24 had to kind of that same sort of revival

[00:28:44] You know from the from the biggest worlds in Key Largo we had 105 boats in

[00:28:51] 2005 I believe

[00:28:53] You know to to where it is now

[00:28:56] You know, we're seeing the boats research with smaller local fleets and you know every once in a while people

[00:29:03] Get together and they're like, hey man. Let's go to let's go to Bacardi. Let's let's go. Let's go do a world championship

[00:29:10] You know, we're pretty excited in the 24th lead to see the world's in San Francisco

[00:29:17] We have I think 30 boats registered for the world's in San Francisco, which is you know this far out

[00:29:22] It's a good showing and

[00:29:25] To be honest with you. I don't know half of the people sound

[00:29:28] They're all West Coast boats that we don't see on the East Coast very often

[00:29:32] And so it's super cool to see a totally new group of people

[00:29:37] Race, you know just like one of the cooler coolest boats ever sailed

[00:29:41] That's gonna be something to watch in San Francisco when they have those 25 not actually breezes with us

[00:29:51] It's the coldest it's the coldest it's the coldest I've ever done sailing in my entire life

[00:29:55] I've raised in snow and ice San Francisco the part

[00:29:59] Coldest place ever been except when you get to the top mark you turn around then it's suddenly

[00:30:04] 20 degrees warmer. Yeah. Yeah. No, I mean San Francisco is great. It's an awesome venue

[00:30:11] But yeah, it is it is is windy. It will give you everything San Francisco promises

[00:30:17] In September big boats series is there for a reason. It's that it's truly amazing

[00:30:22] Thank you. But yeah, it is it is the call of several good sailing in my entire life

[00:30:26] So let me build on that for a second. So where does I mean Jack?

[00:30:31] Just came back from the Cardiff Cup right a couple of weeks ago. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah

[00:30:34] So where does Charleston race week rank in those, you know your favorite regattas?

[00:30:40] It's a Greek. I mean I've done

[00:30:42] Like when I was at school here, I did I did it I think every year

[00:30:46] So I think this is my eighth one this year. So I've done a lot of these

[00:30:50] I'm a veteran now, so

[00:30:52] It depends on the year, you know, I love Charleston, but you know some years, you know, sometimes the weather doesn't show up

[00:30:57] You know, it's not as good

[00:30:59] No, it's definitely it's definitely up there. You know, it's really fun

[00:31:03] But as a you know, as a purist, you know, it's like depends on the year. You know some years here

[00:31:07] You're a fan. Yeah, you know, like some years here are like epic, you know, like the conditions are so good in other years

[00:31:13] Yeah, it's all right. It's not as good, you know, but that's why we got to switch to the next year

[00:31:19] It's not as good, you know, but that's why we got to show up every year. It's a lot of averages, right?

[00:31:23] So I know last year is great and hopefully yeah this year we get to so

[00:31:29] How about you Melon's where's it? Where's it ranked you as a favorite top three?

[00:31:33] Um, I it ranks pretty high because it's the only regatta of the year that I do where I can sleep in my own bed

[00:31:39] So that's a nice perfect. I can go walk my dog after racing love that

[00:31:44] Yeah, I mean you sort of shatting the dog

[00:31:46] Oh, you get your anger out of the chair

[00:31:48] No, I can never yell at my sweet girl

[00:31:52] No, I like being able to do all the different. I don't know that I could choose a favorite regatta

[00:31:57] I like sailing in different boats

[00:31:59] Come on, come on

[00:32:01] What if he is the last regatta you're gonna do?

[00:32:03] Which one?

[00:32:05] What about you guys?

[00:32:07] I love Charleston because Charleston is the only regatta I get to skate for the people I'm fine with

[00:32:13] All the sailing I do is you know is work it's all work, you know Miami the winter circuit in Miami

[00:32:19] And you know November

[00:32:21] I was itching to go to Miami and see it all and after doing 10 weeks of sailing down there through the winter by March

[00:32:27] You're just like I need to see my paper

[00:32:29] You know in Charleston

[00:32:31] To make the most of this one big epic regatta year and I think it's amazing

[00:32:37] You know summers in Newport are great

[00:32:40] Yeah, I don't wish to go to

[00:32:44] See you know it's it's a job. I think you know we talked about like what do you do to get ready for Charleston?

[00:32:50] All I care about is going on having a good time this regatta leads to nothing it ends with nothing

[00:32:55] We want to show up we want to sail we want to just enjoy ourselves

[00:32:59] You know we've been very lucky for a long time as the regatta has shifted

[00:33:05] We had a long run at

[00:33:08] At Patriots Point Marina at the Charleston Harbor Resort with the beach

[00:33:13] Hosting hosting the event and so the parties that the beach were you know probably epic and you know replaced

[00:33:20] Replaced Key West Race Suite parties

[00:33:23] And now we have this new opportunity with the Patriots Point

[00:33:28] Museum and and all of the events are going to be hosted off of the aircraft carrier the USS Roach

[00:33:35] And so I think it's a you know it's a cool. It's a cool opportunity

[00:33:39] But for me this regatta. It's just about having fun and sailing and it's just it's cool. You know sometimes sometimes

[00:33:46] The weather is perfect

[00:33:48] It's generally better than it is not what's the forecast for this weekend?

[00:33:54] It's gonna be a little light Friday Saturday, and then the high pressure moves out around midnight on Saturday night

[00:34:01] And we get a nor'easter come in that it'll be

[00:34:05] 8 to 12 9 to 9 to 14 so we're in there on Sunday

[00:34:10] Which would be great for all of us because we get to get on top of the water, but

[00:34:15] Yeah

[00:34:17] Hopefully it's a southwest early almost westerly and sometimes that is affected by sea breeze

[00:34:25] And this would be very warm Friday Saturday. Yeah, I think almost 90 from what I understand

[00:34:31] How about you Sarah? I know you've done a ton of regattas. Do you love Charleston Race Week?

[00:34:37] I like Charleston Race Week. I've sailed on Charleston Race Week in Charleston Race Week

[00:34:41] I've been on a ton of different boats over the years which is really fun, but yeah, I gotta plug my own work on it

[00:34:47] I started the women's J-105

[00:34:52] So that's become my favorite just because it's my baby right so you got to choose your baby as your favorite so

[00:34:59] This will be our second year going into it

[00:35:03] Really proud of what we've done building the fleet getting more boats every year. We've got

[00:35:09] Almost every single local J-105

[00:35:13] participating tons of women on this course so really thrilled about that. We've gotten some incredible coaching from

[00:35:21] Like a lot of people who are in this room actually so thankful for that

[00:35:25] It's huge support from the community so

[00:35:28] I'm thrilled about the Charleston network and the state-of-the-art

[00:35:32] Tell me about Charleston Race Week itself. Chris, do you prepare differently for it or is it

[00:35:39] Is it the same as other regattas? As the other guys said it's I mean overall it's the same but we do have some

[00:35:46] Going back to the goals

[00:35:48] For Charleston whenever we're racing here

[00:35:51] My goal is

[00:35:53] Never to be coming in on port

[00:35:56] Up current period and you will find so many people from out of town in that location and it is

[00:36:05] Impossible and I mean so at any point

[00:36:09] You should never be

[00:36:11] Coming on port lower than the top mark if you're going up current on port towards the top mark

[00:36:18] You're done you're gonna lose every single boat in the entirety of the fleet because you're not gonna find a hold to turn them turn the mark

[00:36:27] I think that's more like just kind of like preparation for Charleston. Yeah, it's just it's just about going around these buoys

[00:36:34] Seeing how the current is gonna affect you

[00:36:36] That's like if people want local knowledge local advice

[00:36:39] It's turning around these marks seeing how it's affecting you and just recognizing what it's gonna do what it's not gonna do

[00:36:47] Knowing, you know, I can't go don't don't don't over stand the starboard tackle a line

[00:36:51] Don't understand the port tackle a line depending on what the current is doing

[00:36:55] We're gonna see on all the circles will see every different variation of the time

[00:37:00] It's gonna change through one of the days and just you know recognizing what it's gonna do to you on the starting line

[00:37:06] You know like what Melon said like, you know do practice starts because you know, is it pushing you over?

[00:37:12] Is it pushing you off the line? It's pushing it towards the pin towards the boat

[00:37:17] Knowing those knowing that piece of information is way more important than like what the current's gonna do

[00:37:24] Through the race the parents gonna do whatever it's gonna do during the race

[00:37:27] But like how it affects you around the marks that are anchored to the ground is

[00:37:33] What Chris was talking about? That's what you need to know

[00:37:36] So I go find a crab pot in between races find a crab pot go around the crab pot

[00:37:40] Are you are you?

[00:37:42] Wide than tight like how why do you need to be to not be tight by the time?

[00:37:47] You're actually turning around that mark and again like so many people are doing turns

[00:37:52] After Lure roundings or top marks because they're not paying attention exactly what John's talking about

[00:37:57] like so many people especially race one race two are tagging marks because they're just putting themselves in

[00:38:05] compromised situations where they're pinching and

[00:38:09] getting pushed towards a mark and

[00:38:11] You're just in a it's an impossible situation

[00:38:14] That puts the so your spot checking like someone tactician theoretically

[00:38:19] But if it's not the tactician if they're worried about like, you know fleet management, you've got somebody more forward

[00:38:25] Looking at like, you know, we're losing trees the top mark big time, you know

[00:38:30] And so now your entire course is shifted. It's like a wind shift your entire course is shifted

[00:38:35] And so your mindset needs to shift we need to tack out here

[00:38:38] So you're gonna get stronger like at what point do we need the ladder up to get above this mark because again

[00:38:44] If you end up Lure to that mark going up current on port you are in not agree

[00:38:50] What do you focus on most when you're preparing for or what you're racing?

[00:38:55] yeah, I think that the one all-encompassing thing I would say is routine and

[00:39:00] that

[00:39:01] By that I mean if you have

[00:39:04] The same people doing the same little jobs every day off the boat

[00:39:09] So the same people know that they're in charge of filling the water bottles or bringing the food

[00:39:14] Same people are making sure the sails are ready to go. Same people are making sure you have fuel for the engine

[00:39:21] and then on the water

[00:39:23] You have a routine like the tactician is going to drive between races to alleviate the stress on driver

[00:39:30] You're gonna have the routine of cleaning up the boat completely and getting it ready to race as soon as you cross the finish

[00:39:37] Line, then you relax after that you have the routine of the same people

[00:39:41] Same voices saying the same piece of communication. So I think the routine for me in all of those different ways is

[00:39:49] Always going to be the most important thing

[00:39:51] I

[00:39:53] Think that's the best sense

[00:39:55] Same thing they eat the same amount of eggs every morning that the same person ties the main heart on

[00:40:00] That that is the answer that people want to know what the secret is to go

[00:40:05] That's the answer. It's displayed consistency doesn't matter repetition

[00:40:09] If you minimize the chances for panic about something we forgot the waters and somebody didn't tie the main heart on right

[00:40:16] Or whatever didn't bring the spinnaker right? That's the answer

[00:40:20] That is if you want to talk about what pro sailors do differently. That's it

[00:40:25] Yeah, even when it comes to like it's time to take the main down and you're in the channel or whatever

[00:40:30] So the same person should be flaking the main how you're getting it ready to run the same two people running the luff in

[00:40:35] The lead should same people rolling it those things make everything just so smooth

[00:40:40] It goes to like eating the right things at dinner so that you don't have heartburn

[00:40:44] You know drinking the right a number of beers after sailing so they are not hungover, but you had a good time

[00:40:49] For sale

[00:40:51] That is what that was that

[00:40:53] That's a beer floating in the air

[00:40:55] I mean that's it

[00:40:57] I mean that's it

[00:40:59] That's the thing

[00:41:01] If you do those things

[00:41:03] Guarantees your success and so is

[00:41:05] Right?

[00:41:06] Yeah, I found just to add on to that which I've sailed with a lot of great people have been lucky for that and

[00:41:14] They push that same that same mentality

[00:41:17] But one thing that I found for myself, especially when I was driving at trim the trim now

[00:41:22] but um and that's

[00:41:25] PMA positive mental attitude and I find that everyone is able to do their job at

[00:41:31] the

[00:41:32] most efficient when

[00:41:35] You get small

[00:41:37] Like small positive

[00:41:40] Reinforcements not you're winning the race

[00:41:42] But just small things and a lot of times like if I have a

[00:41:46] Tactician that really wants to bark at me. I'm like you can bark at me, but everyone's want to say

[00:41:52] You know, you're higher than the guy below you, you know, you're faster than the guy above you

[00:41:56] Like keep it up because I'm not looking like like they're saying you don't do anything other than your job

[00:42:01] so you have blinders on and

[00:42:04] So just hearing that whatever you're doing is good and this is something you could do better

[00:42:10] Keep it up like I find that even and this goes beyond sailing, you know, everyone wants to be better

[00:42:17] So just giving those small encouragements really helps anyone on the boat do their job better and the boat goes faster

[00:42:24] positive reinforcement

[00:42:26] Yeah, so that's a sort of a crew culture. Yeah as much as anything. Yeah, Jack. What about you?

[00:42:34] What I focus on the most or yeah

[00:42:37] Yeah, I open a listen to Madeline

[00:42:49] Yeah, definitely not a pro sailor I don't sail professionally so it is different where it's like this isn't my day-to-day

[00:42:56] Deal, but we've been lucky enough with our group and my crew on a bx1 run and Abby that

[00:43:03] We have like established enough routine going on

[00:43:08] So that it is huge and it makes a huge difference in all of our sailing and I think like I think the biggest contrast to us

[00:43:15] Starting off to now is is that routine because when you're starting off like as a new team

[00:43:20] You don't know whose role is what and then what happens like people just get distracted Mike. Yeah, you know

[00:43:27] Throughout something or something went wrong on the boat handling or something is distract everyone a little bit

[00:43:32] so just to be on the same page, but

[00:43:36] For me, I just I'm just a big picture guy, you know, I want the boat to go fast

[00:43:40] So like for me and I'm a boat speed guy. I think if I'm not going fast

[00:43:44] It's not gonna be going well

[00:43:45] So I just gotta be feeling good the rigs gotta be right and that way we can be in the right place

[00:43:51] so for me, it's just like really important the boats set up right and

[00:43:56] We're fast for the day. So this has been really excellent. Thank you so much for

[00:44:01] Take the time. I know because you're all competing. This is an evening where you could probably have done some more prep work

[00:44:07] So I really appreciate you spending time with the sail faster Sarah. Thank you for co-hosting and pulling this together

[00:44:14] John Chris Jack

[00:44:17] Thank you so much. Take the time and

[00:44:19] So fast that have fun and best luck to just race week. Thank you