Starting, rounding, winging....Scott Nixon of Quantum Sails

[00:00:00] Hello, everybody, and welcome to another episode of Sailfaster, the podcast for those who, as

[00:00:17] you know, obsess about sailing faster than anybody else. Well, today I've got a terrific

[00:00:23] guest for you and that's Scott Nixon. So Scott is a top, top racing sailor. Many of

[00:00:29] you will know him or heard of him. He's been involved with yacht racing pretty much his

[00:00:34] whole life, it seems. He was an all American sailor at St. Mary's College of Maryland and

[00:00:39] he has a really fantastically wide range of racing experience including dinghies and one

[00:00:45] design kill boats, inshore big boats and offshore distance racing. And he's raced regularly

[00:00:51] with people like Terry Hutchinson and many of the top sailors, of course. Scott works

[00:00:56] for Quantum Sales and he's worked, I think since about 2000, he works primarily on the

[00:01:02] one design classes. And I thought Scott would be really interesting to have on the pod not

[00:01:06] just because of his stellar racing pedigree but also because of this direct involvement

[00:01:11] in testing, design and development of Quantum's one design sail programs. Scott has sailed

[00:01:18] with Quantum customers to win championships at the World's Gold Cup, European, North

[00:01:24] American and national levels. He actively campaigns and coaches and races in a bewildering

[00:01:32] variety of classes including every J from J 22 to J 111, CNC 30s, FAR 30s, FAR 40s, the

[00:01:42] NYC 42s, one 45 Melgers 20, 24, 32, 40 and of course the TP 52 classes. He's won World

[00:01:54] Championships in the Melgers 32 and J 111 classes. So I thought it'd be great to talk

[00:02:00] to and he turned out to be exactly that. He is living in Annapolis with his wife, Alexis

[00:02:06] and their daughters, Savannah and summer. I'm really thrilled that he had time to

[00:02:11] talk to everything he's got going on. So here we go.

[00:02:14] So Scott, good morning. Welcome to Sail Faster. Thank you so much for spending time with us.

[00:02:27] Good morning. Thank you. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it. I've been watching your

[00:02:30] website grow and some of the podcasts have been great. So I appreciate all your work

[00:02:33] you've done. Thank you. Let's kick off with your current role. You've got this really

[00:02:37] impressive sounding title of being the global offshore one design director. We show like

[00:02:42] a dream job. What's set about? Yeah, it's a lot of fun. I've been with Quantum since

[00:02:47] basically 2000. So it's coming up on almost 25 years now. So obviously when I was younger and

[00:02:53] out of college and sailing smaller boats, I did a lot of that for the group and always worked

[00:02:58] with one design classes and started sailing J 22s and J 24s and Meldes 24s and then it

[00:03:04] dwarfed into Meldes 20s and 32s and grew into bigger boats. So I always helped

[00:03:09] Quantum globally. I work for the corporate office. We have affiliates around the world

[00:03:12] in a good network of loss and I work for the corporate company and I helped develop the

[00:03:17] tuning guides. I'm kind of liaison between the guys on the water and the designers. So

[00:03:23] I know you sail to J-15, so we work with our sail designers and get input from customers

[00:03:28] and myself. Guys that do the sail testing and look at sales in the water and kind of

[00:03:32] update the product every year and update the tuning guides and kind of make sure the

[00:03:36] information going out to the group is appropriate. So I know you, it sounds fascinating. Wish I could

[00:03:42] do that. So there you go with customers a lot and sail testing. Other times when you sort of go

[00:03:48] out there and you look at a new sail and you think oh yeah we need to change that a bit,

[00:03:52] I can see we should adjust that or is that much more sort of computer aided these days?

[00:03:59] Yeah no, I mean absolutely. I mean now with the computer programs and the modeling

[00:04:03] the top end designers are getting really good you know and we take the data from a boat and put in

[00:04:08] the rig, the hull, the appendages you know we've done tests with all that stuff. We can help set

[00:04:13] up a baseline tuning guide for a boat that hasn't even hit the water yet. So when then we go

[00:04:18] sailing on the new boat we can help set up the appropriate capture out tensions, the lower

[00:04:23] detentions, get the rate correct and then the sail models get built over those specs. So

[00:04:29] there's a lot of looking at that but for sure when we put sails up they're not always

[00:04:34] not always perfect. So they take a lot of time to get optimized and make sure you know the drafts

[00:04:39] correct and the cameras are right and make sure the sail twist and the hard thing with the one

[00:04:42] design sails are you know for your J105 you have one mainsail, one jib and one kite and obviously we

[00:04:48] sail in zero to 30 knots so those sails need to get through the full range. Obviously I think for

[00:04:53] the one design classes it's important to optimize those sail shapes for that you know six to

[00:04:57] 12 knots which we spend so much time sailing in but still got to get through the super light

[00:05:01] ranges and the breezy ranges and that's where you know rig tune comes in to help bend those sails

[00:05:06] and the appropriate shapes for that. Yeah I realize I'm a quantum boat, quantum house as it were.

[00:05:15] Yeah my I've got a brand new main that Jason Terry has still got in his office somewhere so

[00:05:22] I'm looking forward to unwrapping that. So I mean you sail with everybody like the

[00:05:29] Terry Hutchinson's and so on. Give us some a sense of sort of for you the sort of your career

[00:05:35] highlights if you like. Yeah sure I mean obviously you know everybody wants to win world championships

[00:05:40] and those things I've won a couple of them and we're trying to win another one this year at the

[00:05:44] end of the year in the ORC worlds but those things take a lot of time and a lot of preparation

[00:05:49] and I think when you see people that have won you know multiple world championships you know

[00:05:53] not only they're good sailors, they're good preparers and they just you know spend a lot

[00:05:57] of time to achieve those goals so I think those things have a lot of weight in my mind you know it's

[00:06:01] kind of like the guys that are medalists and do all they work to prepare for that it just it's

[00:06:05] just next level you know it's a lot of time it's a full-time job so those world championships

[00:06:09] in North Americans are big events to win and they take a lot of time so I'm proud of those

[00:06:13] moments and you know a lot of the one-design classes the sailing is so close and so competitive

[00:06:18] that every little thing makes a big difference so the guys that train well and optimize and

[00:06:23] check all the boxes for sails boat prep bottom prep you know crew training do all that stuff to

[00:06:28] win those events it really hats off to that yeah I've talked to you know a few people who've

[00:06:33] been world champions either on windsurfers or on dingy and so on in the series and

[00:06:38] it's it's an obsession I love that I've always had a corporate job so I couldn't get obsessed

[00:06:44] about it but it is that meticulous obsession and attention to detail that's quite interesting

[00:06:53] yeah it is I'm a huge Alabama football fan and I follow you know obviously the Nick Saban and

[00:06:58] Bear Bryant years and I think Bear Bryant had a famous quote that it was always like you know

[00:07:02] everybody has the will to win you know it's the will to prepare to win that really makes

[00:07:06] a difference for the guys that win and do well so it's you know the more you put in the

[00:07:10] better you'll get out of it you know the more you train for Wednesday nights and practice

[00:07:13] and have good can tack the boat well drive the boat well have good spinnaker sets and

[00:07:17] roundings you know tactics don't even count until you can do all that stuff so it takes time to

[00:07:21] prepare to have a good good result yeah I was watching your to that point I was watching your

[00:07:26] video he did on one design starting process so I think it's US sailing you can find it on

[00:07:32] YouTube but you were making that point a few times about those that go out and practice the

[00:07:36] starts get out there and practice and practice and practice before every race every regatta

[00:07:42] that that's a different difference maker so I thought it was interesting

[00:07:47] interesting you're I think you start off by saying the next world championship you is

[00:07:52] ORC so it's not one design it's ORC is it? It's ORC yes sir yeah. What kind of boat are you

[00:07:58] sailing on for that? It's a TP-52 it's an ORC-54. Oh yeah yeah you didn't call it a TP-52

[00:08:05] haven't you? Yeah sorry yeah it's a great boat super close racing it's basically one

[00:08:11] design sailing all the boats are slightly different you know they're modified super series

[00:08:14] boats or our boat was built specifically for the ORC rule so you know sales are optimized for a

[00:08:19] rating rule but everybody's bands are so close that the results are within seconds and boat lengths

[00:08:24] for sure so it's basically one design sailing yeah I've seen a lot of it on Instagram and

[00:08:30] you know YouTube I do follow that and there's some great mark roundings where I have to

[00:08:35] have to rewind a couple of times to say did they manage to make that tag with them the

[00:08:40] three boats vehicle without anyway it's good it's good stuff so um so to that point actually

[00:08:46] do you have a favorite is sort of I know you've you've sailed many different boats also in many

[00:08:51] races but around the Buies a long distance racing do you have a favorite boat or favorite

[00:08:56] type of race that you absolutely love? Yeah I mean for racing boats I really love the one design

[00:09:01] boats I mean for years when the Melvys 24 came out I always thought that boat was really

[00:09:05] special right it came out in 1992 was kind of ahead of its time and it's still a great boat

[00:09:10] great design and you know guys are training for the worlds this summer out in San Francisco

[00:09:14] and that boat's still fantastic to sail it takes four or five people you know a good coordination

[00:09:20] unlike the J70 it's a pretty physical boat you still have to hike really hard so you know

[00:09:24] the younger guys on the rail really you know earn their money on that but it's it's a great

[00:09:29] boat the 32 Melvys 32 was one of the boats I really love back in the day we had I think

[00:09:33] our biggest world was 32 boats and we had you know three pros on the boats and just all the big

[00:09:38] names and sailing were in that class that was a lot of fun I really enjoyed that class really

[00:09:43] fun sailing. Who are the most impressive people that you've sailed with? I've been lucky I've been

[00:09:48] to have sailed on a bunch of different boats over the years and some of these larger teams

[00:09:54] that have pretty nice budgets bring in some pretty top names to be tacticians or drivers

[00:09:59] you know I spent a lot of time trimming Maine or doing runners also doing tactics on some of the

[00:10:03] boats but you know over the years locally here inapolis you know Terry Hutchison obviously

[00:10:09] he's still a legend and I spent a lot of time sailing with him he and I owned a Melvys 24 together

[00:10:13] for a number of years and got to sail with him and it was really fun it was back when he was

[00:10:18] doing some of the earlier cups and when he wasn't in town I got to drive the boat when he

[00:10:22] showed up you know I did tactics and he drove but he's super impressive you know the

[00:10:26] biggest thing coming away from him when you sail with him is just the level of intensity

[00:10:30] and that everything's just brought up to that level every little ounce of you know

[00:10:34] gypsheets being shortened by two mils to hiking as hard as you can you know much longer than you

[00:10:41] would without him on the boat I mean that level of intensity is always there with him

[00:10:44] and it's there from the time you leave a dock to the time you get back to the dock so that's

[00:10:48] that's pretty impressive. On the bigger boats we brought in some great helmsmen over the

[00:10:52] years I sailed in the inter lodge for a number of years and Dean Barker came and sailed with us

[00:10:57] as he was amazing just to see his level of awareness pre-start and the timing you know those

[00:11:03] boats are quite hard to get up to max speed and hit the starting line at angle at targets

[00:11:08] you know right on the line at speed and he would do it almost every start which is really

[00:11:12] impressive. Currently on our the Fox 52 that I sail on we have Santiago Long sailing the boat

[00:11:18] and he's probably the I think he's won you know four or five medals he just was the oldest guy to

[00:11:23] win a gold medal here at the last games and he's his level of awareness and sensitivity on the

[00:11:29] wheel is just amazing to see see those guys sail but it's all their focus you know off the water

[00:11:35] they're quite fun but when they hit the water they're quite serious so they spend all their

[00:11:38] energy on the sailing and racing moments and when they get off the boat they relax and go from

[00:11:42] there but it's impressive to see how they do that. I've seen a couple of Terry Hutchinson videos

[00:11:48] where he's obviously got a chest camera or a head cam or something like that and he's racing

[00:11:53] the Quantum boat in the TP 52 series and that's just interesting just listening to his commentary

[00:12:01] what he's you know there's not a lot of commentary going on but that's what's amazing I mean those

[00:12:06] guys you think they have a narrow view of just doing their job but they're so aware of you

[00:12:10] know on the 52 you have 13 14 people on the boat and he's aware of what every person should be doing

[00:12:15] plus seeing the wind coming plus strategically and tactically knowing where he wants to place the

[00:12:20] boat and what he wants to achieve with the fleet so it's impressive to see their minds work that

[00:12:24] fast and that's kind of when he's doing those videos and talking through it it's just it's

[00:12:27] pretty next level. So Scott earlier we were talking about um favorite parts of the course uh favorite

[00:12:34] parts of race course and um there were you talked about two areas being the start and just going back

[00:12:42] to that that great US sailing video that's really interesting and I'm mark rounding so

[00:12:47] oh when was mark rounding so I'd love to start um talking about starting and I'd love to get your

[00:12:54] thoughts on on your um your approach I mean I know you you go with clients a lot in many

[00:13:00] of the boats but if you're in charge and it's your boat and you're setting up for the start

[00:13:06] take us through take us through what that looks like for you. Yeah again I think you know the

[00:13:12] starts yeah a big part of the race I don't know if it's my favorite part of the race I think

[00:13:16] I mean when you sail the faster boats downwinds always the most fun downwind legs but

[00:13:20] you know 80 percent of the race is getting off the line clean and be it over sail and

[00:13:23] execute your starting plan that means you know starting and going straight not getting pinched

[00:13:27] off not getting flush and trying to go the the way you want to go um but I think the preparation

[00:13:33] you put in the starts really key but my philosophy is you know on the starting line is to start in

[00:13:39] least dense areas so you know I see get to get to sail in a j-one of five class with you guys

[00:13:44] a bunch of Wednesday nights and sometimes those starts are quite game on relative to the other

[00:13:49] classes because you have so many boats starting lines not always square so anybody who does all

[00:13:53] their homework you know pings the ends of the line with the velocitec or the atlas and make sure they

[00:13:59] know you know where the starting line is and spends their time um you know setting up for the start

[00:14:03] can really execute a good start so that's the key I think to having a good start is making sure

[00:14:07] you do all the preparation to get off the line clean and if you do the low density starts you

[00:14:11] know you're probably not going to round the weathermark top three but you can round top five

[00:14:15] pass a couple votes from there and have a great keeper race and that's how the big guys and the

[00:14:19] really good guys in the big fleets win regardless you know they're not always around in first

[00:14:22] and trying to win the pin if it's favored by five or ten degrees they might start middle pin get off

[00:14:27] a line clean you know but execute their start and you know sail the shifts and and the beat the way

[00:14:32] they want to so it's just got if the lines square um let's say it's square to wind and so on um

[00:14:39] is a is is a less dense start generally in the middle yeah well it depends I mean I always tell

[00:14:45] guys when we're doing that and there's a line a square line and I think yeah the more you

[00:14:49] sail with these I don't know if you've done a lot of sailing with the mark bots but now the mark bots

[00:14:52] are out there and the pro's can control these marks on their cell phone basically so you know they let

[00:14:57] us know when the pin is set or a lot of times like in the Great Lakes fleet we do um a mark bot

[00:15:03] for the weather end and the lured in so the line is almost all the time perfectly square until

[00:15:07] the next shift comes through so once they get the line set they tell us they're pingable lines

[00:15:12] square away but um at basically two minutes and 30 seconds I think when you're doing your

[00:15:16] pre-start loops you know your starboard tackle loops normally about 20 to 40 square meters off a

[00:15:20] line and then your port tack loops normally you know 40 to 80 square meter or 80 meters off a line so

[00:15:27] when you're doing those loops at two minutes and 30 seconds you kind of can see and identify

[00:15:31] where the starting line is going to be crowded right so if you see a lot of guys at 230 if

[00:15:35] you're at the middle of the line and there's more boats to the right of you the boat end is

[00:15:40] probably going to be a little more crowded and and more dense than the pin in so that's when

[00:15:43] you can re-strategize and change your plan from starting at the boat to sliding down the pin for

[00:15:48] that at least then start down there so could we could we break down those loops then um so let's

[00:15:53] start with a port tack loop I've heard a number of people talk about being just below the pin

[00:16:02] at three and a half minutes and that feels to me um that's a lot of time to burn

[00:16:07] unless not a wednesday night race where it's uh that it tends to be a lot crowded and

[00:16:13] less room to maneuver but say on a you know heli hamson sailing world nudes type regatta

[00:16:20] that feels to me like a lot of time but i'm interested in how does your loop your start

[00:16:25] with the port tack loop how does that look from your point of view yeah I mean I think originally

[00:16:29] when you're you know doing all your homework and you ping the ends and kind of determine

[00:16:33] you know which end is favored or you know say we're sailing in anapolis in the uh

[00:16:38] really strong ebb tide and um you know that it's a northerly blowing you're probably going to

[00:16:43] be going left so even if the boat's favored by 10 degrees you probably want to start to lure

[00:16:47] to be able to go straight and get out of the current stay off the channel so that comes into

[00:16:51] play when you're doing all that stuff so at three minutes you would identify kind of where

[00:16:54] the group or fleet's going to be and say you figured that you know 80 percent of the boats

[00:16:58] are to your left pre-start towards the pin in is going to be crowded at you probably would

[00:17:02] slide up so that comes into play when you're setting up that pre-start stuff but as far as timing goes

[00:17:07] like say you're going to start to lure it in you know you're normally going to be doing a port approach

[00:17:11] and you're normally going to be tacking between you know 30 and 45 seconds if you're not doing

[00:17:17] that it's going to be hard to start probably three or four boat length stuff from the pin to

[00:17:21] the pin in it's just going to be not executable if that makes sense yeah I get it so um you do

[00:17:27] your final turn to make sort of final approach for the line at 30 seconds to a minute yeah um

[00:17:35] the point at which you're directly below the pin for that does that always just vary or do you have a

[00:17:41] standard two minutes we want to be at the below the pin because that gives us some options yeah

[00:17:48] to a lot of the coaches like Stephen Hutney's guys at 230 where their boat is on port tack is

[00:17:53] kind of where they're going to start meaning they're going to execute a little further kind

[00:17:56] of a semi-vanderbill start where they're going to sail down a certain amount of time to get back to

[00:17:59] that area at the final squeeze whether that be 30 seconds when starboard or a minute 30 on starboard

[00:18:05] but I think identifying the fleet of when they're set up you know majority the boats are going to

[00:18:09] set up on starboard around you know a minute 10 to a minute 45 right so yeah minute 45 is pretty

[00:18:17] early to be time and distance high slow killing on starboard tack so it's loss of opportunity for

[00:18:22] boats to come in on port boats to set up to weather that group so when you identify boats

[00:18:27] sitting up you know at a minute 45 and they're only you know five four or five lengths off a starting

[00:18:33] line they're going to have a hard time hitting that line at full speed so it's pretty crowded there

[00:18:36] so your strategy can change as far as okay we're going to do another loop go back to the pin and do

[00:18:40] a port approach and tack at 25 30 seconds and be able to leave out and put the bow down and

[00:18:45] start to lure it safely or you can dip that group if they're early and slide up the line and

[00:18:50] start at the right side of yeah I like that that's really that's really interesting there

[00:18:55] that notion of where you are at two minutes 30 is basically where you're going to come back to

[00:19:00] and where you're going to start and then you can time time it from there which is interesting

[00:19:04] when we were talking earlier I was surprised at how deep behind the line you like to be

[00:19:10] not you know two boat lengths but um I mean tell me it was a lot deeper than that wasn't

[00:19:17] yeah it depends on the fleet obviously you know we keep bringing up the Wednesday nights because

[00:19:20] it's such a small line and an aggressive group with the J-1 of 5 guys end up very close to the

[00:19:25] line there's always boats over early and when you watch the drone footage of the start you

[00:19:29] know the next day you're like oh my god guys are doing like three knots off the starting line

[00:19:33] when your target's what five eight up win and ten knots so um I think the time of distance

[00:19:37] is really good but that's where it comes into play just the pre-start routine of doing some

[00:19:42] pinging your ends knowing your lay lines for the boat and the pin that comes into play when you're

[00:19:46] doing port approach if you're starting near the pin and same with the boat you know you don't want to

[00:19:50] barge and get stuck out of there I mean how many times the Wednesday night do we see a couple

[00:19:54] j1-5's peeled off into the boat so knowing your lay line is important having your pings knowing

[00:19:58] how many meters you're off and then do a couple practice starts and there's like really two big

[00:20:04] reasons to do the practice starts one is just check the accuracy of your pins and your pings

[00:20:09] when you ping the end with your you use a pro start I think on your boat so when you ping those

[00:20:13] ends you want to be pinging them at I wouldn't go faster than four knots because the GPS is accurate

[00:20:18] but not that accurate so if you're going fast and four knots is probably not as accurate so when

[00:20:22] you ping the ends you want to be close hold courts close hold course at the boat end you know

[00:20:27] right next to the pin ping that and then same thing at the lured in at that pin you know

[00:20:31] ping that doing two to four knots um and then when you do a practice start you want to check

[00:20:36] to see how accurate are so you can start next to the pin and see where your bow is and if it says

[00:20:40] you know four meters off you might need to reap reap in reaping if that makes sense

[00:20:44] yeah it does and the other rule of thumb I'm not sure it's a rule of thumb but you

[00:20:49] talked a few times about um hitting the line you know obviously it's speed and um and on time

[00:20:57] which is the idea um but for you it's being within two meters of the line two weeks below

[00:21:05] for you is a good target so not actually hitting bang on the line but even being two meters below

[00:21:10] on time that feels like a good start for you yeah I agree that's a good start and that's why we

[00:21:15] I always like to ping you know when you ping the when you push a button to ping I always ping

[00:21:19] you know very safe on the lured side of the flag at the boat or the pin at the lured in

[00:21:25] that way you kind of can have confidence in trying to start at zeros on the pro start

[00:21:29] you know when it doesn't count down and your meters are going down quickly

[00:21:34] if you don't do that if you don't have a really safe and a confident ping it's hard to hit those

[00:21:38] zeros you know but general rule of thumb 30 second 30 meters you're off to the races and no

[00:21:42] current so that's a good rule of thumb to have so doing some practice starts to figure out how

[00:21:46] many meters you have to go um is is pretty good and just the guys that do it all the time

[00:21:51] have experience like if I was doing tactics for you I would be telling you okay we have

[00:21:54] 10 seconds to burn you know we're 10 meters too early right now or something like that or

[00:21:58] we're late at 45 seconds in sailing so uh really knowing your meters can help you get out of those

[00:22:03] weird situations that just happened right so you're trying to start in a least dense area and somebody

[00:22:08] comes over last minute on portac and leave bow's you know you probably have to kill high and

[00:22:12] get your separation off that boat so knowing your meters to get to the line and knowing when to

[00:22:16] put the bow down really important but hitting that line at full speed two meters back is

[00:22:20] is going to be a hard start to beat you at least be able to execute a good start and go

[00:22:23] straight and not have to get flushed out of the tack

[00:22:27] so you know the j-105 like probably a lot of big keelboats takes a long time to

[00:22:34] to accelerate to speed so if you're early it's quite deadly because then if you have to laugh

[00:22:39] to kill speed then it will take a ton of time to reattach speed and you'll you'll go hard right

[00:22:46] it's really hard and you look at you know when you start watching all these drone videos of

[00:22:50] our pre-start practices and even off the races you don't realize how much leeway a boat has so

[00:22:56] the one thing that we like to identify pre-start on any boat whether it's you know sailing on the

[00:23:00] tp with all pros or sailing you know the j-105 ones tonight okay it's blowing eight knots so our

[00:23:07] minimum boat speed is probably going to be two knots so i don't want you to go under two knots

[00:23:10] because we don't have good boat control with that we don't we can't defend if we're sitting

[00:23:14] up on starboard tack you know luffing the jib um half trimmed on the main trying to kill time

[00:23:19] and distance to get our starts you know get off the line clean if we're below two knots

[00:23:24] we can't defend we can't defend a port tack or we can't drop our bow down we can't double tack

[00:23:28] if we had to so identifying a bottom speed is really important in all that wind range and then

[00:23:33] as it gets choppier um you probably need to bump that up you know two and a half knots three knots

[00:23:39] and that means you know if you're doing two and a half knots and you're only two lengths off

[00:23:43] the starting line with 30 seconds ago you're probably too early so you know all that

[00:23:47] timing comes into play on the start like i can feel the adrenaline starting to flow as i'm talking

[00:23:55] about this as i'm starting to imagine it because it is very stressful um in those crowded you know

[00:24:01] j-105 like every fleet it's not just obviously a j-105 podcast um but j-105s probably have similar

[00:24:09] similar characteristics rather sort of mid 30s and above keel boats um one uh you know one rule

[00:24:15] of thumb i've heard from um again the j-105 fleet is no maneuvers within the last minute so you've got

[00:24:22] to be on starboard uh 60 seconds plus because otherwise you and but that requires a ton of

[00:24:30] of um you know knowledge and gut feel for what's uh what's going to work in those last 30 seconds

[00:24:37] i think that's a good rule of thumb but i think don't forget your boat speed comes into play

[00:24:40] with that so if you're on port tack and doing you know if our target in 10 knots is uh five nine

[00:24:47] six knots of boat speed if you're doing that boat speed on port tack you have the opportunity to

[00:24:51] tack on the starboard you're still going to be fast and then if there's you know a big gap to

[00:24:56] weather in your early you can tack back to port then back to starboard so it all relates to timing

[00:25:01] and boat speed but yeah if you're if you have good boat speed you kind of can wiggle out of a

[00:25:04] lot of situations where if you set up early and or slow you know you are that marshmallow waiting to

[00:25:09] get picked off from a boat coming in from behind or to lured so yeah the management of that final

[00:25:14] distance is really key yeah i'm already feeling stressed about it uh already um we're going out

[00:25:21] with your colleague jason i think i said on the weekend do uh to um uh you know to get some

[00:25:27] coaching on on starting and as Wednesday night it's absolutely critical um the other um area

[00:25:34] that we were going to talk about was um winward mark roundings and setting up setting up for the next

[00:25:40] leg of the course i'd love to hear you know how you how you know typically you think through that

[00:25:46] those kind of maneuvers yeah sure i mean i think if you think if you break down the whole entire

[00:25:50] race i mean the biggest gains and losses are um starting in the mark roundings you know other

[00:25:56] than that you know if you're tactfully brilliant hit some big shift you can pass some boats or

[00:25:59] you have great boat speed you can pass you know a couple boats here or there but those are the

[00:26:03] big opportunities for gain and the opportunities for loss so you know if you get off a line clean

[00:26:07] your mark rounds are probably gonna be easier because you're in less traffic and vice versa if you have a

[00:26:12] bad start you're gonna around maybe in a little bit more traffic so that's where

[00:26:16] you know tactically you have to think ahead of that weather mark rounding so you know when you

[00:26:19] sail on the big one design fleets you know if you're ahead you kind of want to obviously

[00:26:24] the rule of thumb is to get to the lay line get clear air and get out of there but when

[00:26:27] you're behind that's when it gets difficult right the lay line stacks up so where do you come

[00:26:31] in how do you approach you know it's easy to come in from the portac approach and come in from clear

[00:26:36] air but that's a very you know dangerous situation as you get to the top of the course um but a general

[00:26:41] thumb with you know the longer legs uh sailing world regard is coming up and it'll be what a mile

[00:26:45] and a quarter mile and a half leg if there's good breeze and if you start lured in the line

[00:26:50] and go straight off the line you're probably going to be approaching the weather mark from the

[00:26:54] left side and vice versa if you started the boat potentially you're tacking out early so you're

[00:26:58] probably going to be approaching the weather mark from the right side so if you're approaching the

[00:27:02] right side the danger is you know the lay lines as far as overstanding um approaching the port side

[00:27:07] obviously the danger is you know entering inside the zone and being able to attack in both that

[00:27:12] that files out so picking your spot through the starboard tack lay line is really important from

[00:27:17] there so the one thing that kind of comes into play a lot of times is guys when they're behind

[00:27:21] try to get to the lay line pretty early but it looks good you tack the lay line but then you

[00:27:25] have five ten boats ahead of you and guess where they're going to attack right on the right on the

[00:27:28] lay line so you're sitting in bad air so that final approach of thinking it through not just one

[00:27:32] step ahead but two steps ahead of how to keep that air clear one bill starboard important so a lot of

[00:27:37] times you end up tacking you know smart guys that are behind will tack you know five six ten

[00:27:42] lengths inside the starboard lay have a clear or somewhat clear laying to be able to stay close

[00:27:47] to their targets close to boat speed so the losses are minimized so they can get back in there

[00:27:52] and just round with the group and work on passing boats on the next leg yeah I've heard that people

[00:27:58] talk about a hidden lane being inside the starboard lay line but so if you've got clear air and

[00:28:06] probably some decision making there because you haven't committed to being on the lay line

[00:28:10] but as you get close to the mark the risks start to increase because now you've got to

[00:28:17] tack twice so you've got to find that hole and if that starboard lay line gets more and more crowded

[00:28:24] you're you're now a little you could be potentially a little bit trapped below the lay line and that

[00:28:30] takes some awareness to watch to see where that lay line is you know if it's obviously a right

[00:28:34] favored track or there's some right shift going on or more pressure right obviously the starboard

[00:28:38] tag lay line will stack up quite early and if it's a left handed track obviously it's a

[00:28:42] little more clear over there so just having some patience and seeing where it is but obviously

[00:28:47] you know we talked about the least density starting areas and normally if you have a good

[00:28:50] start if the boat's favored by 10 degrees and you start middle or or pin in you're going to be in

[00:28:55] clear air for a long time and so when the starboard tack boats tack on that left shift you know you

[00:29:01] have the ability of sailing to it for you know 30 seconds tack over and you could have a clear

[00:29:05] lane on port for a long time so that sets up the approach really I mean right after the starting

[00:29:09] line half you have to beat you're thinking about your approach to the weather mark and

[00:29:12] that's really the key to either you know minimizing losses or gaining on that leg it's

[00:29:16] really important so what I thought you know we did in our first year sometimes we got to the lay line

[00:29:21] starboard lay line too early but it did create this sort of sensory relief in terms of okay we're

[00:29:26] on the lay line great we can see them out we're going to hit it but you do lose that flexible

[00:29:30] tactical flexibility but also a wind shift comes in and you lose that obviously and then just get

[00:29:36] crowded so then then you're in air then you're sort of yeah the biggest thing about

[00:29:40] lay line management is your sail an extra distance you know so when you analyze after the race

[00:29:45] a lot of guys you know have the trackers on board and can see the data but I would be willing to bet

[00:29:49] nine times out of ten the boats that sail the shortest distance end up you know podium or for

[00:29:54] sure winning the race because it's just they're sailing shorter distance so when you over stand

[00:29:58] you're adding the meters to your overall distance so it's normally not as good so you

[00:30:02] have to identify whether it's worth sitting sailing extra distance to sailing clear air

[00:30:07] you know normally in my experience in super light air sometimes it's worth the sail

[00:30:11] a little bit past lay line be able to put the bow down sail at least at target speed or over

[00:30:16] target speed but other than that super light air your normally sailing extra distance is quite hard

[00:30:20] but there's also the tack count right in the j105 you're probably losing two lengths to a guy that

[00:30:25] doesn't tack maybe more and chop you're probably losing four lengths so you two extra tax there's

[00:30:30] potentially eight lengths that you're giving up on that beep so yeah tax you to count and you

[00:30:34] need to put them in the right spot so it's important to be able to execute good tax and

[00:30:38] put them in the right spot because it is lost and you need to tax

[00:30:41] we talked a little bit we mentioned sort of the offset as well which is common to

[00:30:46] many classes obviously folks that talking to christy robinson

[00:30:51] in earlier in the sea in the season as she talked about that as being a zone of opportunity

[00:30:57] because if you if you if you're drilled and you've got you you know everybody's coordinated

[00:31:03] you can really catch boats in Jonah off she's absolutely right i mean we have a coach that

[00:31:08] always says basically the offset leg is free boat legs meaning if you sail that well you're a lot of

[00:31:12] people don't put a lot of time or effort into the setup of the weather mark the offset leg and

[00:31:18] that really sets up your spinnacle voice and your hold downwind leg so

[00:31:21] basically if we're coming in on the port tack and do a slam tack just outside the zone and we

[00:31:26] round the weather mark at three knots and you know 10 knots of breeze where we should be doing

[00:31:30] you know six knots of wind we're almost set up for failure right because both behind doing that

[00:31:36] target are going to push into us on the offset leg so it's going to be really hard for us to

[00:31:40] get to the offset leg not have you know no overlaps and have a clear spinnacle set to be

[00:31:46] able to get that kite clear and get down the run so that whole setup is really important but

[00:31:51] you know as you go on the offset leg you're really thinking about you know before you get

[00:31:55] there hopefully the tactician has thought about what the plan is on the run right if it's

[00:31:59] a pretty square run um and the right side's favorite upwind you might be doing a jibe pretty

[00:32:04] early so you wouldn't want to do a high spinnaker set and really waste distance that way and meaning

[00:32:08] if it's a super square course and you're happy nobody's behind you and you have a really good

[00:32:12] offset leg you're probably just going to do a normal vmg bear away where you get the kite up

[00:32:16] get the boat speed target and get the boat down as deep as possible you know in j1-5 we

[00:32:20] start sailing weather heel and easing that spinnaker and getting really deep angles so

[00:32:24] to do that you need to have a nice a nice offset leg that sets that up the biggest thing to me on

[00:32:29] the offset set whole turn you know a lot of guys around the weather mark and just aim straight at the

[00:32:33] offset but really if you do that think about it you can't set your spinnaker until your bow's

[00:32:38] past the mark i do that you really want you really want to aim a length and a half two lengths

[00:32:43] above the offset and that's going to give your bow team opportunity so when you drop the bow

[00:32:49] to bear away the apparent winning it goes f right so the tactician call hoist or the

[00:32:54] helmsman can call hoist so with a good mark rounding um with a person aiming two lengths

[00:32:59] above the offset leg they can get their spinnaker up and drawing and the stern is just at the offset

[00:33:06] where if you just aim straight at the offset and go for a hoist you're going to be two to four lengths

[00:33:09] past the offset leg before your spinnaker's up and drawing so that whole setup is really

[00:33:14] important to take it through that's really interesting because again being a quite a naive

[00:33:20] driver i've always had that philosophy as it always the last couple of years of um being close

[00:33:25] to that to each of the marks that you could touch it whether upwind or downwind um obviously without

[00:33:31] losing too much speed but it's really interesting to i can see why you'd want to stay above

[00:33:37] above the so if you get your kite up earlier you're going to separate from the guys behind

[00:33:42] you and help tactically it helps you be able to go straight or sail deeper or jive depending

[00:33:47] on tactically what you're doing and the guys in front of you may have rounded a bunch of traffic

[00:33:51] and they're fighting high if you have a great set you could gain you know some of those links back

[00:33:55] they did a couple extra attacks with downwind so it's important so that that rule holds whether

[00:34:00] you're doing a jive set or a barroway set yeah even more so on the jive set right because the

[00:34:04] jive set you got a lot going on basically you can do you can hoist the spinnaker you know a

[00:34:08] little bit earlier because you turn into a jive right away um but you know the whole key to that

[00:34:13] on the offset leg is making sure you've broken the overlap with the guy behind you right if you have a

[00:34:18] boat inside you're behind you then obviously he has room you know rooms of his rights to room there

[00:34:24] so you have to give him an opportunity so for me the barroway always feels like a lower risk more

[00:34:30] conservative strategy and i i i know that you have to think about what was the lift attack

[00:34:36] coming into the lag and so i know all that right but but it's for me it's uh missing that first

[00:34:41] shift may be um less risky than you know fucking up uh uh if we do fuck up a jive set it's on the

[00:34:50] driver it's on i'm just on my crew who are really good yeah well there's i mean there's you know there's

[00:34:54] really four sets that are really important to execute so there's the normal barroway vmg meaning

[00:34:59] there's nobody around you you aim two lengths high the offset you have a nice clean set jib

[00:35:04] gets furrow kites up and drawing you're sailing you know your deep target angles right away

[00:35:10] then there's the high set meaning you know you're rounding in traffic or boats behind you

[00:35:15] that if you did a normal vmg rounding and sail down and a guy stayed high he's going to get into your

[00:35:19] air right so the high set would mean you know you're only going to bear away to just above

[00:35:24] your target downwind angle and get the spinnaker up and the you know the term is going to have

[00:35:28] to have a sheet on a little bit more maybe your jib stays out longer you get the boat moving

[00:35:31] until your lane gets cleared then you can drop the bow um or a low set meaning you're around

[00:35:36] behind a group and you know everybody's going to be jiving soon so you're going to set and sail

[00:35:41] you know at least no higher than your vmg um target angle if not a little bit lower so when

[00:35:46] those guys get set up to jib you can jive on them and pass them and then obviously you know the

[00:35:51] jibeset we talked about meaning if there's that's normally a good move if there's 10 to 15 degree

[00:35:56] right shift upwind you're probably a jibeset would be pretty strong yeah one thing i did

[00:36:01] learn last year was don't be in the middle so when people are jiving in light wind conditions

[00:36:08] is if we seem to get quite a lot on the on the shezapink bay off anapolis um um you know i'd be

[00:36:15] stuck in that position again purely my stupid driving and then people can sail past them it's just

[00:36:21] yeah yeah yeah no it's frustrating when you're in the middle and guys are behind and then as

[00:36:25] you sail in the back of their fleet you know biggest thing i always find is it's hard for

[00:36:28] those guys they just you're going to be around boats that aren't sailing the correct angle so if

[00:36:32] you're around in the back of the pack and they might be sailing you know five ten degrees higher than

[00:36:37] you know ray wolf who rounded first is in clear air and has weather heal you know you're going

[00:36:41] to be sailing extra distance just because you're in the back of the pack so maybe an early jive

[00:36:46] getting out on your own and sailing your angles will help you gain boats and gain meters back

[00:36:50] to the to the leaders it is so it's that's you know you're saying so many interesting things

[00:36:56] here i'm gonna go back a little bit some ride all this down the um so do you find then that the back

[00:37:02] of the fleet tends not to do a jive set on ab i mean i know unless we have to do a jive set

[00:37:09] could we have to be over there for some reason but yeah i think it's probably wind speed dependent

[00:37:14] right and when it's light air on like wednesday night's a lot of time when we round that r2

[00:37:19] sometimes the faster um angle uh in the shortest distances on port jive straight back into the

[00:37:25] seven river so um you know executing a jive suit there is pretty important but as it gets

[00:37:30] windier it's in horror maneuver right so if you haven't practiced it it's going to get tangled

[00:37:34] so you know you need to make sure your sword is on that hey scott so the sort of the whole point

[00:37:38] of this series was about sailing faster obviously which is the quest that all of us are obsessive

[00:37:46] about how do you go about ensuring that whether it's your own boat or whether you're

[00:37:52] selling clients or someone how do you how do you go about ensuring maximum boat speed

[00:37:56] yeah i think getting to target speeds is really important and how do you do that i think you know

[00:38:00] use everybody and even the good guys that spend a lot of time practicing and training and sail

[00:38:04] testing and tuning you know unless you do a really good job and going through your boat and making

[00:38:08] sure everything is marked meaning your jib leads your traveler uh marking your jib sheets you know

[00:38:14] we're weather sheeting now a lot in the j-1 to 5 so making sure your weather sheet is marked so

[00:38:18] you can see how much weather sheet you have on um obviously knowing where the leads are knowing your

[00:38:23] backstay tension number um on your little baton with colored tape or a pressure gauge or load

[00:38:28] cell whatever you have there to know those settings and when you're going well documenting

[00:38:32] those settings so you can always get back to that a lot of guys you know sail freelance you

[00:38:36] can get going fast at times but you know as you know crew rotates through the boat you

[00:38:40] may have different tremor or guys had different philosophy or you learn some something

[00:38:44] from somebody new coming on your boat you know you want to be able to record those settings

[00:38:47] and repeat that and uh and get the boat faster that way what's your um ideal way of marking it just

[00:38:53] through a marker pen or do you put tape on or yeah I mean obviously the simple way to do it

[00:38:58] um is just a sharpie pin on the boat and then you know on the jib tracks you would number each

[00:39:03] hole so starting forward would be you know your max forward hold to me would be zero and then as

[00:39:08] you go back you know all the way to five ten whatever your jib leads are um and same thing

[00:39:13] on your um where the jib comes to jib sheet comes to the wind or the block you know having a number

[00:39:20] grid there sometimes you can buy those deck stickers you know quantum has them yeah I sell them yeah you

[00:39:24] can see goes to your boat so you have a same thing you have a number grid system and then I like

[00:39:28] to mark the sheets with a couple different colors or some orange insignia tape from your

[00:39:32] sail makers stick that on the sheet so you can always see you know where the jibs go on

[00:39:37] as a helmsman if you're driving the boat it's nice to be able to okay we're going really well

[00:39:41] and I see the jib might be trimmed a little bit tighter than we normally do it's probably a good

[00:39:44] thing and you wouldn't notice you wouldn't notice that unless you had marks on the sheet you know

[00:39:48] you're not too lured looking at your leads making sure your top tail tail is flying C and L tied it is

[00:39:53] that's really important and then if you ever bring in a coach you know he comes behind you

[00:39:57] and he tells you to tighten your jib sheet up two inches if you don't have it marked you

[00:40:00] know you're just randomly pulling on the jib sheet so when you learn something good or bad it's

[00:40:05] nice to know where you are so it's really important um I've got one actually I've got one

[00:40:10] additional question to ask you when I think about it uh wing on wing is something that some of the

[00:40:15] j105 drivers and laplets are or boats and laplets are starting to look at um any thoughts on wing

[00:40:23] on wing and if when you do it talk us through what you're looking for because it you know you're

[00:40:29] sailing by the lee some of the time when you do that it's quite tricky yeah no worries I mean

[00:40:34] people don't realize the reason wing and wing came on to these you know j boats and the smaller

[00:40:38] sport boats is guys were doing a lot of testing and doing small course racing and basically you

[00:40:44] know a couple boats started going to the wing because the lured legs the track was so short and

[00:40:49] so small that it's literally the best vmg and almost the same target speed so those boats

[00:40:53] started winning the races and people were like wait a second we need to sort this out um I remember

[00:40:59] we did the j111 worlds we won in 2015 I think and our coach was Ed Adams and uh we were winning the

[00:41:05] distance race by quite a bit and he made his practice wing and wing and we were we were back

[00:41:10] to those days we were scared to use it during the winter lured races because it's you know

[00:41:13] it's a little high skill level the helmsman has to drive really smoothly really well with a wheel

[00:41:18] it's quite hard to do wing and wing because there's a little delay there in the steering you

[00:41:21] know the helmsman is trying to keep the windex data started on the rudder the trimmer is

[00:41:25] trying to keep the the clue out you know too lured so the sail doesn't break and then you have to

[00:41:30] trip you have to sail the boat to the break um but we never really did it in the winter lured races

[00:41:35] and I over we were winning one of the distance races by a nice little distance and I missed the

[00:41:38] lay line so I'm like all right let's go to the wing we went to the wing and we doubled our

[00:41:42] distance and we won the race and cut to the thing and he just comes up to us and starts

[00:41:46] yelling that I told you to go wing wing this whole regatta but it's quite good vmg but

[00:41:50] it's tricky right if you have um you know bad air behind it's really hard to keep it full but

[00:41:55] it's it's a strong move but it needs to be practiced for sure yeah also I think I learned from I think

[00:42:01] was Doug the dog strike who talked about the fact that it can enable you to stay on starboard

[00:42:06] even though you're you know heading away and sometimes that that's useful there's two ways

[00:42:12] to look at it a little uh j if you sail j 70s you know that class has gotten so big and so

[00:42:16] many boats that a lot of times uh you know in the eight to sixteen knot range over half the fleet's

[00:42:23] going to be on the wing it's just the best vmg but how do you get in that spot is key you know if you

[00:42:27] round in a group and nobody else is on the wing and you all of a sudden go to the wing you get to

[00:42:31] lure to that group and maybe the group behind you stay on high you get into an area where your

[00:42:36] clear air longer so a lot of times the wing comes into play as far as just clearing your air behind

[00:42:40] yeah so that's pretty important and then the other time it's used as uh we call it no man's land

[00:42:45] coming in you know middle of the gates you're not really laying starboard gate or left gate

[00:42:49] you can flip the boat to the wing and kind of get to one of the gates by being on the wing

[00:42:53] yeah we'll try i'm going to make sure that my crew hear that point you made about it being

[00:42:58] very difficult to drive yes for sure well i'm sorry to say that's where my conversation

[00:43:08] with scott actually ended because my bloody wi-fi dropped so well that's actually where my conversation

[00:43:18] with scott ended because my wi-fi dropped out and so i wasn't able to

[00:43:28] well at that point that was the end of the conversation with scott because my wi-fi

[00:43:31] dropped out which was a bit unfortunate so uh he couldn't hear me i couldn't hear him so

[00:43:36] oh well we had covered a lot of ground and uh i thought it was a fantastic conversation i learned

[00:43:41] to turn i hope you did too hope you enjoyed it thank you very much for listening um i'm sure

[00:43:47] you have all subscribed to sail faster wherever you get your favorite podcasts or go to www

[00:43:54] sail faster net if you haven't and sign up there thanks for listening as always thanks

[00:44:00] to scott for joining us take care everybody and see you all on the water