Greetings,
As I am starting to get an understanding of how the sail controls function on my boat, and posts on sail trim are no longer written in a foreign language, I have become painfully aware of a sail control deficiency on Tachyon: she has never had a boom vang installed. I participated in my first race as skipper of my own boat (single-handed) over the holiday weekend, and aside from some truly awful tacks due to a malfunctioning tiller tamer, and veering off course when I went forward to take down my improvised lashed on whisker pole/boat hook (another item I cannot believe has never been installed on a 25 year old boat!), I noticed that I simply could not match the main sail shape of the other boats. I went from the middle of the pack to the middle of the end of the pack on the beat and reaching. I have crewed several times on a San Juan 21 this summer, and finally had the chance to take the skipper of that boat out with me this past weekend on the H23. He immediately commented on the lack of the boom vang and told me that in order to improve performance I should spend my money on that before anything else. The H23 is supposed to be a one-design class, but I have not been able to find any information as to what is and what is not class legal, and for that matter, where the boom vang should be mounted. Do any of you have a factory boom vang on your H23? If so, could you give me the measurements from the base of the mast and distance from the mast side of the boom to the bails? I am ordering the vang this week and hope to have it installed this weekend.
How did I do in the regatta? I haven't seen the results with the Portsmouth ratings taken into account yet, but I did cross the line first out of the first year sailors.
If any of you have not participated in racing, I urge you to do so. I never had an appreciation for the amount of skill and strategy involved until I started racing as crew. For the novice sailors out there, I've found that at least at my marina it's easy to get on a boat as crew on race day if you are able bodied and understand what the skipper is asking you to do. They will very quickly get you doing what they need and you learn so much more quickly than if you are going out on your own.
Thanks,
Chris
As I am starting to get an understanding of how the sail controls function on my boat, and posts on sail trim are no longer written in a foreign language, I have become painfully aware of a sail control deficiency on Tachyon: she has never had a boom vang installed. I participated in my first race as skipper of my own boat (single-handed) over the holiday weekend, and aside from some truly awful tacks due to a malfunctioning tiller tamer, and veering off course when I went forward to take down my improvised lashed on whisker pole/boat hook (another item I cannot believe has never been installed on a 25 year old boat!), I noticed that I simply could not match the main sail shape of the other boats. I went from the middle of the pack to the middle of the end of the pack on the beat and reaching. I have crewed several times on a San Juan 21 this summer, and finally had the chance to take the skipper of that boat out with me this past weekend on the H23. He immediately commented on the lack of the boom vang and told me that in order to improve performance I should spend my money on that before anything else. The H23 is supposed to be a one-design class, but I have not been able to find any information as to what is and what is not class legal, and for that matter, where the boom vang should be mounted. Do any of you have a factory boom vang on your H23? If so, could you give me the measurements from the base of the mast and distance from the mast side of the boom to the bails? I am ordering the vang this week and hope to have it installed this weekend.
How did I do in the regatta? I haven't seen the results with the Portsmouth ratings taken into account yet, but I did cross the line first out of the first year sailors.
If any of you have not participated in racing, I urge you to do so. I never had an appreciation for the amount of skill and strategy involved until I started racing as crew. For the novice sailors out there, I've found that at least at my marina it's easy to get on a boat as crew on race day if you are able bodied and understand what the skipper is asking you to do. They will very quickly get you doing what they need and you learn so much more quickly than if you are going out on your own.
Thanks,
Chris
