Hitting the gas

Latest video and update on Paul Larsen's speed sailing campaign

The work up for SailRocket continues down in Weymouth. The video here was shot on Sunday.

Paul Larsen reports:

Well we went for it again yesterday in more breeze as promised. I went with the old soft sail mentality where if it feels like it's a bit too much and all a bit risky... then we should back ourselves and go for it. If this boat is ever going to do its stuff then we have to get used to sailing in stronger stuff. We had wind and tide in our favour and a great group of helpers now becoming pretty handy at handling the boat. Malcolm [Barnsley] was down as was Dom, Gretel and Alex.

The launch all went smoothly but when we pulled up the rig at the near end of the course the boat began to go head to wind and then through head to wind. It wanted to tack and we couldn't stop it. Now the boat was fully backed and we were relying on all the safety's built in for just a scenario. We decided not to fight it but to go with it and lead the whole craft around into a gybe which would put us back on course. I sheeted the wing in tight so she wouldn't slam across and around she came. Thankfully she was undamaged and ready to go. The RIB let me go and I sailed slowly up onto the course to allow them to get in position half way down. Alex was using a tripod to film from on the shore.

Sailrocket quickly accelerated up to 25 knots while I juggled the mainsheet between the coarse and fine tune. In all the excitement of the circle work I hadn't paid enough attention to configuring the mainsheet so that there was enough travel in the fine tune. The coarse tune was pretty tight so I left it in the cleat. Just to check that I wasn't oversheeted I eased out only to feel the boat slow. When I sheeted on it felt like I was given a kick in the arse but the way we have the forward mainsheet bridle set up it prevented me from sheeting in any more. This bridle had just served its purpose and saved the wing when the boat tacked so it's a very necessary piece of kit. We need to install a system to allow us to adjust this as not being able to sheet in the last 10-12 degrees is obviously limiting us.

Nonetheless she felt rock solid and not in the least bit intimidating. I shot past the RIB reading off the numbers on the instruments over the VHF. At the end of the course I did a big bear away to get away from the shore so I could round up. The boat was smoking but sailing into rougher water. We were now over 30 knots and quickly running out of runway. I initiated a round up and the boat spun into the wind as if I had ripped on the handbrake. Sweeeeeet. That's a nice tool to have in the box of tricks.

The RIB quickly came along side and Dom quickly installed the Harken 6:1 purchase for lowering the rig. It was about now that we realised we were right in the channel in a flood tide getting sucked into the causeway and under the bridge...Which was too low to clear. The rig was half way down and now... she bloody well decided to tack again!!! It was all getting a bit exciting. Once she tacked we tried to motor-sail this bloody weird contraption against the current and sort of succeded but when the rig back winded hard in a half raised position it hit the beam, punched a big hole through the carbon Nomex composite and tore the lower flap off...and then gybed. I knew we had to get the rig down and under control and then motor hard out of this causeway. If we continued to get sucked under the bridge we would just write the whole lot off.

Dom, Gretel and Helena did a great job very quickly and we brought the RIB alongside and got the hell out of there. Phew... too much excitement. we all laughed nervously. We had done a little bit of damage but all in all I felt we had got away with it. We had seen the boat do something unusual but we had the foresight to build in good systems to deal with it. These systems had saved our bacon. We now have to work out why the boat has such a strong tendency to tack. My feeling is that we need to launch and retrieve SailRocket from the shore. We still need to use the RIB of course but the raising and lowering of the rig needs to be done from a fixed point. We learnt a hell of a lot. There is bound to be a bit of damage sustained in our learning process.

When we got it all back to the shore and inspected the damage we found it really was nothing major. A hole in a non critical area a few dints in the flap and some stripped threads on the plastic flap hinges. Cool, I can deal with that. So we all retired to the Cove Inn pub for a debrief to lower our heart rates.

We have the best photos yet of the boat in action and Alex got some great footage so you will all see it soon enough. Sailrocket is once again in the 30 knot club but I will let you all have a guess at how quick when you see the video. You can have a guess on the blog spot.

So it was another great day for learning and gaining confidence. The boat is in its element when on the course. It feels incredible and really is not intimidating at all. I have done over 30 knots on alot of boats and this boat feels the most stable of them all.

Top fun... now for 40!!!

It blew over 60 knots last night. Luckily she was all tucked away in the container.
Cheers, Paul.

NB: The video is formatted to play in Windows Media Player and is 6MB in size - therefore only suitable for those with broadband connections. Mac users can now view WMV files by downloading a suitable add on to Quicktime - we for example use Flip4Mac which works a treat. The only noticable difference is that while the clip will play out while downloading on a PC, on a Mac it must download first.