That's right. 2 boats costing well in excess of $50 million each will match race each other tomorrow ie 1 on 1. If one boat wins the first two races there won't even be a third race. Given that it is perfectly possible for these beast to finish a race in 2 hrs that is possibly more than $10 million dollars per hours racing these boats will ever do! These boats are approx 90ft long but also 90ft wide - one is a cat and the other a trimaran and they both fly a hull in less than 5 kts of wind. Get this - they can do 3 times the speed of wind, thus in only 10 kts they do 30kts!! One of them has a wing sail that 1/3rd bigger than a wing of a jumbo jet.  Hope they finish safely. Apparently they will be showing video of the racing live and I think this is where.

What a busy w/e! So much went on at Rutland. The new RS100 showed through very well, conditions were against the fast assymetrics, Alex Mothersele and Hamish Ellis were top 29er, Tom Paddock dragged some old friend of mine around the track in a Firefly, and much more besides. Full results here.

So Bough Beech turned the sun up for most of the weekend - a bit less on Sunday and a bit chillier (is that a real word?). But perfect practice conditions for the South Zone Squad. Another new invention by Nicky MacGregors crowd was the decision that sailing ought to be conducted according to a health and safety traffic light system. Personally I think they still need to work on the conventional colour sequencing...

but guess what I'm doing? The chariots of fire are rolling!

Must stop these alliterations as all arguments are absolutely ...

Anyway, this w/e the SZS & NZS are out for fun. Conditions look like being close to perfect with sun at both venues and brilliant windstrength for training forecast. SZS are at Bough Beech with just a tad more breeze in the offing than the NZS at Grafham. A F2-3 is just perfick. Have a good w/e folks.

Just a quick reminder of the forthcoming combined Feva / Tera training event on 20th / 21st February.  There are currently 10 Fevas and 10 Teras registered for the day.  Due to the high level of interest, we have organised additional coaches so that the two fleets can gain from excellent coaching over the two days.  Jonathan Lewis , Tera National Squad coach and former Feva National Squad coach will be running this 2 day event. Jonathan will be supported by Phil Walker and Andrew Weeden .  Jonathan and Phil will be splitting their time between the Fevas and Teras during the course of the two days, with Andrew supporting those with less experience. 

The event is open to a broad range of capabilities and is aimed at giving everyone something to build on in their sailing.  The Feva training events Jonathan ran last year were a huge success - and have helped to establish a Feva fleet at Draycote. Jonathan's involvement with Tera's makes this an ideal opportunity to help establish a Tera / Feva pathway at Draycote.  Numbers are just about ideal, but there is still room for a couple more boats in each fleet .  To cover rib hire, coaching and other costs, there is a £4 charge per person per day for Draycote members. Visitors will be charged £8 per person per day.  Start time is 9.30am Saturday (rigged but not changed) and a similar time on the Sunday.  We will aim to finish by 3.30 / 4.00pm on the Sunday.

Please contact Simon Loveridge (simonloveridge@sky.com) if you would like to register a place.

"...for me, ultra-aggressive sailing was just normal.That's how you should race. Once on the water, the gloves were off. But back on shore, we got on fine. We'd sit down and talk about movesand what had worked well."

Ben, in his autobiography "Close to the Wind", was talking about practicing with and racing with his mates from his club in Cornwall. What he says just has to be a good principle - on the water everybody is equal and you fight hard. But, and there is a but, this means doing it fairly, without gamesmanship, without bullying younger or less experienced sailors. If such sailors baulk you it is usually through knowledge or experience that is less than yours.

There are three things that will happen if you shout at and abuse them for their indiscretion 1) you loose your racing thread and it takes time to get back into the groove so you will have lost even more - not smart 2) you loose the potential friendship and goodwill of someone who probably looks up to you  3) It diminishes you as a person to loose control in such a poor manner and looses you respect.

 If on the other hand you get on with your own race it is easier to remain in the groove and you have the opportunity to explain afterwards what they did wrong and what they should have done, thereby winning friends and influencing people. Everyones a winner!

Sail hard but fair and take your own penalties promptly. That guarantees fun.

Practicing the bear away without using rudder - extreme but pretty fast I think by Sam & Richard.

The second day of the Skandia Inter-School Sailing Festival was filled with lots of sunshine and fun at Middle Island, but the young sailors were facing great challenge of very light wind condition. 18 teams comprising over 120 youth sailing enthusiasts of aged between 12 and 18 were competing in team racing format with 24 dinghies -- six Q’ba, six Pico and 12 Feva dinghies at Middle Island, RHKYC’s dinghy sailing centre on 30 and 31 January.

The event has entered into its 8th chapter and Royal Skandia is honoured to return for the second year as title sponsor of this popular annual inter-school sailing event. Besides the fierce competition on the water, the venue is filled with a festive atmosphere with onshore activities and entertainment such as DJ music, food and beverage, and throngs of spectators cheering on their teams.

Contestants of this event are a mix of students from international and local schools, several schools have been the “veterans” of this event such as the King George V, Island Schools, German Swiss International School, Jockey Club Ti-I College, Hong Kong Sea School…etc. And this year, we saw new challengers, and two of them even came all the way from Macau, they are the Australian International School, Macau Anglican College and the International School of Macau. The two Macau teams not only enjoyed the races, they also enjoyed the experience of camping at Middle Island.

78 races plus 3 fun races were held on 2 days, and fierce competition among schools was seen. The Hong Kong Sea School faced great challenge to defend their champion’s and runner-up’s titles achieved last year. Results here. together with Y&Y article from RHKYC.

Great technique being shown here by Adam & Ed last Sunday at Parkstone. See the way the main outhaul is lightly eased off to give max power; the way Adam is showing total main sheeting angle control with a direct bypass of the mainsheet; the perfect slot twixt main and jib; Ed looking upwind for where the next is coming from (that's where it does come from on these fast assymetrics you know; Kite sheet eased to the point of luff curl but not overly so on the edge that speed is lost with non stop trimming, the speed is great that the wake is reduced to a mere ripple as the hull just skims the surface - and the result of course that the Rib is being left for dead... Pure adrenaline! (Thanks Niall for the photo)