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Keep an eye on the telltales: The telltales are the small strips of ribbon or yarn attached to the sail. They show the direction of the wind relative to the sail. By keeping an eye on the telltales, you can adjust the sail trim to keep the wind flowing smoothly over the sail.

Use the sheet: The sheet is the line that controls the sail’s angle relative to the wind. You can adjust the sheet to control the amount of power in the sail. As a general rule, you want to trim the sail in as tight as possible without causing excessive turbulence in the wind.

Watch for luffing: Luffing is when the sail flaps and loses power due to too much wind pressure or an incorrect sail trim. Keep an eye on the sail to make sure it’s not luffing excessively, and adjust the trim to keep the sail powered up and efficient.

Adjust the halyard tension: The halyard is the line that controls the height of the sail. You can adjust the halyard tension to fine-tune the sail shape and optimise performance. A tighter halyard will flatten the sail and reduce power, while a looser halyard will allow the sail to fuller and generate more power.

Work with your team: Trimming a headsail is a team effort. Communicate with your team to make sure everyone is on the same page and working together to achieve the best possible sail trim. Make small adjustments and pay attention to how the sail responds, and don’t be afraid to experiment to find the optimal trim for your boat and conditions.

By Peter Grayson

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26 DECEMBER 2021

Due to good preparation Crux was ready to go on Boxing Day.  The original plan was to leave the Marina at about 11:30.  We decided there was no need to be at the start line too early.  As other boats slowly made their way out of the Marina, Carlos was busy downstairs doing some last-minute navigation on the latest wind data and I went about setting up the sheets and getting the boat ready for sail.

Before we knew it, it was 11:45.  We quickly cast off and made our way out to the start line, hoisted our storm sails and checked off with the start boat.  Carlos finished checking the latest winds and before we knew it, it was 12:45.

We hoisted the mainsail, but as it went up, we discovered the blanking plug on the mast hadn’t been put in after the storm sails were up, and on hoisting, one of the slugs on the main had come out.  Consequently, we had to drop the main, add the blanking plate and rehoist, ease but it chews a few minutes without realising.  Carlos suggested getting the spinnaker up on deck.  I went about setting the spinnaker up and Carlos said, “you might as well connect all the sheets up to the spinnaker”.  I asked, “how long till the start?” to which he replied 2 minutes.  I looked at him and said, “two minutes to our warning signal?” and he said, “no two minutes to the start!”.  Time sure goes quickly.

We hit the start line with our spinnaker going up and before we knew it, we had started the Rolex Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race.  As we made our way towards the Heads, we were quite shy with the spinnaker and only just holding it.  I suggested to Carlos that we get rid of the spinnaker as I did not believe that we would be able to carry it and being two handed, if we decided to keep pushing on and then we needed to drop it, we would not have enough resources and time to be able to drop it without actually losing a lot of ground.

This decision turned out to be a wise choice as others started losing their spinnakers.  We rounded our Mark and then made our way out to sea to our next mark.  As we made our way out, it was clear that heading out to sea before tacking was the preferred tactic.  At this point, Carlos decided to go down for a nap and I don’t blame him.  Getting the boat to the start line is no easy task.

As I continued out to sea, I saw a helicopter approaching.  I took the jacket I had half on, off and put it in the cockpit and basically focused on looking forward as most photographers prefer action shots and not waving at the camera.  The helicopter did a complete loop around the boat quite close and quite low and the boat got a good whack of downdraft from the helicopter, but the result was a very good shot.

We got out to the point that most the boats were tacking.  I could see going a little bit further was preferable before tacking.  We tacked and started making our way down the coast.  We continued doing shifts as we made our way down the coast, averaging about 3 hours on 3 hours off.  I ended one of my shifts and went downstairs.  I was only downstairs around two or three minutes, and suddenly I heard the number 3 flogging and the boat leaning over.  I quickly popped my head upstairs to see what was going on.  Carlos yelled back that we had over 30 as he was about to tack.  We completed the tack and then quickly discussed what we’re going to do.  Did we think the squall was short lived or going to hang around?  I responded that we needed to get the three down immediately as it was flogging, and it was not going to survive.  We discovered later when we had to flake the number three that it had a small tear in it, so we couldn’t actually use it anymore for the race.

About 20-30 minutes after this, we came across a full crewed boat crossing in front of us and we’re a little bit puzzled because it had no main and look like they had either their #4 or storm Jib up only and we thought that was a little bit of overkill.  It wasn’t until the next few skeds that we discovered that there was a small, isolated squall and a lot of boats got hammered with a lot worse than we did.

During the night around about 3:00am, Carlos was yelling down to me for help, this was tiny little bit odd, because Carlos would normally just come down and wake me.  He then continued to calmly tell me we had lost Mary, the auto pilot.  I came up on deck and Carlos repeated that Mary was dead.  There was a job to do and he couldn’t leave the helm anymore to do the job.  So, he needed me to do it.

I did the job and then we discussed what we’re going to do with Mary.  We knew that we needed an autopilot to be able to radio in Eden and continue racing.  The conditions were still 20 knots from the South.  The boat was bouncing around and both of us were suffering a little bit from seasickness.  Neither of us wanted to attempt to even work or repair the autopilot, doing so would just lose parts.

On Christmas Eve, I had called Carlos asking him about a backup autopilot and I actually ended up going to Khaleesi and stealing hers and all the electronics and converters so that in the rare case that the primary autopilot died, we had a backup.  Khaleesi’s autopilot was a self-contained system, but it had not been tested on Crux.  I had actually updated the software and hadn’t even tested it at this point.

Carlos suggested that as long as we could physically mount the autopilot, then we could wait until the conditions improved to actually wire it in.  With a small modification, this was doable and with that I went back to bed.

27 DECEMBER 2021

The wind was consistently from the South between 20 and 30 knots and we just continued to sail and make our way down the coast.

28 DECEMBER 2021

At some point during the 28^th, conditions started to improve, the rain had gone away. There was a bit of sunlight, and both me and Carlos were starting to feel a little bit better.  Carlos decided that he was going to start attempting to wire in the new autopilot, so while I was sailing, I was yelling the colours of the wires to him, how to wire it up and where we needed to mount the head unit.  After about 20 minutes, Carlos came upstairs, opened up the rear locker and pulled out two wires.  We cut the plug of the backup actuator; hard wired it; flicked the switch; pressed auto and the system came alive and was steering Crux.  It was working and we were still in the race!

29 DECEMBER 2021

The 29^th was another glorious day.  We had some good wind and had some spinnakers up.  Ultimately it was just a really pleasant day.  As me and Carlos were upstairs talking, Carlos pointed as a flipper looking item past the boat.  I looked at and instantly was like “this is a sun fish!”.  Carlos was not convinced, but after seeing a few more in the following days, agreed that it was actually a sun fish.

Carlos decided that, given the 29^th was such a good day, that he would make the night difficult and tiring.  My shift ended and I went downstairs.  Normally I sleep in all my gear, wet weather gear and PFD.  This way when someone yells for help, you can jump up and be on deck in 5 seconds.  The conditions were calm, the boat was warm inside, the bunks where dry so I thought I’d take the opportunity to sleep without all my gear so not to run hot, but with my PFD still on. I checked with Carlos to see if he was ok with me not having all my wet weather gear on and that if he needed me, to give me early warning so that I could completely get dressed.  I could still get up on deck quickly if needed, but my gear would get wet if I did.

I struggled to get to sleep a little bit this night.  I think not being 100% in my wet weather gear and 100% ready to go was itching at me.  I could feel the boat was getting more and more powered up as time went by, and after about an hour of not sleeping I got up and got completely dressed as I could tell the wind had increased.  I tried to get some sleep, but unfortunately although I was now ready, the boat was trucking along and powered up and even from my bunk I could feel the boat was on edge.  After 20 or 30 minutes the spinnaker collapsed and reset.  “That’s 1” I thought, then not long after that it did it again, “that’s 2”.  I had learnt from a previous offshore skipper about the “3 kite rule”.  When the kite collapses or is very unhappy 3 times, it’s time to get it down before you tear it or break something.  I did not get to 3.  At 2 I got up and went to check what was happening and see if we could run a little deeper.  Carlos responded that we were already running deeper than we should have been and bearing off more would be starting to really track away from our run line.

I had a quick look at the direction we were going and our run line and suggested that we needed to drop our spinnaker and swap to something that would allow us to run parallel to our run line.  We decided that it was going to be quicker to just drop the spinnaker, go bare head and hoist a jib top afterwards so that we were going in the right direction with the main.  We discussed how we were going to drop the spinnaker, because we were running really shy and the spinnaker had a lot of power in it.  We prepped the spinnaker, moved the pole forward and got ready to do the letterbox drop.  Carlos and I  where about to look at each other to check that we were both ready to do the drop, when suddenly the brace let go and jumped out of the winch.  Decision made for us, dropping now!  It was a very quick drop down the hatch and the jib top was up before we knew it.

I tried to get some more sleep, but it wasn’t long before Carlos woke me again to change to another sail as the wind angle meant we needed the #4 up now.  Carlos gave me as much sleep as he could, before needing to swap, since I hadn’t got much in my off shift, what with the sail changes.  Between sail changes you need to spend 20 minutes cooling off again and letting the excitement die, before trying to go down and sleep.

30 DECEMBER 2021

Seeing land is always a bit of a trick, you see it and think not long now.  Tasmania isn’t that small and as the wind dies it gets bigger.  

I came up on deck around 9am on the 30^th for my next shift.  The wind was soft, and Carlos told me that the wind, although it might pick up for a little while, was likely to die. There was a possibility that we were going straight into a hole towards the bottom of Tasmania that we couldn’t really avoid.

For the rest of the day there wasn’t much to report, except how stunning the view and conditions were.  Eventually the wind started to die, and we parked down towards the bottom of Tasmania; as did everyone else in Storm Bay.

31 DECEMBER 2021 – 10 HOURS IN A HOLE

I woke around midnight to the sound of the sails slamming back and forth and came up on deck to start my shift.  Carlos told me that the wind had completely died in the last half an hour. He had centred the main and basically set the boat pointing in the right direction as there was nothing much more that could be done.  Carlos told me the hole was around for at least another 10 hours.  Although this was bad news, it made one decision easy…  that Genoa needed to come down!  In 10 hours, it would have many holes in it from slamming into the spreaders.

Carlos had let me sleep longer on my off shift than normal; I expect he was trying to make the most of the wind before it completely died.  Carlos went down to sleep and I could tell he was tired.  It was now my shift and I was quite fresh, so I looked at the boat situation, what speed were doing over ground and started to think about ways of getting the boat to move faster and/or make things more pleasant.

First item was Genoa down as discussed, I then looked at the birdy at the top of the rig and the backstay flags for puffs of wind and where they were coming from.  I also took my beanie off so that I could feel the puffs on my face and ears.  The wind was at a reach, so I got some spare sheets, tied them to the end of the boom and took the other end to a forward fitting or bow bollard.  Basically, I pinned the main at the correct angle to the puffs, rather than centred.

The autopilot was too noisy, after all, it was dead silent apart from the main slapping back and forth.  It was also too active for 0.8knot boat speed.  I could use the autopilot to hold the helm steady, but its adjustments were also too large.  So, I set up a rope wrapped around the end of the tiller tied to either side, which held the tiller, but still allowed adjustment of the helm as needed to any angle and silently.

The main halyard where it enters the mast was squeaking and was soon quietened by throwing some water on it.  I couldn’t go any faster, but I could make it more pleasant for all on board; moving around the boat slowly, so as not to make noise and not to rock her.

Carlos was below snoring!  I have never heard him snore; he was tired and slept through the rig shaking from the main slapping back and forth in the sea chop.

If you have every raced with no wind for any length of time, it can be very maddening.  Plenty of sailors lose their cool and I have heard stories of crew crying after days of no wind.  By morning I was starting to get annoyed.  During the night, every 20 minutes or so a puff of 5 knots would appear, it wouldn’t last long, so I would hoist the Genoa from the pit and catch what I could for 2-3 minutes.  It would die and I would open the clutch, drop the Genoa, set it up in the pre-feeder and wait for next puff and do it all again.

The hole though, was an opportunity to enjoy where I was.  To the right over the land the glow in the distance of Hobart.  To my left there were two fishing boats.  One was lit up as you would expect in the distance on the horizon.  The other, however, was a small city.  The amount of light it was putting out was phenomenal; the entire sky over that way was lit up more than Hobart.

Despite the glow, you could still see millions of stars you can’t see on land with ease.  It is spectacular to sit and watch.  It really is breath taking.  Suddenly I heard something nearby.  “What the hell was that noise?”  It got a bit closer and the noise became clearer and it turned out to be dolphins taking breaths, swimming towards Crux.

I greeted them!  Tasmania always has heaps of dolphins in large pods that greet you when you get to Tasmania and I look forward to this every time.  I moved to the bow looking over them, talking to them, trying to keep their interest.  I couldn’t actually see them because of how dark it was, but the water was slightly phosphorescent.  I could see these glowing streams running around the boat as the dolphins played and raced around the boat.  Other dolphins were moving more slowly around the bow.  Their entire body slightly glowing and their noses, tails and fins brightly glowing.

There might have been no wind but spending 20 minutes on the bow of the boat talking to the dolphins as I watched their glowing shadows come and go and listening to them taking breaths, was a pretty unique experience.  More dolphins came and went but eventually it was back to slam, slam, of the main while watching the stars and waiting for a puff.

As morning dawned there was just enough light for me to see puffs coming and clouds forming over the shore.  The wind was coming from the West now and it looked like there was wind near land.  I didn’t really want to go towards land, as there was likely to be no wind in a few hours, but there was nothing to my east.  Eventually a puff came along and I turned the boat towards land.  After a few puffs a constant 5 knots settled in.  It felt like light speed; fingers crossed it would hang in.

Eventually Carlos appeared and we had breakfast and chatted.  Any suggestions of sleep were dismissed – I told Carlos “I’m not sleeping till I get Crux around Tasman Island!”.

We eventually made Tasman Island; the land scape is beautiful – selfie time!  I could see bigger boats catching us further out to sea.  The sea looked like there was more wind further out, which wasn’t unexpected, but it isn’t easy to creep out to it with the little wind we had.

There was a little more wind as we came around Tasman Island, but we were now going straight into a 1-1.5m swell with the wind behind us at about 6-7 knots.  It was torture to say the least.  On every single wave the spinnaker collapsed and reset, and there wasn’t much we can do as there wasn’t enough wind to keep it filled; and to hot up would take us South!

Eventually, as we entered Storm Bay the wind built, and we made good time across the bay.  I headed down to get a quick nap before entering the Derwent River.

I was on helm entering the Derwent River as the wind softened, but was just hanging in.  As we continued up the river, the wind suddenly died, and the spinnaker collapsed.  The spinnaker then started blowing over the rig.  A quick look around showed a wind line to my starboard and in front of me.  It changed direction from behind to in front of me.  I quickly moved the pole and dragged the kite off the rig, and it started to fill as I bore away.  The wind continued to build, and I worried that it would continue building and turning.  I asked Carlos to get the Genoa up.  We needed to get the spinnaker down.

Carlos suggested that we try to keep flying the spinnaker.  I was a little concerned as we were powered up on the limit and I couldn’t follow our run line – we might pass the sandbar, but there wasn’t much in it.   As we continued up the river, the wind thankfully shifted aft a bit and we then had some wiggle room.

The wind held in and we crossed the finished with a few boats following us.  We quickly dropped sails and did the obligatory pass down the wharf where the crowds cheered and congratulated us.  As we entered the marina, Danielle and Rachel (18 month old daughter) were waiting at the entrance, I could see that Rachel was a little confused and not really responding to me much, but as we continued on towards our marina spot I could hear Rachel crying and trying to get to me.  I then spent the rest of my time in Hobart with Rachel keeping a close eye on me and, for the first time, actively holding my hand everywhere we went.

Delivery back

The delivery back was braved by Carlos Aydos, Jack Barnes, Zeljko Berkovic and Ramon Berkovic.  Young Ramon sails lasers and O’pen Skiffs at MYC.  He was obviously super excited with the delivery and demonstrated his ability to sleep anywhere!  All are/where MYC members and regular Khaleesi crew.

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So, what do you think Felicity? Eden or Hobart?

It was our second conversation about retirement in the past 24 hours, but the situation on board Supernova was not improving.

We were nearing Bermagui but had come too close to land and were out of the current.  Our one remaining deck instrument had let us down.  It was still blowing 20 – 25 kts from the south, but as we passed Montague Island, we realised that the unlit magnetic compass on the bulkhead would get stuck in its bubble whenever the boated heeled past about 30 degrees.  Instead of us following the compass, the compass was following the boat.  When I realised that we hadn’t been steering 180 all day – more like 200 plus – my heart sank further.

All that bloody time and all that bloody effort getting ready for the race, and it was going pear shaped before we’d even gotten past Eden.  I was feeling very down.

However, a sticky compass was not the biggest issue on our minds.

Felicity Nelson and I had purchased the Sydney 36 Supernova back in February after 3 years campaigning the Jones 40 Arch Rival in the CYCA’s blue water series which includes the race to Hobart.  We’d had a lot of fun on Arch Rival, but had been keeping an eye out for a boat of our own that satisfied criteria such as being under 40′ (for the cost and ease of handling), with a competitive handicap (because you want to feel like you’re in with a chance on a good day), and finally, we wanted a bomb proof design that would finish an offshore race regardless of the conditions.

Supernova ticked the boxes and although being 15 years old, she had not been campaigned offshore meaning that although we had a bit of work to do to get to Category 1, we hoped the structure of the boat was strong.

Felicity was up for her 25th race, and I was looking forward to my 18th.  A number of those races were completed with Greg Zyner on the MYC entries Morna and Copernicus.  We’d decided that our goals for the first year owning the yacht were firstly to get to the start line, and secondly to get to the finish line.  Anything after that would be a bonus and as I had never retired from a Hobart race, I was determined that this would not be the first time.

The forecast for the race was a good one for a smaller boat.  A picturesque start under spinnaker in a moderate southerly, with a proper southerly due later on the first day.  The forecast from Clouds Badham advised S/10-15 then SSE/15-18 in the morning and SSE/20-25 with gusts 30 kts and peak gusts 35 kts when offshore in the afternoon and evening.

After dealing with the southerly on the NSW coast, the next feature of the race was to be a high-pressure system detaching itself from Tasmania and drifting slowly across the Tasman as we were due to enter Bass Strait.  On the east side of the High would be light South Easterlies, and on the west side would be light Easterlies and North Easterlies.  In between would be nothing.

As the high moved away, the NE’er would build for those close to Flinders Island and we were due for a great ride down the coast of Tassie.

The forecast for the tail end of the race was too far away to worry about at that point, but our strategy was locked in.  We’d get a spank on the NSW coast and take a long board out on starboard to get into the current.  Then we’d flop onto port tack when the wind shifted east on the second day and get as far west as possible in Bass Strait to get on the right side of the High before riding NE’ers down the Tassie coast.

The old adage that the first bit of Tasmania you should see is Tasman Island kept popping up among the competing ideas in my head, but not to worry, we’d have plenty of time to refine our approach to Tasman Island as we headed south.  After all, the sayings of salty ol’ seadogs were born of a different age.  In those times you left Sydney with a hard copy of the weather prognosis cut out of the newspaper and listened into weather forecasts on the HF Radio for coastal waters areas along the way.  Such a quaint idea now that we have a satellite dish on the taff rail delivering weather information at broadband speeds.

The first 24 hours of the race was rough, but not extreme.  The weather was playing along with the forecast and the boat was handling it well.  We came out of The Heads with a #2 and a reef and were changing through the gears as the pressure increased.  A second reef went in, then a change to the #3 and back to one reef.  As dusk approached the wind was in the mid 20’s and the second reef went in again.

If I’ve learnt anything over 20 years of offshore sailing it is the importance of being able to reef in a hurry, so we’d put a bit of thought into the process on Supernova as well as practicing at every opportunity.  With the mainsail on slides instead of a bolt rope, a main halyard marked at the correct heights, and twin cunninghams on the mast, the watch on deck could pop a reef in or out in well under a minute without calling up the off watch.

Despite all that, we were still caught out just after dark when a squall came though the fleet.  Although we had the second reef in, we had not moused the lazy reef line through the leech cringle of the 3rd reef, so when the wind increased from mid 20’s to mid 30’s without warning, we were stuck with the wrong headsail up and could not shorten the mainsail.  We were way overpowered with the #3, but at least it would survive the squall without detonating, so we focused on the Main instead.  All hands were on deck to drop the sail entirely, run the third reef line, and re-hoist.  As soon as this was done the #3 was replaced with the #4 and we were back on the wind, steering into the sort of rain and spray that stung the eyes unbearably whenever you dared to peep above the wheel for a quick update from the instruments.

It was during this period overnight when we got an inkling that a list of issues was starting to grow.  Someone mentioned the freshwater tap in the galley didn’t seem to be working, then crew came on watch saying they’d had no sleep because there was water pouring through the throttle control panel, or that the head was full of water.  They were all little things that did not ring any alarm bells at the time, because banging into a southerly was never dry or comfortable.

Then at 5 am the next morning as we started the engine to charge the batteries for the 0635 Position Report, the instruments literally disappeared in a puff of smoke.  Later analysis showed that a widget in the switchboard had shaken loose and fallen across the copper bars that supply power to the whole board, but at the time all we knew was that the instruments were blacked out and the cabin was filling with wisps of acrid smoke and the smell of burning plastic.

We shut down the engine immediately and started tearing the boat apart to find the source of the smoke.  My concerns centred around the alternator which had been running hot and was undersized for the bank of lithium batteries installed earlier in the year.  If you’d asked me in November to swap out an alternator I would have looked bemused, but I’d become a dab hand after the flooding of the ignition panel during the Cabbage Tree Island race started a chain of events which resulted in an electrician and a mechanic spending the days leading up to Christmas Day swapping out all the bits and pieces relating to the ignition, tachometer and alternator, trying to get a combination to work together and get us to the start line.

They’d done the best they could considering suppliers were closed, spare parts were unobtainable, and families were getting cranky about Christmas plans being delayed.  Still, as we motored out of the marina on Boxing Day morning, the most likely cause of our retirement was going to be the engine, alternator or batteries failing before we got to the all-important Green Cape Declaration where we had to swear all that hardware was operating at 100%.

After digging through gear bags, rudely woken bodies and soggy bunk cushions the batteries and associated wiring appeared OK.  Shining a torch into the engine compartment gave the impression there was less smoke in there than was floating around the rest of the cabin.  At this point attention moved to the switch board which may have copped a bit of spray overnight.  The “Instrument” switch was off and would trip back to the off position when you tried to flick it on.  So, the panic was over.  There was a short circuit in the panel, the instruments were out of action, but the engine was working, and the alternator was charging.

While we were charging the batteries for the morning’s position report there was also the opportunity to tidy up a bit, and what we found was lots and lots of water.  The head was full of it, as were cupboards, shelves, sinks and sumps.  Bunks were wet through, and the headsails on the cabin sole were soaked.  After a number of buckets were passed up to be emptied, the next thing to appear were rolls of toilet paper, sodden to the core and being jettisoned overboard.  I couldn’t believe this quantity of water had come down the hatch, or through the throttle lever, even if it was pouring through like a tap each time a wave filled the cockpit.

When troubleshooting the lack of fresh water at the tap, we discovered that 50 odd litres of the water sloshing around the bilge had come from the starboard water bladder which had let go and emptied at some stage overnight.  It had flooded the electric freshwater pump and the motor for the fridge before it spread throughout the rest of the boat.  The fridge was no big loss, but half the fresh water was gone and a method for retrieving the remaining water was going to be a problem.

While listening to the sched we’d been surprised at the number of retirements less than 24 hours into the race.  It seemed like every 2nd or 3rd boat on the sched sheet was heading north or already in port.  On the one hand we agreed the weather had been rough, but not that rough, but on the other hand we too were discussing retirement.  We had no instruments or chart plotter, the laptop was flat, and its charger was dead, we’d lost half the drinking water and we were barely a quarter of the way through the race.

Felicity and I threw the pros and cons between us.  The nav lights were working, but how would we go without instruments, particularly at night.  How could we be competitive without weather updates, routing or AIS.  Would 40 or 50 litres of water last 8 crew another 3 or 4 days.  Could we survive with only 2 rolls of dunny paper!  These doomy and gloomy thoughts passed between us and we wondered if it was worth continuing.  We were close to a call on the race but thought we should do the right thing and discuss our concerns with the crew.  It was at that point we noticed something odd… everyone seemed to be smiling and having a good time.  The boat was powered up and moving nicely through the swell as the on-watch guessed at the wind speed and discussed when the next sail change would be on the cards.  I heard someone call back the compass heading while the steerer and mainsheet hand discussed height and boat speed despite the dead eyes of the instrument displays glaring back at them from the mast.

The skippers had another quick chat and decided maybe things weren’t as bad as they’d first thought.

We were now about 24 hours into the race and the wind seemed to be playing along with the forecast and shifting to the south east as the cloud cover thinned and lifted higher into the sky.  The mood on the boat was positive and the crew were coping well without instruments, sailing to the tell tales and the feel of the boat under their feet.  We could check our position on various smartphones hidden in dry bags around the boat but keeping a loose eye on the compass fitted to the bulkhead indicated we’d lifted and were making a good course.

This feeling of cautious optimism didn’t last long.  At 1335 we had been required to standby the satellite phone for a possible call from the Race Committee.  Over the last few years, the CYCA has been tentatively navigating a transition between using HF radio as the primary means of communication with the fleet and using more modern satellite communications technology.  This year both systems were compulsory, and we had 2 position reports on the HF each day as well as a communications check in the middle of the day in which a random selection of boats would be called via the sat phone.  However, our satellite gear was on the blink.  Another victim of last night’s weather, the system was powered on but a message on the screen said the antenna could not be found.  I glared at the big white dome on the pushpit that seemed so oversized on a 36-foot boat and switched off the circuit breaker for the satellite comms gear for the rest of the race.

Later in the afternoon of the 27th we were well south of Batemans Bay and had started the engine for another battery charge before the evening position sched.  The ignition panel was only a few months old, but it had been flooded in the Cabbage Tree Island race a few weeks earlier.  The tachometer died during that race, but a new one had turned up at the last minute and was installed just before this race.  We’d been advised the panel’s days were numbered, but it would hopefully get us to Hobart and back before corrosion in any number of places inevitably took its toll.  Consequently, it was not a total surprise when the engine alarm began blaring with that incessant monotone that makes you wince, and heads appeared out of bunks asking what the problem was.

The problem was that the panel and tacho were wet again and full of short circuits.  The tacho needle was jerking around the dial, the displays were fading in and out and the various alarm lights were flashing off and on randomly, all while the alarm continued screaming for everyone’s undivided attention.  Something we’d learnt during the recent dramas was that a working tacho was required to make the alternator charge the batteries… who would have guessed? Apparently, it’s not enough just to spin the alternator around using the engine.  In this system, a signal from the tacho is required to wake up the alternator and direct charge to the batteries.  So, no tacho = no batteries and now we could be in real trouble.

For the moment the engine was running, and the batteries were charging, but we could not leave the engine on for the rest of the race and if the tacho was dead, would the alternator kick in again next time we tried to fire up the donk?

All on board breathed a sigh of relief as we pulled the plug on the alarm, but what were we to do now?

We were abeam of Montague Island for the evening position sched and had only just come to grips with the fact that the magnetic compass on the bulkhead, such an intrinsically reliable piece of navigational equipment, had let us down.  We had been on port tack for most of the day in winds that still had the power to force us up occasionally.  Each time the boat heeled over and the bow fought the helm to port, the compass would stick at that more southerly heading, and only slowly return to its correct heading once the boat had borne away.  We had fooled ourselves into believing the wind had backed and lifted us onto course, so instead of being off the continental shelf sailing a southerly course with the East Australian Current pushing us along, we were inside the current and closing the coast.

I felt like an idiot.  If I’d had a good look at the chart on my phone, I would have realised we were coming in and that something didn’t add up, but I never doubted the magnetic compass.  The sea, the sky, the wind and the compass had reinforced a hopeful interpretation of the forecast for winds easing and backing into the south east.  It was obvious now that we’d screwed up and tacked in too early.

The position sched on the evening of the 27th reinforced our fears.  Yachts in our division, and those of a similar size, who had stayed offshore smashed us between the morning and afternoon scheds.  Love and War, Disko Trooper, Crux and the mighty Azzurro had pulled 20, 30 or 40 miles ahead in only 12 hours.  While we were wallowing in the shallows, they were sitting in 2 or 3 knots of current which translates as pure VMG down the racetrack.

After broadcasting our position we shut down the engine not knowing if would start again, and as the sun sank into the horizon it sank in for us that not only were we short of nav, comms, and instruments, we were out the back door on the results page as well.

So, what do you think Felicity? Eden or Hobart?

The next morning we’d be off Twofold Bay and would have to make the decision.  If the engine didn’t start, or if the alternator didn’t kick in then we were definitely out.  It would not be permissible to pass Green Cape without those components operational, but even if they did work, we still had 400 nm of the race to go with limited water and not much to steer by except a dickie compass and the chook at the top of the mast.

Felicity’s opinion was carry-on and try the engine in the morning.  She observed that the weather was improving, and we had just gone to Lord Howe Island with less gadgets than we had on board right now.

I think that was that comment that swayed me.  We’d recently done the Lord Howe Island BBQ Cruise on the Farr 1020 Sequel which had nothing more advanced on deck than a chook and a compass.  Other than that, all we’d required was a GPS, a pleasant weather window and a crew who had nothing they’d rather do than sail 400 nm across the Tasman Sea.

As the sun rose on the morning of the 28th we weighed up the arguments for and against.  No light, sound or movement appeared from the engine start panel, but the buttons functioned so the engine started and stopped, and the alternator charged the batteries.  We listened to the coastal waters forecast and decided that the pros were getting stronger and the cons were getting weaker.

The sky was clearing, the wind had eased, and our course was taking us east of Green Cape and Gabo Island.  The crew were still smiling and had steered overnight without skipping a beat.  Fresh water might still be an issue, but we reckoned there was at least 1.5 Lt per head per day in the remaining tank, and almost a litre of UHT milk per person once that ran out.  It might be a dry trip up the Derwent, but we’d be unlikely to perish before the customary carton of beer was delivered at the dock in Hobart.

We had all the ingredients we needed for a lovely trip to Hobart.  Structurally the boat was solid and undamaged, the crew was keen and cheerful, and we had a beautiful weather window ahead of us.

It would be madness not to continue.

Around midday on the 28th, Supernova reached close by Gabo Island with a clear sky, a full main, jib top and genoa staysail set.  So, there I was as we entered Bass Strait, sitting in a puddle in the bilge drawing circles and arrows onto a hard copy of the BOM’s 4 Day Chart from the day we left Sydney.  The HF Radio weather report for Tasmanian coastal waters areas was carefully transcribed onto the back of a soggy sched sheet next to me.  I’ll make a salty ol’ seadog yet.

… and that was the end of The Hard Part.

Supernova made it to the Start Line and would go on to make the Finish Line early on the 31st of December.  Felicity completed her 25th Sydney to Hobart and was recognised as the highest place female skipper achieving a 4th in Division and 13th overall – what a bonus!

Written by Jim Nixon

Sometimes in life things just go your way. Often, it’s just about being in the right place at the right time. Toucia and I lucked out by heading off in the trusty X-Trail in late April bound for nowhere in particular but aiming for Kakadu. Probably anyone who got out of
NSW at that time also got lucky. When the virus took off in Sydney, we were pretty much on our way home to Manly but soon decided to take a big port tack at Mt Isa to my sister’s place on Magnetic Island off Townsville to wait and see what was going to happen.

I had planned to do all the Qld regattas on a friend’s sports boat anyway, but the crew was stuck in Sydney, so I hunted around for a ride for Airlie Beach Race Week and ended up on a Farr 40 named Ponyo (Piss Off Not Your Ocean) which was great fun (see Marike’s report last month). But I’d never done a Magnetic Island Race Week (MIRW) so was super keen for that to happen too.

Once again good fortune didn’t desert me, and I hitched a ride on a Farr 11.6 named Amaya II out of Townsville Yacht Club for the regatta. The boat had never really been raced by its current owners, brothers Ben and Matt. Their previous MIRW in a Farrier trimaran had ended in disaster when a front hatch had been left open and hundreds of litres of water flooded the boat’s bow. They only twigged to the problem when they started to be overtaken by monohulls.

Anyway, Amaya had good bones but needed work to be race ready, so we set about pulling 30-year-old spinnakers out of dusty bags, drilling holes for jammers and tweakers, and lubricating EVERYTHING including the crew because Townsville’s heat gets you very thirsty. All the sails and most of the lines on the boat were made last century, and off came 20 years of cruising junk, fishing gear, rusted stove, extra anchors etc. We were still hammering, drilling and screwing as we motored the start of race 1, a 15-mile beat into a 20knot sou-easter to Four Foot Rock off Cape Cleveland.

Few of the rapidly assembled crew had ever sailed together and their spinnaker racing experience was negligible. With a reef in the main and a fabulous Hood spectra No2 that had been in a garage for 20 years, we got to the rock in good position and nothing broken and hoisted a vintage 2.2-ounce fractional spinnaker for the dead square run to the finish. We needed to sail dead square because hardly anyone on the boat had ever hoisted a kite let alone gybed one and, as I was the bowman and valued my life, I wasn’t gonna teach them that day.

Cleveland Bay off Townsville is super shallow and bumpy when the wind gets up, a lot like Port Philip Bay, and we got some great surfs to the line and finished fifth on handicap, a perfect start for a PHS series. The wind was unrelenting,
powered by a huge high over Australia, and race 2 was a similar slog, this time a short beat to an upwind clearing mark then a run westward to Townsville under a cruising MPS, the boat’s youngest sail. Getting it set took most of the
downwind leg but when it finally filled, we took off, hitting 13 knots. We rounded the bottom mark mid-fleet for the long upwind slog, which ended in disaster just before the top mark when a dodgy old spinnaker bag (which I had earlier pencilled in for the bin) decided to abandon ship through the lifelines and disgorge its contents, the 2.2 ounce kite, into Cleveland Bay.

Needless to say, we stopped pretty quickly, losing minutes in retrieving the errant nylon and some prawns. I was totally buggered by then, so we poled out the trusty Hood headsail for the run to the finish line and a gallant third place.

Race 3 took us anticlockwise around the island to a mark off Horseshoe Bay on the north shore of MI and with a moderating breeze to look forward too. We’d been having great starts, as had our nemesis, a boat named Lunacy with Matt Allen (Ichi Ban owner) its co-skipper, but this time we got too greedy and arrived at the favoured pin end early and had to gybe away and start on port and duck quite a few boats. Lady Luck reappeared and we sailed off into a huge right-hand shift and lifted to get to the top mark up with the big boats. The assy finally went up after only 10 minutes of swearing and a peel to a previously unseen masthead symmetric had us right behind Lunacy and the Beneteau 44.7 Shazam at the White Rock turning mark. One of THE secret weapons on board, local boat broker Justin, picked the right way to go on the upwind beat home and a shy kite run (yes, the indestructible 2.2 fractional) took us over the line in fourth place for the overall handicap win and the series lead.

Day 4 dawned with palm fronds flying through the air at my sister’s place. “Dogs off chains” was the common meteorological observation at the marina and word around the dock was insurance concerns would see the AP flag soon joined by the A flag. As we were leading the series by three points with scores of 5, 3, 1 we weren’t too upset when that finally happened. Shortening the regatta to four races meant there would be no discards, so it would all come down to the last day. Traditionally the MI regatta is a light wind affair, but this year Huey wasn’t going to let up. The soueaster blew all night and again the morning saw the bay covered
in whitecaps and a “square” choppy seaway. The Race Committee was determined to get a race in and after a meeting where skippers were reminded of Rule 2.1 … “race at your own risk” … a reaching course towards the city and back was chosen. We’d calculated the numbers and thought a fifth would be the result needed to clinch the series and overcome the 4 per cent hit our handicap had received.

Once again, a good start helped, and we came off the line powered up with a reef in the main and a No 3 jib which was almost new but could have come off James Craig. Amaya was one of the most windward boats and with the clearing mark to be a starboard rounding we held on starboard tack all the way to the lay line to shut out most of the fleet coming back on port tack, some of which had to tack away and overlay. Easing sheets at the mark, we took off to Townsville with only Lunacy, a Hanse 445, ahead.

There’s no doubt Bruce Farr is a genius and the 40-year-old Amaya accelerated like a true thoroughbred. Soon we were up with and weaving through the nonspinnaker boats and then Division 3 yachts and finally the (slower) multihulls which had all started before us. The big multi-storey multis are really hard to get around but we lucked out again and snuck around to windward of one block of
flats when they started playing silly buggers with a smaller monohull.

Soon the faster Div 1 boats were coming through, including an amazing sports boat, a Sayer 8, planing past us! By the bottom mark it was becoming like Pitt Street with only metres between boats. Unfortunately, the fleets had to cross to reach their next marks and there was a lot of bumping going on, almost as much as an MYC twilight fleet rounding the Cannane AS mark! We managed to keep
clear and round the Strand buoy for the long starboard leg to the final mark. A second reef was called for and we managed to get it in without too much drama.

What Amaya’s crew lacked in experience they made up for in youth and enthusiasm, especially with the regatta win on the line. We had picked up a few locals on the dock for ballast just before the final race, one who had just had knee surgery a few days before, but he was jumping from rail to rail like an Olympic gymnast. What to do at the top mark? It was gusting easy 25 and we were looking pretty good in about third or fourth spot. Spinnaker or play it safe? What would the Melody girls do? No guts, no glory. Spinnaker it was! Up went the trusty fractional 2.2 and off we shot. Up stayed the No 3, not just to fill the gap under the kite but because we couldn’t risk any weight forward to pull it down.

It was a short, wild run but it made all the difference, closing us in on the leaders and gapping the boat behind who poled out headsails. We crossed the line elated and feeling like we hadn’t left anything on the racetrack. But the excitement
wasn’t over yet.

Over the VHF came a call for help from a yacht that had a suspected spinal injury aboard. We had a doctor with us, Nick, who was a rescue chopper medico, and we hammered the diesel to get to the dock where the injured sailor was being cared for. What a day! It was pure adrenalin from go to whoa.

As it turned out the injured sailor was not as critical as the point-score standings – or the beer supply – and was under good care. The nervous wait began. Would we hang on, or would the millionaire win another regatta? Finally, the results came over the internet … Amaya fifth. Yipee! good enough for the series win by one point. Yay! If we’d been 15 seconds slower then, it would have been sixth spot and second place overall.

The trusty 25-year-old fractional spinnaker had saved us once more. What a great win for the underdogs … co-skippers Ben and Matt, local expert Justin, 21-year-old Jess who will go a long way in the sport, funny guy Wade, doctor Nick, and all the last-minute additions to the weather rail. The smiles were ear to ear and the backslapping started and beer flowed, and the rest is unprintable for a family yacht club newsletter.

Fabulous fun. I’m probably still grinning as you are reading this!

Manly Yacht Club’s scheduled sailing events for September have been abandoned.

2020-2021 safety audits for Categories 4-7 will be extended until 31 December 2021 however it is expected that all skippers check their all their equipment is working correctly and within expiry dates.