About 12 skippers and crew gathered in Bristol on an early February Tuesday evening for 2 hours of give-and-take about thoughts on sailing fast. Here is a brief summary of important points critical to sailing a SS23 fast:

* Keep the boat moving The SS23, with a significant displacement and a full keel, slows quickly. Nose down after a tack and slowly bring the head up to quickly gain speed. DO NOT PINCH. In light air, going upwind, sail perhaps more off the wind than usual.

*Feather to windward As the wind picks up, keep the boat speed up. At full speed, going to windward, feather up to an almost pinch until you feel the boat just begin to think about slowing, then come back down and power up again. This will let you move to windward without significant loss of overall speed.

*Reduce weather helm Angle of tiller should be no more that 4 degrees to windward, preferably even less. More than this will exponentially increase drag. Position of crew, heel, and sail set all will affect weather helm. It is critical to understand how these all work together to change center of efforts of sail and hull and the need to correct the tendency to swing to weather.

*Develop a feel for your boat In short, this is called helmsmanship. It takes time and patience to acquire. You will come to know how the boat is moving through the water, and when it is time to change things…sail set, angle of sail, etc.

*Set heel to a minimum Until you hit hull speed, the boat should be as vertical as possible to take full advantage of the hull configuration and its contribution to movement to windward and its resistance of leeward drift. Remember that increased water line increases hull speed, and the more heel you have  the greater your hull speed. Thus the reason for overhang in the topside shape. However, the more you heel, the more you reduce the contribution of the hull and keel to resist leeward drift. , Your weather helm also increases. I suspect the increase in water line length and thus increased hull speed, is quickly offset by increased leeward drift as the keel efficacy is reduced. Consensus is that in the higher winds, a heel of 15 degrees might be best.

*Set traveler down 4 inches to full when sailing upwind in heavier air, and play the mainsheet to spill upper air through increased twist and to decrease angle of attack of the sail rig. Keep the heel constant, and power through the puffs without getting knocked down.

*Keep the bottom clean It matters!

*Rig adjustment Most of our masts are stiff, and most are kept basically vertical. Perhaps a bit of rake aft, and perhaps a bit of prebend by adjusting tension on the upper and forward shrouds. The jumpers look great, and the boat is designed to have them in place for our 7/8 th rig. Taking them off would theoretically reduce weight aloft and allow more rig tensioning by allowing more mast bending, but most racers have left them in place.

Unfortunately we did not keep notes. These are the highlights as best I can recall. These are generic maxims for sailing fast in any boat, but perhaps particularly relevant for the sea sprite, Personally, the best book I have found (clarity, instruction, diagrams, completeness) on sailing fast is the book Trim. It is used by North U. in their sail seminars. It stands well by itself, and is even better with one of their seminars. Its companion book Tactics is also superb. Here is the link to their site: http://www.northu.com. I am sure it can be bought through Amazon.

We had a great time. It was a quiet, mid-winter break in snowy Bristol, and a needed reminder that sailing season for us in the northern climes is on its way.

Fair winds, everyone.     Carter