Nacra 5.8 Catamaran Reimagined

Nacra “Nationals” - Hervey Bay
5th January 2022 - final day of racing

Gusty, shifty, light, shifty, gusty, touch of rain, bursts of sunshine, gusty, shifty - and that was just in one race.

In the N5.8 fleet it was all on for first place with us and 1715 tied on points going into the final day with three races scheduled.

Race 8: we were a bit slow out of the blocks and scored a 5th. We did have a nice start but then got out of phase at some point. 1715 was first across the line so we had our work cut out for us for the next two races.
Race 9: 1715 tried to jam us into the start boat so we hung back and let them all go and cruised through a bit late, tacked off to the right and sailed our own clear air race. After one lap we were first and opened up our lead to almost two minutes (1:57 to be exact) by the finish. Our main rival 1715 finished fourth.

It was now game on for the final race of the regatta.

Race 10: an even more aggressive start from 1715 who luffed us up and above the Start Boat before the start so we ended up back winding sails and reversing whilst the rest of the fleet including 1715 sailed off into the distance. After clearing the start line we again tacked off to the right and sailed our own clear air race and picked every shift perfectly to go from second last to first by the end of the first lap and opened our lead to 1 minute by the finish. 1715 finished fourth however they lodged a protest against us for a start line infringement. Bronte has now experienced her first protest committee and hearing. The jury decided in favour of 1715 so we finished second overall in the regatta.
Congratulations to all the competitors and a big thanks to the Hervey Bay Sailing Club and all their wonderful volunteers for hosting a great regatta.

Nacra “Nationals” in Hervey Bay. 3rd January 2022
Caroline crewed today whilst Bronte went horse riding.
It’s Caroline’s once-a-year sailing day with me. We were winning Race 4 until 1 metre from the finish line then we crashed into the finish boat. 😂😂
We were then snoozing between races and 45 seconds late to the start of Race 5. We recovered well in the shifty conditions and ended up winning the race by about two minutes. (4th at the first upwind mark, 2nd at the gate first time). You’ve gotta love a lovely clean deck layout N5.8 in the moderate shifty conditions. Weather is spectacular, sea water is bath temp warm. Enjoy!

(Apologies for the partly muted videos. We have music playing on the boat whilst racing and it gets picked up via the GoPro microphone and then gets muted in some countries due to copyright breaches)

Day 1: Nacra 5.8 “Nationals” at Hervey Bay. Fresh wind (15-19 knots). Race 1 blew the cobwebs out as it was a good constant 19-20 knots. Then very shifty in Race 2 and 3. We won race 2 by a heathy margin but lost it all in race 3 on the wrong side of a downwind shift (my error).

On shore activities have been great. New Years Eve we went to the local pub for a Pracilla style Drag Show, then Nacra beach activities on New Year’s Day featuring tug o war, three legged races, flag races, touch footy. We then went to the Rodeo last night for something completely different. Heaps to do on the Fraser Coast and at Hervey Bay.

The Nacra Australian Open is scheduled to start today at Hervey Bay. We are here and ready to go but doesn’t look like we will be racing today due to too much wind. (We are at the white dot near the bottom of the screen)

Heaven, as defined by the Oxford Dictionary:
5pm Friday afternoon, Reaching on a Nacra 5.8 all the way from Kurnell to San Souci and back again, just like Captain Cook would have done when he arrived at that same spot on the Endeavour 250 years ago with his square top main and big jib 😄😄

Nacra 5.8 Reimagined at Far Kurnell Friday 5pm 5th November 2021