Tuesday 30 January 2007

Race11 Handicaps

Coming thirteenth in Race 10 helped Sheer Force's time correction factor (TCF) take another step downwards (see graph), along with Anthanta IV(12th in Race 10), Toccata(9th), Amon Ra(10th), Getaway Sailing(6th), Panther(7th), Bos Global(11th) and Panacea(8th). On the other side, Chloe III(1st), Farr Lap(3rd), Summersalt(4th) were penalised with slightly tougher TCFs. Two "new" yachts have appeared in this week's handicaps, Talon, and Sailors with Disabilities (previously Kaz?). Sailors with Disabilities takes over from Panther as the scratch yacht in Division 1, by about 2.5 minutes.

**7878 SAILORS WITH DISABILITIES -20.280
*8001 PANTHER -17.754
*6095 UPLIFT -14.340
*6900 X3 -12.606
2999 OBSESSION -10.734
*6175 LOVE BYTE -10.518
6155 GETAWAY SAILING.COM -10.368
*8301 CADENZA -10.356
*5382 TOCCATA -7.650
4970 AKELA -5.880
**6999 TALON -5.574
*2020 SPEARHEAD -5.514
*7404 CHANCELLOR -4.662
*KA400 SCARLETT O'HARA -4.506
*4208 FARR LAP -3.978
*6279 SUMMERSALT -3.780
*8004 DJ2 BOS GLOBAL -3.690
*6472 SYMBIOSIS -3.522
*80808 PANACEA -2.166
*MH163 CHLOE III -1.170
*6182 SUNDOWNER V -0.714
4037 SHEER FORCE 0.000
*MH304 DISTRACTION 0.264
*316 ANTHANTA VI 0.360
*5665 AMON RA 1.098
The table above, sorted by minutes relative to Sheer Force shows that Chloe's good performances means that she now has to beat Sheer Force by over a minute, whereas previously, Sheer Force has had to finish in front. Our peer group is unchanged, but to finish in the money, we need to be among Farr Lap, Summersalt, Bos Global and Symbiosis. Hopefully, the improvements to Sheer Force will help us achieve this!

Saturday 20 January 2007

Race10 Results

Race10 saw windy conditions again, with maybe 20kn coming from the north east. There was no threat of a thunderstorm. After being way overpowered last week, skipper David T decided to reef the main on Sheer Force and use the No.2 Genoa. This arrangement served us well on the work up to the Lady Bay mark, and to come back, we removed the reef and put the pole out. We ran into trouble after rounding Clark Island when the mounting of the starbord side Genoa sheet pulley broke with a loud bang. This forced an unscheduled tack which led to us having to do more tacks that we would have probably preferred to avoid, slowing us down. It took us a long time to get around Bradleys Head, contributing to our modest 13th placing on corrected times.

The race saw18 starters in Division 1, and 3 dnf's. Sheer Force was the last of 7 yachts with corrected times within the 1hr09 minute, so our finishing position could have been 7th if we were a minute faster. On corrected times, Anthanta only beat us by 1 second, and Bos Global by 4 seconds.

Across the line, Sheer Force was also 13th of the 15. We trailed Panther by 18mins, and Farr Lap by 6mins. The average elapsed time for this race was 1:08:51 (slowest in the series), and Sheer Force was 5.83mins slower than that, entirely within our normal range, about a minute worse than our average. The handicapper expected Sheer Force to come 12th in this field. Cadenza apparently had difficulties, crossing the line 11th instead of her expected 3rd. Symbiosis also finished 4 places worse than expected. Yachts finishing well ahead of their handicap predictions were Chloe (4) and Farr Lap and Summersalt (both 3). The handicapper's score was 36%, achieved by reducing an outright spread of 20:01 to a corrected spread of 12:47.

The table below gives the Division 1 results for Race 10, sorted by elapsed time:-

Results Race10 Elapsed Outright Handicap Diff fm Mins Rel to
  Time Place Predict Fleet behind Sheer
      Place Average winner Force
PANTHER 0:56:13 1 1 -12.6 0:00:00 0:18:28
OBSESSION 1:01:37 2 4 -7.2 0:05:24 0:13:04
GETAWAY SAILING.COM 1:02:16 3 2 -6.6 0:06:03 0:12:25
TOCCATA 1:05:23 4 5 -3.5 0:09:10 0:09:18
SPEARHEAD 1:07:24 5 6 -1.5 0:11:11 0:07:17
FARR LAP 1:08:42 6 9 -0.2 0:12:29 0:05:59
SUMMERSALT 1:08:46 7 10 -0.1 0:12:33 0:05:55
DJ2 BOS GLOBAL 1:10:30 8 7 1.6 0:14:17 0:04:11
CHLOE III 1:10:46 9 13 1.9 0:14:33 0:03:55
PANACEA 1:11:12 10 11 2.3 0:14:59 0:03:29
CADENZA 1:11:28 11 3 2.6 0:15:15 0:03:13
SYMBIOSIS 1:11:53 12 8 3.0 0:15:40 0:02:48
SHEER FORCE 1:14:41 13 12 5.8 0:18:28 0:00:00
ANTHANTA VI 1:15:43 14 14 6.9 0:19:30 0:01:02
AMON RA 1:16:14 15 15 7.4 0:20:01 0:01:33
  Corrected Corrected        
  Time Position        
PANTHER 1:09:06 7        
OBSESSION 1:07:35 2        
GETAWAY SAILING.COM 1:08:38 6        
TOCCATA 1:09:35 9        
SPEARHEAD 1:08:25 5        
FARR LAP 1:07:42 3        
SUMMERSALT 1:07:45 4        
DJ2 BOS GLOBAL 1:09:55 11        
CHLOE III 1:05:50 1        
PANACEA 1:09:18 8        
CADENZA 1:18:37 15        
SYMBIOSIS 1:11:10 14        
SHEER FORCE 1:09:59 13        
ANTHANTA VI 1:09:58 12        
AMON RA 1:09:41 10        

When they get updated, Race 10 will see some major moves on the pointscore. Chloe's excellent and improving performance will now get her into first place on 25 points, pushing Sundowner off that perch. Farr Lap climbs from 11th to 6th place, but Uplift falls from 2nd to 12th place. Sheer Force will climb two rungs on the ladder from 9th to 7th place, on 35 points, well within striking distance of the top with 5 races to go.

Points after Race10 Points Place Lowest Drop
CHLOE III 25 1 11
SUNDOWNER V 28 2 24
PANTHER 28 2 9
SYMBIOSIS 29 4 7
SPEARHEAD 29 4 8
FARR LAP 30 6 24
SHEER FORCE 35 7 13
CADENZA 36 8 11
SUMMERSALT 36 8 10
ANTHANTA VI 38 10 15
SCARLETT O'HARA 41 11 24
UPLIFT 43 12 24
TOCCATA 46 13 15
GETAWAY SAILING.COM 51 14 24
AMON RA 57 15 15
LOVE BYTE 66 16 24
DJ2 BOS GLOBAL 68 17 17
OBSESSION 68 17 24
X3 90 19 24
CHANCELLOR 108 20 24
PANACEA 115 21 24
DISTRACTION 130 22 24
AKELA 132 23 24

Chloe's great season is highlighted in the graph which shows Difference from Fleet Average. Chloe's performance shows a steady and clear improvement from race to race.

After the race, the two Davids effected excellent repairs to the broken pulley mounting.

Tuesday 16 January 2007

Race10 Handicaps

As usual, the finishers in last week's race have had some minor adjustments to their time correction factors. The factors for X3 (14), Amon Ra (12), Panther (11) and Summersalt (8) have eased, and those for Bos Global (1), Farr Lap (3), Obsession (5), Chloe (2), Sheer Force (6), Symbiosis (7) and Spearhead (4)have tightened. The numbers in brackets how each yacht's placing on corrected time in Race09.

The graph shows how Sheer Force's time correction factor has drifted down through the series, easing our handicap slightly. The TCF's are shown on the right axis, and the bars on the graph show our corrected time placing (left axis) for each race.

The changes are very minor, and leave Panther as the scratch yacht, giving Sheer Force a start of 17.5 minutes. Our peer group is also unchanged: Sundowner has to beat us by 8 secs, and we have to beat Chloe, Anthanta, Distraction and Amon Ra by up to 1.4 mins. To be among the prizes, we need to be sailing amongst Farr Lap, Bos Global and Scarlett O'Hara.

The handicapper expects Sheer Force to finish 19th out of 23 in a complete field. The table below showns the start in minutes each yacht gives Sheer Force. We give a start to those below us in the table. As usual, these starts are calculated on the roughly correct assumption that the race duration is 60mins.

*8001 PANTHER -17.538
*6095 UPLIFT -13.764
*6900 X3 -12.030
*6175 LOVE BYTE -9.942
6155 GETAWAY SAILING.COM -9.918
*8301 CADENZA -9.780
2999 OBSESSION -9.588
*5382 TOCCATA -7.638
4970 AKELA -5.304
*2020 SPEARHEAD -4.680
*7404 CHANCELLOR -4.086
*KA400 SCARLETT O'HARA -3.930
*8004 DJ2 BOS GLOBAL -3.282
*6472 SYMBIOSIS -3.186
*4208 FARR LAP -2.904
*6279 SUMMERSALT -2.898
*80808 PANACEA -2.172
*6182 SUNDOWNER V -0.138
4037 SHEER FORCE 0.000
*MH163 CHLOE III 0.408
*316 ANTHANTA VI 0.780
*MH304 DISTRACTION 0.840
*5665 AMON RA 1.374

See you on Friday. Let's hope the winds are a little milder than they were for Race09!

Saturday 13 January 2007

Race09 Results

We were greeted with a very strong north easterly before the start of Race09. The white caps on the harbour were large, and David T estimated the wind at 35kn. It looked too dangerous to sail, but the wind eased a little to maybe 25kn by start time, and we sailed the course carefully, still overpowered, with the No2 Genoa and full Main. At the club later, Janet congratulated those yachts which had voluntarily withdrawn in the difficult conditions - we noticed Anthanta IV motoring off before the race, and no doubt there were others.

That said, once we got going, Sheer Force handled the conditions very well, the crew adapted to their new roles, and we felt quite comfortable going up the harbour. We came 6th on handicap after being about a minute behind at the start due to the extreme conditions. But for that minute, we might have finished 3rd on corrected times. As it was, only 7 seconds of corrected time spanned Spearhead, Obsession, Sheer Force and Symbiosis, so it was very tight in the 4th - 7th positions.

The race itself had 15 finishers in Division 1, and the average elapsed time was a typical 1:05:02. Sheer Force recorded a time across the line some 3.68 minutes slower than the fleet average. This is a minute better than our own average. This good result is partly affected by Cadenza's exceptionally slow race (she had very little sail up) which would have slowed the fleet average. Cadenza was 9.3 mins slower than the fleet average (as she was in Race01), whereas she is usually 5-10 minutes faster than the fleet average. There were a couple of new yachts in this Division 1 field, Estate Master and Attitude.

Sheer Force was 11th across the line in Division 1, almost 15 minutes behind Panther. Nearest to us were Chloe (2 mins ahead), and Sundowner (3 mins behind). The handicapper's predictions for the finish order was upset by the windy conditions. Cadenza was last to finish, 11 places behind predicted, and DJ2 Bos Global, Farr Lapp and Chloe finished 3-4 places ahead of prediction. My other 'measure' of handicapper performance is the extent to which the spread of elapsed times is reduced by the time corrections. Unfortunately, the elapsed time spread of 20:31, thanks to Cadenza, became a spread of 21:44 after correction, giving the handicapper a negative 3.5% score, the worst since Race04 of last year's twilights.

The table below is, as usual, the Division 1 finishers in elapsed time order.

Results Race09 Elapsed Outright Handicap Diff fm Mins Rel to
  Time Place Predict Fleet behind Sheer
      Place Average winner Force
PANTHER 0:53:49 1 1 -11.2 0:00:00 0:14:54
ESTATE MASTER 0:57:30 2 3 -7.5 0:03:41 0:11:13
OBSESSION 0:58:41 3 5 -6.4 0:04:52 0:10:02
X3 0:59:53 4 2 -5.2 0:06:04 0:08:50
DJ2 BOS GLOBAL 1:01:42 5 9 -3.3 0:07:53 0:07:01
SPEARHEAD 1:03:08 6 6 -1.9 0:09:19 0:05:35
FARR LAP 1:04:29 7 10 -0.6 0:10:40 0:04:14
SYMBIOSIS 1:04:51 8 7 -0.2 0:11:02 0:03:52
SUMMERSALT 1:05:54 9 8 0.9 0:12:05 0:02:49
CHLOE III 1:06:38 10 13 1.6 0:12:49 0:02:05
SHEER FORCE 1:08:43 11 12 3.7 0:14:54 0:00:00
SUNDOWNER V 1:11:35 12 11 6.5 0:17:46 0:02:52
ATTITUDE 1:11:43 13 14 6.7 0:17:54 0:03:00
AMON RA 1:12:40 14 15 7.6 0:18:51 0:03:57
CADENZA 1:14:20 15 4 9.3 0:20:31 0:05:37
  Corrected Corrected        
  Time Position        
PANTHER 1:06:15 11        
ESTATE MASTER 1:05:23 9        
OBSESSION 1:04:02 5        
X3 1:08:34 14        
DJ2 BOS GLOBAL 1:00:32 1        
SPEARHEAD 1:04:01 4        
FARR LAP 1:03:10 3        
SYMBIOSIS 1:04:08 7        
SUMMERSALT 1:04:58 8        
CHLOE III 1:01:40 2        
SHEER FORCE 1:04:07 6        
SUNDOWNER V 1:07:14 13        
ATTITUDE 1:05:54 10        
AMON RA 1:06:42 12        
CADENZA 1:21:46 15        

When RANSA updates the pointscore, I expect that Sheer Force will maintain her 8th position, equal with Anthanta. Missing another race will now bump Uplift from top position to be replaced by Sundowner. At 26 points, Sheer Force is well within striking distance of the leaders (17-21 points) which don't have any or many good drops left to save them from the effects of missed races.

Points after Race09 Points Place Lowest Drop
SUNDOWNER V 17 1 11
UPLIFT 19 2 24
PANTHER 21 3 9
SYMBIOSIS 22 4 7
SPEARHEAD 24 5 8
CHLOE III 24 5 11
CADENZA 25 7 11
ANTHANTA VI 26 8 15
SHEER FORCE 26 8 9
SCARLETT O'HARA 27 10 14
FARR LAP 27 10 24
SUMMERSALT 32 12 10
TOCCATA 37 13 15
GETAWAY SAILING.COM 45 14 24
AMON RA 47 15 15
LOVE BYTE 50 16 24
DJ2 BOS GLOBAL 57 17 17
OBSESSION 66 18 24
X3 74 19 24
CHANCELLOR 84 20 24
DISTRACTION 106 21 24
PANACEA 107 22 24
AKELA 108 23 24

Tuesday 9 January 2007

Race09 Handicaps

With only a small field last week, RANSA's updating of the handicaps for Race 09 has been quite modest for Division 1. Seven yachts (incl. Sheer Force) had their time correction factors eased a tad, and two yachts were toughened a bit. Panther remains the scratch yacht, and is expected to cross the line almost 18 minutes in front of Sheer Force.

As usual, my calculations assume a race duration of 60 mins - a reasonably close assumption, since the average for all finishers this series after 8 races is actually 63 mins. On this basis, our peer group of competitors expected to be within 2 minutes of Sheer Force at the finish line consists of 5 yachts (see table), all but one of which we need to beat by a minute to be ahead on corrected times. The table below shows the Division 1 yachts in seeding order, from the fastest to the slowest, with the calculated correction shown relative to Sheer Force.

*8001 PANTHER -17.874
*6095 UPLIFT -14.004
*6900 X3 -12.714
*6175 LOVE BYTE -10.182
6155 GETAWAY SAILING.COM -10.158
*8301 CADENZA -10.020
2999 OBSESSION -9.492
*5382 TOCCATA -7.878
4970 AKELA -5.544
*2020 SPEARHEAD -4.866
*7404 CHANCELLOR -4.326
*KA400 SCARLETT O'HARA -4.170
*6472 SYMBIOSIS -3.354
*6279 SUMMERSALT -3.168
*8004 DJ2 BOS GLOBAL -2.886
*4208 FARR LAP -2.796
*80808 PANACEA -2.412
*6182 SUNDOWNER V -0.378
4037 SHEER FORCE 0.000
*MH163 CHLOE III 0.450
*316 ANTHANTA VI 0.540
*MH304 DISTRACTION 0.600
*5665 AMON RA 0.912

As illustrated last week, to feature in the prize presentations, we need to be half way up the field when we cross the line. Sheer Force's elapsed time averages 4.7 mins slower than the fleet average. We win prizes when we are 1-2 minutes slower than the fleet average, which gives us our target for Race 09.

Saturday 6 January 2007

Race08 Results

Race 08 had the smallest field in the series so far, with only nine starters, but the moderate north-easterly conditions obviously suited Sheer Force with us finishing 2nd on handicap and 5th outright. On corrected times, we were 35 seconds behind the winner Chloe III (which, coincidentally, crossed the line exactly 35 seconds behind us on the water). In the end, the committee boat could not separate Sheer Force from Out of Sight - we both registered the same elapsed time of 1:06:59. Out of Sight is not in the Full Series pointscore (she may be in the Lite Series) and has not been in the RANSA handicap lists to date.

It's not surprising we weren't too sure where other yachts were. Apart from Chloe and Out of Sight, which were close to us, the 4 yachts which beat us were from almost 3 minutes to 13 minutes ahead, and the 2 behind us were 4 minutes back.

The table below shows the 9 yachts in the order we crossed the line:-

Results Race08 Elapsed Outright Handicap Diff fm Mins Rel to
Time Place Predict Fleet behind Sheer
Place Average winner Force
PANTHER 0:54:13 1 1 -11.1 0:00:00 0:12:46
SCARLETT O'HARA 1:02:34 2 3 -2.7 0:08:21 0:04:25
TOCCATA 1:02:37 3 2 -2.7 0:08:24 0:04:22
SYMBIOSIS 1:04:16 4 4 -1.0 0:10:03 0:02:43
SHEER FORCE 1:06:59 5 6 1.7 0:12:46 0:00:00
OUT OF SIGHT 1:06:59 5 5 1.7 0:12:46 0:00:00
CHLOE III 1:07:34 7 9 2.3 0:13:21 0:00:35
AMON RA 1:11:01 8 8 5.7 0:16:48 0:04:02
ANTHANTA VI 1:11:32 9 7 6.2 0:17:19 0:04:33
Corrected Corrected
Time Position
PANTHER 1:06:46 8
SCARLETT O'HARA 1:02:50 3
TOCCATA 1:07:26 9
SYMBIOSIS 1:03:11 4
SHEER FORCE 1:02:33 2
OUT OF SIGHT 1:05:39 6
CHLOE III 1:02:08 1
AMON RA 1:05:33 5
ANTHANTA VI 1:06:33 7

This table shows that Sheer Force's elaspsed time was only 1.7mins slower than the fleet average, our second best race in the series on this statistic. This is the performance necessary for us to win a prize in this Division 1 field.

With the smallish fleet, the handicapper got the finishing sequence pretty right. The biggest "surprises" were that Chloe crossed the line 7th (expected to be 9th) and Anthanta was 9th (expected to be 7th). By reducing an elapsed spread of 17:19 to a corrected spread of 5:17, the handicapping system got its best score so far, 69%.

Barring any late corrections, the Full Series pointscore table after Race 08 will look like:-

Points after Race08 Points Place Lowest Drop
UPLIFT 8 1 11
SUNDOWNER V 11 2 6
ANTHANTA VI 13 3 13
PANTHER 14 4 7
CADENZA 15 5 10
SYMBIOSIS 16 6 6
SCARLETT O'HARA 18 7 9
SPEARHEAD 20 8 8
SHEER FORCE 20 8 9
CHLOE III 22 10 11
FARR LAP 24 11 24
TOCCATA 24 11 13
SUMMERSALT 24 11 10
LOVE BYTE 26 14 24
GETAWAY SAILING.COM 33 15 12
AMON RA 37 16 15
DJ2 BOS GLOBAL 56 17 17
CHANCELLOR 60 18 24
OBSESSION 61 19 24
X3 62 20 24
DISTRACTION 82 21 24
PANACEA 83 22 24
AKELA 84 23 24

Our good result last night will promote Sheer Force to equal 8th with Spearhead. Prior to Race 08, we were in 13th place. We will be on 20 pts, with the series leaders on 8 to 13 pts. Of course, this second place gives us a good start in the post-New Year 8 race Twilight Lite series (best 6 races count).

Thursday 4 January 2007

Race08 Handicaps

The usual fine tuning of handicaps has taken place for Race08, and the table below gives the handicaps relative to Sheer Force, calculated in minutes from the time correction factors, assuming the race duration of 60 minutes.

*8001 PANTHER -17.868
*6095 UPLIFT -13.956
*6900 X3 -12.666
*6175 LOVE BYTE -10.134
6155 GETAWAY SAILING.COM -10.110
*8301 CADENZA -9.972
2999 OBSESSION -9.444
*5382 TOCCATA -8.586
4970 AKELA -5.496
*2020 SPEARHEAD -4.818
*7404 CHANCELLOR -4.278
*KA400 SCARLETT O'HARA -4.224
*6279 SUMMERSALT -3.120
*6472 SYMBIOSIS -2.958
*8004 DJ2 BOS GLOBAL -2.838
*4208 FARR LAP -2.748
*80808 PANACEA -2.364
*6182 SUNDOWNER V -0.330
4037 SHEER FORCE 0.000
*316 ANTHANTA VI 0.210
*MH304 DISTRACTION 0.648
*5665 AMON RA 0.648
*MH163 CHLOE III 0.846

Our peer group (yachts expected to finish within 2 minutes of Sheer Force) consists of 4 yachts we have to be ahead of (Anthanta, Distraction, Amon Ra and Chloe) and one (Sundowner) we can be very close behind and still beat on handicap.

In races to date, Sheer Force has needed to be 2 to 7 minutes faster to have won on handicap. This means we have to be amongst Scarlett O'Hara and near Akela to be a chance for gold.

About Me

My photo
I'm a city dweller, living on the Sydney CBD fringe. Have had a long career with a major resourse company, working in research, technology, operations and business development. Now retired, enjoying travel, volunteering, recreation and grandson!