Qingdao Calling
The Moth preparations are taking a back seat for a few weeks while Dave and I head off to Qingdao for some 49er testing with Nathan & Ben.
Given the amount of weekend time that’s been devoted to Mothing lately, we haven’t taken the 49er for a run since our testing session in April. Surely it shouldn’t be too hard to learn how to trapeze again.
The past weekend’s Mothing was pretty successful, with 6 boats taking to the water at 8am on Sunday. I think everyone would’ve learnt a fair amount from the 10 or so races we ran before heading in as the breeze died at 11. It was pretty amazing how big the gains and losses can be in racing, rather than just blasting around or two-boat tuning. It was also interesting to see the different theories and designs all ending up in roughly the same place. We had a Bladerider, 2 Prowler Zeros, 2 Prowler 4s and a Gilmour. 4 CST high-modulus rigs. MSL10, MSL11, MSL12 , MSL13s and an ‘07 Truflo. And a sailor weight range from 58 - 88kg. If only we could get such close, tight racing every week, we’d be improving pretty quickly. At least there’s still plenty to learn.
But then there’s always plenty to learn when it comes to Moth sailing.
Anyway, I’ll see how I go blogging when I get to China. Then maybe I’ll try to dump some photos on flickr. If they’ll let me.
