Beth sailing canoe heading downwind with little fuss in British Columbia - article on fleet racing BETH.

How does the BETH sailing canoe go in mixed fleets and handicap racing?

BETH sailing canoe – The designer has lots of fine things to say about the sailing performance of BETH – but Andrew Barclay has been racing his against mixed fleets in British Columbia where she sails equal with Laser Radials in light wind and gradually outclasses them in stronger.

I provide some tips about getting a bit more from the boat.

Learning to sail course - hull trim

Learning to sail – building a foundation for Sail and boat trim.

In general I don’t like most sailing books and most sailing lessons.

I think that a learner doesn’t need to learn many new words. Also because they don’t explain the correct principles in the beginning their explanations become really complicated.

If you understand how to use a sail to get power – when it is at maximum power and when it isn’t it all becomes very logical.

Goat Island Skiff going fast downwind with heavy load - Texas 200

Strong wind downwind with unstayed Masts, Cat Ketches and Cat Yawls, more safety and efficiency

John Goodman and I sailed the immaculate Goat Island Skiff he built from my plan in the Texas 200.

The boat showed itself to be one of the faster in the fleet despite loading up such a short boat with food, water and camping gear for six days with little outside support.

We played with sailing the boat by the lee – a method used by racing boats to gain both speed and control.

I document the method here including a video showing how the angle of heel can be controlled using the mainsheet.

Photos from Goolwa Wooden Boat Show 2011 – looking forward to 2013!

Photos and slideshow from the Goolwa Wooden Boatshow 2011.

Over 250 boats – mostly in the water. Wooden hydroplanes, “restricted 21s”, riverboats, putt putt launches, classic sailing boats, kayaks, canoes and more.

I had the quick canoe, the eureka canoe and the OzRacer on the stand that was shared with Duck Flat Wooden Boats and Boatcraft Pacific. Good time was had by all.

lug sails at very competitive prices - reallysimplesails.com

WIKI setup and tuning Lug Rigs, Spar bends and weights, Sail controls and More

The conservative viewpoint is that traditional rigs are not very efficient. However allied to efficient hulls and set up correctly, lug and sprit rigs can be very efficient indeed – not too much slower than “modern” rigs, particularly when the same lessons are applied to trad sails and way cheaper.

This is a WIKI drawn from the group on the Storerboats forum discussions on setting up lug and sprit rigs for best performance building on the information in my webpage.

Setting up for performance – Balance Lug – Goat Island Skiff

John Goodman who recently spent 5 days semi racing a Goat Island Skiff in the Texas200 event got back to me with some observations and even some pictures of aspects of the boat and the sailing.

I have responded with suggestions to make some further improvements. Between John and me there are some useful tips about setting up a boat for more speed.

However the standard setup of the Goat is fine for most – it is still pretty quick in standard form.

There is advice for both lug and sprit traditional rigs here.