be obvious how much you’re
losing, but from a coach boat it
is: Boats that do those button-
hook turns around the leeward
mark get crushed. It’s important
to be more calculating and a lit-
tle farther away from the mark
as you approach it—at least as
much as the fleet allows.
Brun also recommended sail-
ing past the mark a little bit and
have 99 percent of your turn
done as you pass the mark.
You’ll know you’re doing it right
if the tiller is in the middle as
you pass the mark. In other
words, at the mark, you’re going
straight, sailing closehauled. Do
that and you’ll have way more
grip on your keel and end up in
a higher lane than boats still
turning as they pass the mark.
That’s when the keel stalls and
the boat slides sideways.
In a perfect setting— without
much traffic and a square
course—start your turn when
you’re around 2.5 boatlengths
abeam of the mark.
It’s OK if your arc takes you
a little downwind of the mark
before turning up. Again, the
idea is that, as you finish
the turn and actually pass the
mark, you are going straight.
If you’ve done a beautiful
mark rounding and you’re going
fast in this nice, arcing turn, you
can go to final trim about the
time you hit closehauled.
If you’re not fast, it could be
because the fleet did not allow
a beautiful arcing turn, it’s just
like the exit of a tack. Trim to
about 90 percent until the boat
is up to speed. Do this and you’ll
have more grip on your keel and
incur less leeway. You’ll also
end up in a higher lane than
boats still turning and maybe
overtrimming their sails as they
pass the mark.
The tricky thing with your
approach to leeward marks is
that the wind angle makes a
huge dierence. If you’re going
around a right-hand mark—
looking downwind—and are in
a big left shift, you don’t have
to head up that much because
you’re going to be rounding up
into the header, which means
you’re heading up, but not much
because it’s a big left shift.
After sailing for a bit, you might
tack to get onto the lifted tack.
In that case, you can initiate the
turn closer to the mark because
there’s less turning involved.
You just head up 60 degrees
or so and you’re good, so a boat-
length away will probably work
in these situations. The key is
to set up a nice big smooth turn
rather than a button-hook.
Making the turn correctly
is even more critical in stron-
ger winds because you can get
pushed sideways more eas-
ily, especially if your sails are
overtrimmed when heading up
to a closehauled course.
This same negative eect of
overtrimming before getting up
to speed became apparent to
us coming out of tacks when
we were first sailing the Melges- We were sailing in 12 knots,
and right o, we’d pull the trav-
eler up to the normal spot that
it rests. The result? We stalled
and went sideways out of tacks;
the boat heeled too much.
If we divide the traveler
position into thirds, the resting
spot upwind in 12 knots was
a third down from all the way
up. So, coming out of a tack,
we learned to set it just below
the middle. Then we’d hike, chill
for a little, let the flow attach
to everything, and then pull it
Going fast is
the key. Sure,
you can overdo
it and start
reaching around
the course, but
pinching on a
skinny keelboat
is far worse.