SE Districts was an awesome learning experience for us as it was only our 3rd time (and the longest by far) in the Lightning. Our performance definitely improved throughout the regatta and we jumped from a last place finish in the 2nd race to finishing 10th out of 14 boats. We are still working to improve boat handling and understanding how to adjust the many controls available. Speaking with many of the older and experienced Lightning sailors on Saturday night was hugely beneficial and we went into Sunday with new tips and things to watch out for. Among the most important was improving spinnaker and jib trim and understanding how to adjust backstay and wire tension. Roll tacking is something we are working on as well. After discovering how stable this boat is and how slow it turns, we needed to adjust the speed and method with which we were rolling the boat.
Tactically, the racing proved challenging but also a great learning experience. All of us remarked on how interesting it is to have 3 people (not 2, like in collegiate 420/FJ sailing) to discuss tactics and strategy with on the course. We are learning to express opinions and how to make decisions together. Besides college sailing, we all come from pretty varied sailing backgrounds and we all saw how this plays a role in the way we make decisions and think about the course. Above all, we are learning to rely on each other and offer all viewpoints and ways to plan an upwind or downwind leg.
Each of us learned things specific to our position on the boat. Read below to see what each of us walked away from the regatta thinking about:
Darby (skipper):
I’ve grown up skippering all my life, but I am just now getting used to skippering bigger dinghies, like a Thistle and a Lightning. The first thing I noticed about a Lightning is its slow reaction time. The tacks are slow rolls, and we all had to control ourselves and wait before we jumped to the other side.
Many people remarked how the Lightning is a technical boat, and I have to agree. All of the control lines are right in between the middle and the skipper so that they can constantly be adjusted. Additionally, I have never sailed with a backstay before. A lot of this past weekend was playing with it (and talking about it with veteran sailors) to figure out the best setting. We found that we were playing the backstay too much for the conditions, and if we were to get overpowered, we essentially should set the backstay and vang sheet. Back when we were practicing a couple of weekends ago in heavy wind, I had Wheeler playing the traveler like a main sheet, but we found out this weekend that you should still play the main in the puffs, as long as your vang is tight. The tuning guides said to trim the main to where the top batten is parallel with the boom. I focused on that a lot this weekend, messing around with the different “gears” of the boat per se. A big thing that I noticed that I am not used to is the twist in the sail: when properly trimmed, the top of the leech is much farther out than the foot, creating a twist in it if you are looking at the boat from the stern. However, after looking around at the other boats, I think that, at least for those conditions, it was fast to have a decent amount of twist. Hannah mentions this in her section, but we are still figuring out the jib cloth and wire tension for different conditions. I think once we can figure that out and I come to understand how to make the boat go fast for the different gears (pointing, footing, etc.), I’ll feel good about how the boat moves through the water and I’ll be confident in our boat speed around other boats.
Going off of that, I think a great stride for our team as a whole was figuring out our dynamic, especially now that my head was more in the boat with making it go fast. In college sailing especially, I’m used to having a crew that isn’t experienced enough to make tactical decisions, purely because they just started sailing in college. Given the technical demand of the boat and my lack of experience driving it, I found myself focused on making it go fast and paying less attention to what was happening on the race course. I had to keep on reminding myself that Wheeler and Hannah are just as, if not more capable of making tactical decisions because they were the ones with their heads outside of the boat. They both had pivotal calls that I wouldn’t have seen had I just been sailing alone. Finally by Sunday, we were having great conversations discussing where we should go, what the wind is doing, where the other boats are, etc.
Wheeler (middle):
I definitely learned a lot from our first regatta. My two main takeaways were related to spinnaker and crew communication. I had flown a spinnaker before but never in such shifty conditions. I was used to setting the pole and making little adjustments to the sheet trim. The waves and shifty wind made this challenging as we were constantly having to heat up to power through waves and connect puffs. I want to continue to pay attention to spin trim in future regattas and make sure to keep our chute far enough away from the forestay so it's not choked off.
On the crew communication side, I thought our team got much better at painting a picture of the course for Darby as the weekend went on. As a skipper in college, I was more used to just driving the boat and not being the one to scope out the course. As middle, pretty much my entire job is to look upwind and help Darby make good calls which was definitely different than what I was used to. For this regatta, we had to deal with shifty and inconsistent wind as well as waves from passing motorboats. I think communicating is one area where I can continue to improve.
Hannah (forward):
By far, the biggest learning curve for me in the Lightning is learning how to sail with a spinnaker (we don’t use spinnakers in college racing which is where most of my competitive experience comes from). I am really short and so am still working on figuring out the best way to gybe the pole. Other than that, I find downwinds really fun since I act as the wind and boat “lookout”. It puts me in a good position to help make a decision about our subsequent upwind leg. On upwinds, I learned a lot about jib trim and how to not overtrim given a location marked on our spreaders. I tried out a new communication system with Darby using percentages (100% when the jib is at the mark on the spreader and decreasing as I ease the jib from there). Additionally, adjusting cloth and wire tension during races is something I have had to get used to. I am still figuring out the optimum wire tension for different amounts of wind as I seem to have read and heard a few different answers for how much it should be on. However, I love being able to adjust cloth tension and seeing all the wrinkles leave the jib; I can almost feel the boat power up the first time I tighten cloth after getting on the water. Overall, I’m happy with how we did at the regatta and am excited to keep learning and sailing with this team.
We loved getting to attend our first regatta with the Lightning Boat Grant Program at our home club of LLSC. The familiar faces and venue helped us ease into competitive Lightning sailing and a great time was had by all. Despite the familiarity, we enjoyed meeting new faces and friends of the Lightning class. The annual district meeting was held Saturday night and it was helpful for us to attend to learn more about our district. We will be helping out the new PR coordinator, Elaine, with building the social media presence of the Lightning SE district. Huge thank you to those experienced Lightning sailors who were happy to share advice, answer our many questions, and were cheering us on both on and off the water. It is clear that this class lives up to its reputation for being friendly and supportive to all. Also, special thank you to Jim and Pam Burke (Pam is our mentor for the Boat Grant Program) for both putting on a wonderful regatta and all their assistance and support of our team!
Next, we will be competing at the James Island Regatta June 15-16. Come introduce yourself if you’ll be there; we would love to meet you!
Hope to see you on the water soon!
Darby, Wheeler, and Hannah
Photo credits to Chris Voith and Jenny Calahan; thank you!!
