DDR14 Questions

[DeathSpear]

I have the wrong boat for it now but since I haven't done the Ditch in over a decade, I'm thinking about it - i.e. Dan's philosophy (plus mud and rum are better equalizers than ratings.)

I think you'd really enjoy it. I would recommend not to try it shorthanded. On the JS we might do close to 100 gybes, and you can't really blow many of them. I do suggest you try to trailer back. I've done the delivery over the water twice and that is NOT my idea of fun. That alone is a testament of how much fun we are having on Saturday.

[BobJ]

Re the delivery, I thought you had people for that.

I don't have the use of a trailer any more - and I'm about to pay the price with my first haulout/bottom job. Alameda Marina was the only place I could drysail (5,500#) and it was time to move on.

So would you go with a small kite that blows through the foretriangle easily? (The last time I did the race was with my J/33 and full crew.)

[Idiotwind]

Unless the RC can guarantee it's a kite fly all the way down, I don't see how you can throw a new, basically unused system at an otherwise great event. When they start using DW PHRF for the Double Damned, and nobody complains, I'll listen. I do agree with Bob that, with as wide a PHRF span as the DDR brings in, one should shoot for Division Honors, and leave the rest to chance (although, but for about 10' of OCS, we would have been 1st, overall this year, and that would have been nice).

We'll be back next year, any system used, 'cuz it's a blast, and we can beat back at 60mph. Probably the same for the Moores.

[BobJ]

I just read this again, including that bit about blowing through the foretriangle easily. Hopefully you know what I meant. I do inside gybes and have to pull about three miles of sheet around. But it's outside the foretriangle . . .

I need to sail more.

[Wylieguy]

I've stopped sailing the Jazz Cup and have only tried the DDR once in my Wyliecat. If they used the downwind ratings I'd be back. They're both fun races, but having a chance to do well is also a fun factor. I rate 129 like the Express27s, but after a few miles, they're miles ahead. Wylies don't plane, and downwind is not their strongest point of sail. There are stretches of reaching on the DDR, but a whole bunch more ddw, or close to it. I know the NCPHRF Committee did lots and lots of comparisons during the Downwind research and development.

Like Bob, I'm trailerless (a guarantee to myself that I won't try the PacCup again) so slogging back down the river and through Suisun with a 6 hp outboard will be my fate if I sail the DDR. Saturday might be fun, but the next two days will be something else

[DeathSpear]

I just read this again, including that bit about blowing through the foretriangle easily. Hopefully you know what I meant. I do inside gybes and have to pull about three miles of sheet around. But it's outside the foretriangle . . .

I need to sail more.

For DDR you'll have people to do that

And I would feel like a total dick of an owner if I wasn't there for the two DDR deliveries, painful as they were.

[Thing-Fish]

DDR is the one you want to do as crew on OPBs.

[aA]

exactly. ratings rules notwithstanding, if it wasn't for the race being a perennial season counter for us, i would skip the hassle.

[Ballard Sailor]

Why don't you simply look at the past results and adjust everyones ratings to the point that they all have the same corrected time, then do the race with those ratings?

Are wyliecats really in the same class as express 27's?

The vocals are usually in the minority.

[IOR Geezer]

I think if you were to fairly rate boats for the Ditch Run, draft and keel profile would have to equate more heavily into the equation.

In fairness to the YC, maybe a second or 2 credit per mile if you stay and have dinner and a cocktail. If you "load and go" you should be assessed
a penalty. SSC puts a big effort into this event and it is their biggest of the year, and while their sailing program may not be huge, the juniors program is
huge in the sailing community and many a great sailor has come through it.

[Idiotwind]

PHRF DW ratings compress the bandwidth, placing a premium on sailing a clean race with the kite up. No extra meters on course, no mistakes, no crashes, and you'll do well. If you have to beat, or close reach, with no turbo-wind-catcher (kite) in effect, the boats on the rating perimeters, the under 75's or over 200's, are going to suffer big. But others are also going to suffer in that situation, as the compression of the rating spectrum is going to muddy the results, as you get away from PHRF 100.

Race for division honors. Overall is magnificent, but it's ephemeral, given any rating system.

[Ballard Sailor]

I gotta get one of those turbo-wind-catcher thingy's!

[Buzz Light Beer]

There needs to be a time credit for rum recovery operations

[BobJ]

WD: "I think I need to get farther aft."

PHRF DW ratings compress the bandwidth . . .

Most were using DW ratings with TOT. TOT is what compresses the corrected times (vs. TOD). I noticed recently that for the next Pacific Cup they're going back to TOD.

The other thing with races into the north Bay is building breeze as the day wears on, like Jazz Cup in early September. The slower-rated boats tend to do well.

[Idiotwind]

Yeah, Bob, but sometimes it doesn't heat up. TOD vs TOT works the same way, but it's a horizontal compression with TOD. If the course is shortened by current, or by wind coming up late for the slow boat starts, the high-raters are favored. Under TOD, if the course is lengthened, for any reason (adverse current, light wind, no wind, etc.), the slow boats generally tend to bleed out on the course, unless it's totally absurd, and the slow boat is smart enough to solve the puzzle in light air, or luck shines, and Darwind or Galaxsea dominates. That's sailboat racing.

TOT tries to make elapsed time on the same course the determining factor, and does so evenly, across the spectrum, as well as it can. New boats, modified boats, freak boats, will all feel the love and/or contempt of the PHRF Committee, until there are enough of them to give a real, rational baseline. Older boats have had their ratings pretty well washed out, although a new mind on an old rating can mix it up. The compression I was talking about in Standard vs. DW ratings is real, and assumes that everyone is hitting their polars downwind. It attempts to remove the advantages of the Etchells upwind, and damp the advantages of the Cal 20, downwind.