Following Waypoint Yacht Club’s Tako and Flying Fizz Races this morning, Mothgirl Dibou talked with several of us on the SYC dock about some Fizz racing features and answered questions about her new boat. She had several interesting tips and suggestions, so I thought I should post the transcript here:

[7:00] IM: Mothgirl Dibou: I couldn’t help noticing that some of you have problems sailing the fizz at max speed
[7:10] Mothgirl Dibou: the first basic thing is that you want as little lag as possible
[7:10] Mothgirl Dibou: so when you race you always type “reduce lag” first
[7:11] Mothgirl Dibou: this switches off cosmetic things you don’t need
[7:11] Mothgirl Dibou: and in the next version will also make your text display more up to date
[7:11] Mothgirl Dibou: it makes it sail a little better that way
[7:11] Mothgirl Dibou: When you sail upwind, never try to sail too high unless you have to round a mark or something.
[7:12] Mothgirl Dibou: The main thing is a fizz starts to plane at 5 m/s, so when you sail upwind you start off at 50 degrees or so to get it to plane as quickly as possible until you reach the 5m/s barrier.
[7:13] Mothgirl Dibou: then you luff up a bit but not further than 45 degrees
[7:13] Mothgirl Dibou: this way you will sail at about 6 m/s upwind
[7:13] Mothgirl Dibou: if you don’t you will sail at 4 m/s or less but higher, so you will reach the buoy much later
[7:13] Jane Fossett: yes
[7:14] Mothgirl Dibou: when you tack still going upwind make sure you are planing
[7:14] Mothgirl Dibou: the boat will turn faster if you keep your sheet as it is at about 15 degrees and turn as fast as you can and immediately to the right course

[7:14] Mothgirl Dibou: this way the boat will keep planing and you wont have to adjust your sheet
[7:15] Mothgirl Dibou: if you turn too far or not far enough the boat will slow down
[7:15] Mothgirl Dibou: the apparent wind angle will increase and you will have to adjust your sheet ASAP
[7:15] Mothgirl Dibou: if not you will loose planing then you go to the downwind mark (talking about the USS Olympic course)
[7:16] Mothgirl Dibou: try to keep the boat at 90 degrees to the wind or slightly over
[7:16] Mothgirl Dibou: at 90 degrees you will have a genaker
[7:17] Mothgirl Dibou: this will appear between 160 and 90 degrees
[7:17] Mothgirl Dibou: the genaker will increase speed significantly
[7:17] Mothgirl Dibou: factor 1.6 I believe
[7:17] Mothgirl Dibou: but you will find that the heel is very bad as well
[7:17] Mothgirl Dibou: 40 degrees at 10m/s wind or more at 11 m/s
[7:18] Mothgirl Dibou: 11 m/s is the threshold at which the boat might capsize at this course
[7:18] Jane Fossett: over 160 you wing? How does that compare to 160?
[7:18] Jane Fossett: you said the genaker only is up to 160
[7:19] Mothgirl Dibou: over 160 is a course you never want to sail
[7:19] Jane Fossett: ok!
[7:19] Mothgirl Dibou: the boat capsizes when it has a heel of more than 45 degrees for a few seconds
[7:19] Mothgirl Dibou: not immediately
[7:19] Mothgirl Dibou: but after about 3 seconds the heel will also slow the boat down
[7:20] joepie Korobase: good to know
[7:20] Mothgirl Dibou: so try to keep it under 40 degrees by releasing the sheet a bit but never too much
[7:20] Mothgirl Dibou: sheet is much more important than heel
[7:20] Mothgirl Dibou: the sheet should be at 1/2 of the apparent wind direction at all times
[7:21] Mothgirl Dibou: When you reach the downwind mark and gybe
[7:21] Mothgirl Dibou: be careful for the genaker not to touch the buoy
[7:21] Mothgirl Dibou: than you sail at a somewhat closer reach to the blue buoy here
[7:21] Mothgirl Dibou: that is easy
[7:21] Mothgirl Dibou: but you will see the apparent wind change very fast
[7:22] Mothgirl Dibou: this means you constantly need to adjust the sheet
[7:22] Mothgirl Dibou: i my self have 2 gestures
[7:22] Mothgirl Dibou: sheet -1 and sheet +1
[7:22] Mothgirl Dibou: the arrow keys i use for the big works
[7:22] Mothgirl Dibou: going round the buoys and releasing the sheet rapidly
[7:23] Mothgirl Dibou: for instance
[7:23] Mothgirl Dibou: the up key releases it by 1/5th
[7:23] Mothgirl Dibou: the down key tightens it by 1/10th
[7:23] Mothgirl Dibou: so 1x up is to be corrected by 2x down
[7:23] Jane Fossett: good to know
[7:23] Mothgirl Dibou: then you sail upwind again
[7:23] Mothgirl Dibou: try to keep it planing
[7:24] Mothgirl Dibou: it should never leave this condition during the entire race
[7:24] Mothgirl Dibou: so turn fast
[7:24] Mothgirl Dibou: immediately to the right course
[7:24] joepie Korobase: 1/10 of 90 then?
[7:24] Mothgirl Dibou: 110th of the current angle
[7:24] joepie Korobase: 9 in 18 out
[7:24] Mothgirl Dibou: so a sheet angle of 30
[7:24] joepie Korobase: oh
[7:24] Mothgirl Dibou: 1/20th is 3 degrees
[7:24] Mothgirl Dibou: *1/10
[7:24] joepie Korobase: ok!

[7:25] Mothgirl Dibou: i use the minimap for going around buoys and tacking
[7:25] Mothgirl Dibou: i know the next course already
[7:25] Mothgirl Dibou: steer
[7:25] Mothgirl Dibou: and watch the minimap
[7:25] Mothgirl Dibou: iit rotates the fastest
[7:25] Mothgirl Dibou: then i correct with little steps using the text display
[7:26] Mothgirl Dibou: and set the course to 45–48 degrees
[7:26] Mothgirl Dibou: when you press the left/right arrow key shortly
[7:26] Mothgirl Dibou: the boat steers a little bit
[7:26] Mothgirl Dibou: if you hold it just a bit longer
[7:26] Mothgirl Dibou: it steers at 1.5 the speed
[7:26] Mothgirl Dibou: for faster rounding
[7:26] Jane Fossett: oh!
[7:26] Mothgirl Dibou: so always use little steps for adjusting
[7:27] Mothgirl Dibou: then you reach the upwind mark again
[7:27] Mothgirl Dibou: and need to go downwind
[7:27] Mothgirl Dibou: to the finish
[7:27] Mothgirl Dibou: but if you do this you will have an angle to the wind of more that 160
[7:27] Mothgirl Dibou: so no genaker
[7:27] Mothgirl Dibou: never sail without a genaker
[7:28] Mothgirl Dibou: instead sail at 158 degrees or so
[7:28] Mothgirl Dibou: constantly keeping the sheet at 1/2 the apparent wind angle
[7:28] Mothgirl Dibou: it will be very fast
[7:28] Mothgirl Dibou: then gybe and immediately set the right course again
[7:29] Mothgirl Dibou: if you keep pulling the sheet in as the speed increases
[7:29] Mothgirl Dibou: you will go over the finish line very fast
[7:29] Mothgirl Dibou: lol
[7:29] Jane Fossett: the tako polar shows that 160 is much slower point of sail than 150. Is the same true for the Fizz?
[7:29] Mothgirl Dibou: that’s about it
[7:29] Mothgirl Dibou: yes
[7:29] Mothgirl Dibou: just under 160 is the fastest
[7:29] Mothgirl Dibou: keep a safety margin though
[7:29] Mothgirl Dibou: you don’t want the changing wind to take away your gennaker
[7:30] Mothgirl Dibou: if you do that well
[7:30] Mothgirl Dibou: you should be able to sail a round in less than 6:30
[7:30] Mothgirl Dibou: i cant do that yet
[7:30] Mothgirl Dibou: Joepie can i think
[7:30] Jane Fossett: Olympic course?
[7:30] Mothgirl Dibou: it is slower than a Tako
[7:31] Mothgirl Dibou: but a bit more realistic this way
[7:31] Mothgirl Dibou: yes
[7:31] joepie Korobase: we will go faster in time im sure
[7:31] Mothgirl Dibou: yes, i think so too
[7:31] Jane Fossett: I have not tested out the windshadow. Can you give us an idea of the range and intensity of shadow effects?
[7:31] Mothgirl Dibou: if everybody wants i can increase the speed in a future release, but for the time being i think this is very nice
[7:32] Jane Fossett: I think we all need to get used to one stable version.
[7:32] Mothgirl Dibou: does anyone have a question for me?
[7:32] Mothgirl Dibou: yes we will keep it as it is for now
[7:32] joepie Korobase: i liked the wind shadow question
[7:32] Mothgirl Dibou: oh yes
[7:33] Mothgirl Dibou: windshadowing
[7:33] Mothgirl Dibou: when two boats are within chat range
[7:33] Mothgirl Dibou: so very close together
[7:33] Mothgirl Dibou: the boats will tell each other their positions and course
[7:33] Mothgirl Dibou: each boats calculates the windshadow it receives from the other if any
[7:34] Mothgirl Dibou: this only works when close together and only when you are truly upwind to the other boat
[7:34] Mothgirl Dibou: the effect will diminish rapidly when you are a bit behind or in front of the wind in its sails
[7:34] Mothgirl Dibou: just like in RL
[7:35] Mothgirl Dibou: only difference is the distance
[7:35] Mothgirl Dibou: we are limited to chat range
[7:35] Jane Fossett: thank you
[7:35] Mothgirl Dibou: so also be aware of people behind you
[7:35] joepie Korobase: grin
[7:35] Mothgirl Dibou: once they get within range your wind will reduce dramatically
[7:35] Mothgirl Dibou: and they will easily sail passed you
[7:36] joepie Korobase: i might add a radar hud
[7:36] Mothgirl Dibou: lol
[7:36] Jane Fossett: grin
[7:36] Mothgirl Dibou: that would be cool
[7:42] Mothgirl Dibou: oh, one more thing, the race id
[7:42] Mothgirl Dibou: everybody sets this as a number between 1 and 99
[7:42] Mothgirl Dibou: but we have 3 digits
[7:42] joepie Korobase: yay!
[7:42] Mothgirl Dibou: so i set mine to 749
[7:42] joepie Korobase: 666 is mine evil grinn
[7:42] Mothgirl Dibou: chance is 1 in 1000 to have someone with the same id
[7:37] Balthazar Fouroux: Thanks, that was great stuff to learn
[7:38] Mothgirl Dibou: i hope it all made sense
[7:38] Jane Fossett: Moth, I think the discussion on the ORG forum has been helpful, the posters all ended up agreeing they like the boat as it is right now
[7:38] Mothgirl Dibou: yes that is a very useful forum
[7:38] Berjo Saiman: thank you
[7:38] Mothgirl Dibou: everybody agreed to keep it yes
[7:38] Mothgirl Dibou: which is best i think
[7:38] Jane Fossett: yes.
[7:38] Mothgirl Dibou: shouldn’t be too easy
[7:39] joepie Korobase: totally agree on that
[7:39] Jane Fossett: [haha, its not too easy]
[7:39] joepie Korobase: lol
[7:39] Mothgirl Dibou:
[7:39] joepie Korobase: that boat is a bitch!
[7:39] Mothgirl Dibou: sorry about that
[7:40] Jane Fossett: haha, and with that closing comment… I’ll go edit and post this today…