DOWNWIND - PART 10: DEFENDING (LESSONS FROM BRAZIL)
at 2.29.2012
(c) 2012 Doug Peckover
One thing I love about sailing a Laser is that we get to sail against some of the best sailors in the world. And when it comes to sailing downwind, the country that changed downwind sailing forever was Brazil.
The 1998 World Master Games were held at the Colombia River Gorge and the person to beat was Olympic Gold Medalist Gaston Brun from Brazil. In the 4th race it was blowing about 15 and I took the lead from him on the run. Brun then schooled me with something I had never before seen done so well. Here's what I wrote in my journal that evening:
On the run, he passed me again, I tried to blanket but he moved to the left and then right to stay in clear air. Very well done... Brun sailed a fine race and deserved his 1st place.
He was right in front of me and in my wind shadow, yet he stayed ahead to win the race. More importantly, he won the Worlds Games by one point over me, so passing me and staying ahead was worth 2 points. This was one of the critical parts of the championship that determined the winner. Here's how he defended against me.
Green is me and the green arrow is the wind direction and my wind shadow. Normally, green catches and passes red and is in complete control, as we have seen in the previous articles:
So red defends by heading up and green, being aggressive, also heads up. In doing this, the apparent wind shifts, so green's wind shadow no longer blankets red:
No problem, green just sails a hotter angle to get to windward of red:
In most cases, red will try to out-run green and they will sometimes both sail off the course. But Brun in red defended by bearing off slightly to sail by the lee (or he could have jibed). The apparent wind shifted to the other side, putting me way out of position when I also bore off:
So, I took the bait and bore off even more to get to windward with the new apparent wind and, in doing so, had to sail a further distance than Brun:
Just when I was in position, he headed up slightly, forcing me to head up much more again to cover him. Brun was acting and I was reacting, and I remember feeling like a puppet on a string.
The cycle repeated several times until I realized that I was steering to stay on top of him while he was steering to catch the waves. Even though I was taking his wind part of the time, I was also having to sail a further distance and was missing good waves to surf.
It was a great lesson from a great sailor and he deserved to win the race and the championship. It taught me that for every move there is a counter-move and, all things being equal, the smartest sailor wins. And as we all know, Laser sailing is about as equal as it gets.
