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Not quite an i550 question, but when is it more advantageous to fly a symmetrical spinnaker? Besides DDW of course! I'm sure each of you has your own opinion, let's hear them!

Hey Rocky, I'm pretty sure TTB tried it in the very early days and the hull shape did not play nice and the Symmy tried to take them from chine to chine in a not nice way. You would need to confirm with TTB of course.

Yep, we originally ran an etchells chute with a symmetrical pole. potential was there but the chine walking was a total pain in the arse and made steering tough. thus why i ordered the 1/2ounce ayso runner. it is bigger than the etchells (52sq/m) and the boat is alot more settled. good for the light air shit and when you have tide against you also. if you get a chute that size, if you get a gust be prepared to get towed with it!!

nortorious wrote:In mixed fleet handicap racing, the symmetrical boats will clean a sportboat's clock in many conditions. The speed difference is not enough to counter the distance sailed issue.

wha ????????

Not sure what you are racing against, but a well-sailed asymm sportie will kill any well-sailed sym sail boat 95% of the time. Been there, done, had my ass handed to me against M24's, Antrims, Hendos and even the occasional J80 (sorry to say). Sprit boats pretty much ran the table last week at Screwpile, in predominantly light air, with a little more pressure in the afternoon seabreeze.

YMMV.

Raced the "Delta DINGHY Ditch" this last weekend......and found ourselves in that "5%" cataogory where symetricals beat the sporty's.

The course is 30 miles downwind from Rio Vista to the Sacramento turning basin, running up the deep water shipping channel. Rabit start, and we were one of the last of the pack to get rolling. Wind was light....W 5-10 knots...a beat up to one windward mark then off down the course which mostly is straight North to Sac.

We nailed our start, despite a strong contrary flood, and rounded the windward pin and immediately started picking off boats ahead of us. It was a broad reach to a run, and we were not yet in the narrow channel so had room to manuever w/ kite up. But as the course entered the shipping channel, and the channel slowly turned to the east, it became DDW w/ no room to take advantage of hotter angles. It was frustrating to see the bulk of the fleet, which we had gleefully sailed through earlier, pick us off one by one. We just couldn't heat it up for more than a minute or two before having to jibe again in the narrow channel. The best we could do was heel to windward, rotating the chute as far in front of the boat as it would go, and soak her deep. Light winds and DDW were our demise.

We still ended up mid fleet, 3rd in class, drank alot of beer and enjoyed the stereo (although changing CD's was hard to do w/ all the gybing....won't need to hear Moby again anytime soon!!!)

No matter what, there is simply NOTHING better than racing a boat you built! And 95% of the time, you'll beat those old school symetrical boats!

bd

bendoo wrote:Raced the "Delta DINGHY Ditch" this last weekend......and found ourselves in that "5%" cataogory where symetricals beat the sporty's.bd

..any pic's of that?

Awesome Ben ! Thank you for updating us all with your racing adventures !

no pics...I'm a loser when it comes to that stuff ...sorry guys.... it was a great day though!!!