After a disappointing leg one and a good 4 days resting in Caen to put it behind me, I set out to the Start on Sunday rearing and ready to make some improvements….possibly a little too much because in the second start after a General re-call in the first, I was individually recalled along with 2 others to re-start and ended up going around the windward mark in last place. A little embarrassing but by the end of the short course, I managed to get 10 odd boats behind me and started trying to crawl up the fleet again.

Big crowds waving us out of Caen

By Cherbourg I was just in the top half but, unfortunately it didn’t last long as I chose to stay offshore when the majority went in shore and made big gains. The big learning point from this mistake was timings and realizing how important it is to engrave the timings of weather changes in my head. Having had a couple of beatings by big rain squalls already, we were a little bit warmed up for the following 24 hours. However it still was a little dissappointing to turn around Guernsey to see 125miles as the distance to Land’s End and realise that it was going to be a lot of bashing into waves, no sleeping and very wet while only going 6knots.

For this leg my intention was to stay just to the right of the fleet, where I thought gains could be made. Due to another miscalculation in weather timing this ended up being a big split from the fleet which, in hindsight I was fortunate to not come out of in last….More lessons learnt about engraving of weather change times.

Turning round Lands End near the back of the fleet and thoroughly frustrated I took a bit more time to look at the weather, made a plan and stuck to it. This started off as a peaceful sail upwind which, presented a good opportunity to catch up on some much needed sleep but, by the time we reached Ireland, It ended up as a sleigh ride with spinnakers and surfing at over 20knots at times. I spent most of the trip in close company with Nigel King including spending daybreak chatting to each other, surfing along in 25knots of wind and both loving it.

A shifty ride into the finish line and finishing 2 minutes behind Nigel and 2 hours behind the leaders saw us finishing in 32nd and 33rd(now dropped to 35th after a 5minute penalty from breaking a seal on one of my batteries). Having made two big mistakes in the race and struggling with a few breakages, this isn’t a result that I am ecstatic about as I feel I can make improvements. However it is an improvement from the last leg and from where I was at Lands End, it isn’t all bad news.

Arrived, thoroughly battered into Dun Laoghaire

We continue again on Sunday on another 470mile leg to Les Sables d’Olonne. Hopefully the weather isn’t too harsh and we get a little bit of rest for the boats and ourselves.

Onwards and hopefully upwards,

All for now,

Sam

After struggling through leg 1 of the 2011 Solitaire du Figaro, having finished in 45th, I find my self struggling to get many positives from the situation. After a full nights sleep in a normal bed, I’ve had a bit more time to think about it and now the challenge is to put it behind me and look forward to the next 3 legs.

7th at the First Mark

We had a downwind start in the Fog which, went quite well for me turning up at the first mark of the course in 7th. The first leg was an 80mile reach to the Eddystone Light house off Plymouth. This started with bailing 100litres of water out the bottom of the boat from a leaking ballast system, we then put the spinnaker up and we’re fast reaching on the Rhum Line and making good progress. Unfortunately my big spinnaker then blew up and was out of action for the rest of the race. This turned out to be quite decisive in my finishing result.

Inadvisable inconvenience for racing

I turned up at the end of the reach in 25th and a bit surprised to have not lost too much ground. Unfortunately the wind started dropping and my ability to stay at a similar speed to everyone else dropped too. From there onwards it was a slow but steady decline towards the back of the fleet where I spent the rest of the race. We drifted past Portland bill with the tide and no wind until the sea breeze kicked in. The fleet then split in two with the leading pack getting past St.Albans ledge before  the tide turned against the rest of us.

Finally after getting to needles fairway buoy, we crossed the channel again  initially  we made quite fast progress before the wind died completely and we were left drifting and some of us anchoring. I dragged my anchor for about an hour before it finally caught the bottom and a few hours later I realised the down side of anchoring in 65meters of water is, its a lot of rope to pull back up. the course got shortened at the next mark and we went strait to the finish. Struggling to get across the line in a dying wind and increasing tide made sure that our already large time deficits on the rest of the fleet were increased further.

Most of the race I enjoyed myself, despite not being any where near as competitive as I would like to have been, I enjoyed the sail, the challenge and trying to make the boat go as fast as I could with what I had. Unfortunately as I heard on the VHF that more and more boats had finished the reality of having a 5 1/2 hour deficit, on results which are awarded in accumulative time, would be a very tall order to overcome. Either way we have 3 more legs of this race and I have no intention of approaching in any different attitude then if I had finished in the top 10 instead of the bottom 10.

Artemis Offshore Academy sailors updates. Congratulations to Phil!

We start the next leg this Sunday(7th August) and head to Dun Laoghaire. This is 470miles and the long range forecast currently looked for an upwind sail which, at least means I cant break my spinnaker…again.

All for now

Sam

This morning we had the welcome briefing for all the skipper competing in this years Solitaire du Figaro, it consisted of a lot of formalities, a few useful bits of information and a few give aways. Entirely in french  and short but sharp, it was good to see everyone gathering for the first time and it is starting to dawn on me, that this is actually happening and not just something we are talking about any more. With lots of sailors who I’ve only ever heard about and seen their faces in magazines, Im actually going to be lining up against them in less than a week. Very exciting but, slightly nerve racking at the same time.

The welcome briefing

Over the weekend we had our first set of measurements to pass. On friday the boat came out the water to get weighed and they put about 20 templates upto the bottom of the boat and its appendages to make sure we were the same as everyone else. We all have to be with in 3mm of these templates or a big time penalty can be dished out after the race, and their apparently not shy or kind with these, and I dont plan on finding out. This ended up with us having to doing a bit of filling and fairing but we are now confident that we shouldn’t have any problems in case of a random check through the race.

Boat coming out for a rules check

After that we had to measure our sails, this is a fairly painless activity of which we dont have a lot of control over, apart form to make sure our spinnakers are as dry as possible, so the moisture in the cloth doesn’t allow them to stretch out of the limits. A couple days spent with a de-humidifier ensured there were no problems here.

Romain hard at work measuring sails

Through the week we have a few more briefing for various things(safety, rookie specifics, race brief) and on friday we have the Prologue race, which is a short inshore course sailed single handed and done by all the skippers and the boats in ‘Race-mode’ with a few prizes that make it worth trying for. As the youngest competitor this year, I have been asked to have the national TV onboard before the start so, may find myself on France 3 at some stage. Then a final day of preparation and tweaks on Saturday before on early departure on Sunday.

Very much looking forward to getting over the start line and it being just myself and the boat, Until then will have to enjoy the final preparations as much as possible…or try to.

All for now,

Sam

2 weeks today we will be well into the first leg of the 2011 La Solitaire du Figaro and the last 9months of preparation will be showing itself as to how productive it has been. Since I got back to the boat last Monday it has been all go, getting back in the water and all the last minute training possible. On Friday morning we have to be at the Perros-Guirec where the race starts from and that will be our last chance for any training before the Race start on Sunday 31st July.

The boat went back in the water on Tuesday night and I then spent a couple days making sure everything was put together just right, including a couple hours of training. With Mark Lloyd for a sunset photo-shoot, and joining in for one race of the Pol Roger cup, held in the other Artemis Offshore Academy figaros. I then had my final meeting with Sports Psychologist Niel Weston before setting off on my delivery to Lorient where our winter training group, CEM, have re-united for a final training session with coach Franck Citeau.

www.lloydimages.com

We have also managed to sort out my food and Diet Plan for La Solitaire with RTW foods. The major problem in sorting this out was trying to get enough calories in my daily quota, without spending too much of my time preparing and eating food, which effectively is going slowly as your not sailing the boat. We tried to make as much of the diet finger food as possible but, still struggled to get what we needed. So. we have now settled for “Boil-in-the-Bag” food which can be eaten hot or cold. This cuts down preparation time massively and leaves me with the added luxury of hot food, if I get the time. As a result an ideal days food consists of something like this: Muesli(in a bag), Four ‘boil-in-a-bag’ meals, dried fruit, nuts, chocolate, energy bars and a dessert(in a bag). This will probably be adapted a little depending on the forecast on the day before the leg. I won’t get hungry, thats for sure.

My delivery down to Lorient was very productive, managing practise a few tacks, gybes and sail changes as well as passing through parts of the course, around brittany and the Channel Islands. I then got a chance to go sailing with my brand spanking new mainsail today and was very pleased with it so, got back home in a very good mood. We have two more days sailing before setting off on the delivery to Perros where the real ‘Final-Preparations’ will begin.

Sailing past Pont Durand

All for now

Sam

Since the boat came out the water a week ago, its has been very very busy for the whole shore crew working through the Jobs list and for the painters trying to strip off the old paint and reapply the anti-fouling with a smooth, go-faster finish. Unfortunately as is the British summer, weather has not been on our side. Thankfully this doesn’t stop Max, Simon and Romain from flying through the Jobs list but for the painters, its been a much harder chore.

Our home-made painting tent.

While the boat has been out the water I have been using the opportunity to catch up on a bit more of the shore based things prior to the solitaire. At the end of last week I went back to our training base in the south of france to meet with Weather Guru, Sylvain Mondon form Meteo France. He has worked with La Solitaire du Figaro for the last 10 years as well as many other major sailing campaigns and record attempts, including Jules Verne trophies. I got the priceless opportunity to have a days one-to-one session with him looking at the course for this year(which he helped create), running through all the likely weather scenarios and routing situations. Although my patience in a classroom doesn’t last very long, I managed to take a lot back from this 7 hour session. I then spent a few days working on the boat and have now disappeared  for a few days rest before the final 3weeks of prep for La solitaire.

At the beginning of next week, we will put the boat back together and into the water for a few final days training and tuning then on Friday, I will set off on my delivery to Lorient where we have a weeks training with all the guys we spent the winter with at CEM in La Grande Motte. The deadline for arrival in Perros-Guirrec for the start is the 23rd July, which is 2 weeks tomorrow, and after that we are not sailing again until the Prologue race , 2 days before the start. Those two weeks of training are going to fly by.

The JP Morgan Asset Management Round the Island Race 2011 was a wet wild 7hours for the 6 of us onboard Artemis 23. I was joined by Paul from Pol Roger Champagne, Kirsty from Spinlock, Tom from Marlow Ropes and two other member of the Artemis Team, Carolyn and Simon.

Our start at 0630 in the morning was to say the least, a little bit crazy, with 25 knots of wind and well over 100 boats on the start line. With out realising quite how many people were aiming for the same spot as us, I quickly realised we were deep in the mix of mayhem. For the first 10 minutes, racing became less of a priority and avoiding crashes was high on the list as I think it was for most of the fleet. The beat through the western solent towards the needles calmed down a bit but, a constant watch for other boat was still necessary. By the time we reached the needles, in 3rd of the 4 figaros, the Mayday calls were all over the radio with every obscure disaster you could think of: lost rudders, people in the water, multihulls capsized and the list was endless.

Thankfully all was well for us and turning round the needles left us with a decision as to which sail to use, I decided it eer on the edge of caution and unfortunately this cost us a few places but, it is not something I regret having seen the problems around us and heard the stories afterwards. We got our self into some space and then put up the big spinnaker to have and incredibly fun blast round the southern tip of the island, in big waves and lots of spray everywhere. We turned round the most eastern end of the course and on to the ‘home strait’ in 4th out of the Artemis Figaros and unfortunately that was how it stayed till the finish. Not winning is never easy but, the most important thing for us. was to have fun and not break the boat, as its the one I will be using for La Solitaire du Figaro in 4 weeks, and we achieved this still finishing 27th of 120 in our class.

Clinging on with the big spinnaker up

The day after the race, my coach Nico Berenger came for a couple days of rig and sail tuning. With the new sails this year and the very adjustable Figaro rig, there is a lot of optimisation that can be done to get the best out of what we have. This was an extremely productive 2days with Nico, topped off with an afternoon of going through the course of the Figaro and starting to run through a few different weather scenarios so the decisions on the race course will hopefully ahve been run through and thought about already.

The boat is now having a mini re-fit and will come out the water to be painted and the mast taken out on thursday. We are back in the water in 10 days for a final 2 weeks training before arriving in Perros-Guirec for the start on the 23rd July.

All for now,

Sam

Since getting back from the La Transmanche I have been back in the solent doing a bit of training by myself and joined by Conrad Humphreys and Nigel King, the other two british entries in the Solitaire, for some of it.

It has been a mostly windy couple weeks where we have only really had a chance to get our new sails out once so, the main agenda has been maneuvers and boat handling. I spent a couple days on my own trying a few things and after a few majors in 30knots with a big spinnaker, thankfully an improvement was noticeable. While we were training over the winter, I felt pretty confident with my boat handling and have therefore spent the last couple months focussing on other things such as boat speed. I realised the down side of this meant that my maneuvers have become the rusty part but, after these couple weeks I am starting to feel a bit more confident again.

Nigel and I spent a day doing one-on-one Match racing style starts which, in 20knots and single handed can get quite busy at times, thankfully no clashes even though it was close at times as you can see from this video.

Yesterday we had a short 20mile race around the solent with the 3 of us, unfortunately Nigel had to head home early with pilot problems but, Conrad and I stayed out for a Photo-shoot with Mark Lloyd where we got some good photos that can be seen on the Artemis Offshore Academy Facebook page here.

On saturday we are competing in the annual Round the Island race but, unlike normal I will be onboard with a crew of 6 and I’m hoping it doesn’t start to feel too cramped. Our start is at 0630 in the morning and there will be updates on the race website www.roundtheisland.org.uk as well as on my twitter feed www.twitter.com/goodchildsam. After the race I have a couple more days training with coach Nico Berenger before the boat comes out the water to have some work done on it in the final preparations for La Solitaire in 5 weeks.

All for now,

Sam

© Lloyd Images

© Lloyd Images

© Lloyd Images

With 6 weeks to go to the start of the Solitaire du Figaro, the Transmanche was the last time we will get to line up with most of the fleet before it really matters. My race, despite consisting of a lot of ups and downs, saw me finish as the 3rd solo and the first ‘Bizuth’ or rookie.

The day before the start the course got changed to avoid strong winds on saturday night so, we had a 150mile course off to the west of brittany including a passage through the famous Chanel du Four. Our manic start in the narrow channel and 25 boats saw me get away form the start buried deep in the pack with a lot of catching up to do. I got around the first mark just shy of the top ten and after the initial 10miles reaching there was not too much change. We then had a 50mile upwind leg in 20knots which was a good opportunity for a speed test with the new sails.

Le Phare du Four (on a good day)

Unfortunately, a small abnormality with my electrics (which was easily fixed and not serious) allowed me to get distracted from the rest of the race and mentally I was very unhappy with the first half of the race, spending the whole thing with no definite plan. The upwind mark then arrived a lot quicker than I expected it and I rounded in a little mess just behind Nigel and Conrad.

We hoisted the spinnakers and started on the leg that turned out to be the decider for the race. There was complete shut down of wind that left the majority of the fleet parked and waiting for the new wind. 4 of us, including Nigel, chose to go west of route looking for the new breeze that filled in 5 hours later. Despite our progress being slow, we managed to find the wind before everyone else and put a 2 mile gap between us and the rest of the fleet.

There was a moment of worry when we split from the rest of the fleet going through the Chanel du Four but, thankfully being guided by the local Michel Bothuon through very narrow gaps in the rocks, we managed to hold them off and hold our lead to the Finish. Michel was double handed so I thought Nigel and I had finished 1st and 2nd solo sailors but, was a little surprised to find Jermie Beyou on the dock waiting for us. After making an early break from the fleet he had escaped the worst of the wind shut down and then made a tidal gate and finished an hour and a half before everyone. Considering everyone else finished within 50minutes, this was pretty incredible.

I am very happy with my result but, am under no deceptions that the solitaire is going to be easy as there will be many more sailors and a lot of talent. I have got a list of things away from this event to go work on over the next 6 weeks so that on the 31st July, I can hit the start-line as competitively as possible and give myself a good chance of making the best of the opportunity i’ve been given. The boat is on the way back to cowes at the moment and I will join it on Tuesday to continue training from there. The next race will be the Round the Island race on the 25th June.

All for now,

Sam

The last day of preparations for the final practise event of the season has gone pretty well for the 3 brits. Conrad Humphreys, Nigel Kind and myself have had nothing but small jobs to do on the boats, leaving plenty of time to look at weather and the racecourse.

20 solo figaros in the 2011 Transmanche

The weather for the first 24hours of the race looks fairly kind but, from saturday night we will expect some strong southerly winds of over 30knots. This forecast has made the race committee think about the course to Plymouth and back and there are rumours going around that the course maybe shortened to keep us from having to go up wind in potential boat breaking conditions. The new course would keep us closer to the French coast and probably have us finishing before the worst of the weather comes through.

Despite the weather, I think the most exciting part of the race will be the start which, is in a very narrow channel with no where near enough space to fit all the boats and the penalty for pushing the limits will be running aground. The start line can only possibly be about 100metres long and there are 21boats in our fleet alone plus 25 other boats competing of which we are all single or double handed. So, interesting I think to say the least and ironically the french called this a depart anglais(English Start). Hopefully not too much carnage.

The first part of La Transmanche out through the rocks

Ill keep updates to course changes on twitter and an update after the race.

All for now,

Sam

Following the UK Figaro nationals a couple weeks ago, we took the boat back to Cowes(fun sailing on the delivery) and then spent a week there continuing to tweak some of the boats systems and install some new electronics. During the week work we also got a chance to head a out sailing a few times including taking Yachting World’s Elaine Bunting out for a quick spin – here is her blog from the days sailing.

I also got a chance to meet up with Sports Psychologist, Niel Weston at Portsmouth University and Nutritionist Di Johnson. In Portsmouth we had a very productive session making sure that my plans for the season are all staying on track and also coming up with plans of trying to avoid myself getting distracted by the smaller less important things while preparing and racing. Nutrition is also something I am very inexperienced in so, to meet Di and get some of her advice was invaluable. We are now coming up with a diet plan mainly for the Solitaire du Figaro where we will have 3-4 days racing with minimal sleep, followed by 3-4 days recovery for the next leg, going on for 4 weeks. What you eat and how quickly you recover here I think will have a big impact on how you approach the next leg.

Enjoying an easterly on the way to Plymouth

Following that, I have brought the boat down to Plymouth for a couple days 2-boat testing with Conrad Humphreys before the last training event prior to the Solitaire. Yesterday we did some upwind speed testing with the help of Dick Parker from North Sails UK and tonight we are heading off on our delivery to L’aber wach for La Transmanche race starting on Friday.

Heading out training with Conrad

The race start on the North coast of Brittany is 220miles around Plymouth breakwater and back. The tactics behind this race are much different to that of the Basse Normandie where tide will have a much lesser effect and raw boat speed is likely to make the gains and loses.

All for now,

Sam