Our Melges 24 Big Day Out….
IMCA Press Officer Justin Chisholm on his favourite big day out in a Melges 24:- When I first joined the Melges 24 class about five years ago I wrote an article for the IM24CA describing the baptism of fire I experienced when I survived four windy races in big seas at the infamously brutal SNIM Regatta in Marseille, France. In that article, as well as describing the agony of my first Melges 24 hiking experience, I also related the pure joy and sheer exhilaration I experienced when for the first time, I hurtled downwind clinging to the back rail of a Melges 24.
That Easter weekend in France now seems like a long time ago and that rookie Melges 24 sailor now has more races under his belt than it is sensible to try and count. In the last five years I have been lucky enough to race at all the Melges 24 European and World Championships as well as competing on two Volvo Cup Circuits in Italy. Although I have been back to Marseille on several occasions the venue never really produced the spectacular conditions of my first time experience. However there have been plenty of other ‘big days’ out on various Melges 24 racecourses around the world.
The Worlds in both Hyeres and Key Largo each produced some challenging conditions, as did the Europeans in Neustadt, Germany when the race officer seemed determined to wait for the wind to get over thirty knots before sending the fleet afloat. Our fast and furious kite run down to the start area was certainly memorable and proved to be our best run of the day. On the first downwind leg of the race we buried the bow at speed and could only watch as the backstay crane collapsed causing the rig to come tumbling down.
Exciting and memorable as all of those days on the water were, for me, and I suspect the rest of the Team Barbarians crew, they all pale into insignificance alongside the now legendary final day at the 2006 World Championship in Santa Cruz. This one had it all – California sunshine, huge waves along with thirty five knots and more of breeze. From a race which looked like being sailed in fifteen to twenty knots when we arrived at the race area, it ended up a real demolition derby with six rigs coming down and countless other retirements. It is some measure of the conditions the fleet was exposed to that the eventual World Champions from that event, Dave Ullman and his fully pro Pegasus 505 crew made the decision to finish the race under main and jib rather than fly their chute down the whole of the final run.
Despite Santa Cruz’s reputation for big wind and waves, we really hadn’t seen anything like that all week. Admittedly the wind strength had increased incrementally each day and Ullman had commented to several visiting teams on the dock the previous day ‘Oh don’t worry. I have seen the forecast and trust me, the windy stuff is coming!’. When we arrived at the race committee boat an hour before the scheduled start there was no more than twelve knots of breeze. Half an hour later the skies cleared and the pressure began to ramp up rapidly, sending the bowmen scurrying forwards with their spanners to wind up the rig tension.
I remember aboard our boat, as the wind continued to rise, we kept winding on more and more turns until finally Stuart Simpson (owner and bowman) muttered to me as he put the spanners away ‘We are in uncharted territory now. We’ve never had so much rig on.’ He paused, then looked me in the eyes and added for emphasis, ‘Ever’.
As we went into sequence I remember being surprised just how quickly the seas had built to such gargantuan sizes. The wind was screaming in the rigging and looking up the course the breaking waves had turned the race area completely white. In the distance the bright yellow windward mark was only visible for twenty percent of the time as it lurched around in the swell. Aboard our boat we each set about our normal roles for the countdown to the start. Due to the peculiar underwater topography in Santa Cruz the right hand side of the course had always come good in the final third of the beat and all week what we had christened ‘the Swim Step Start’ had been working well for us and had even enabled us to win a race. For the uninitiated, the Swim Step Start is performed by rounding close to the stern of the race committee boat and tacking on to port immediately on the gun. Our helmsman, Jamie Lea, had mastered this technique so well that on one start we had heard someone on the RC boat say ‘Here come the Brits again. Right on cue!’
On this final day we saw no reason to let the increased wind strength make us deviate from a successful plan. Jamie nailed it for one final time, we hit the line tacked on the ‘B’ of the bang from the starter’s cannon. As we flung ourselves to the new weather deck I like to think I heard a faint smattering of appreciative applause coming from the race committee.
We were off into the melee, fully hiked, max backstay and going for it. For quite a while we were the only boat on port and the separation between us and the boats on the left of the course was dramatic. As we had learned during the week the ‘Santa Cruz effect’ did not kick in until the last bit of the beat, so as we slogged our way upwind occasionally launching off a big wave before crashing back down, we could only glance nervously at the rest of the fleet. ‘How’s it look lads?’ came the hopeful call from the back of the boat. ‘Well it ain’t too pretty right now’ confessed our tactician Nigel Young grimacing. On the helm Jamie grimaced too and said some rude words. On the rail we gritted our teeth and dug in hard. Happily our efforts were rewarded a few minutes later by the welcome sight of the fleet beginning to drop down to us.
A few minutes later, after making sure we could lay comfortably, (tacking was pretty tricky in the now massive waves), we picked the flattest spot we could find and scrambled ourselves on to starboard tack to head for the waiting pack of press and spectator boats which surrounded the windward mark. ‘Any issues?’ I asked Stuart, shouting to make myself heard over the wind and waves. He knew I meant starboard boats, but shrugged his shoulders and shouted back ‘Only one. How the hell are we going to get downwind?’ Good question.
As we rounded the buoy, straining and jerking on its anchor rope as each breaking wave rolled by, I treated myself to a sneaky glance back at the fleet. We were leading by several boat lengths from a real melee. Despite the fact that we were full planing across the spreader leg towards the wing mark under just main and jib, one glance at the look on the faces of my crewmates told me that our only option was to hoist our trademark pink chute. Death or glory!
Running forward after we bore away at the spreader mark I hoisted the kite and then turned and just legged it for the back of the boat. I got there just as the kite filled and the acceleration nearly sent me out over the aft guard rope. Regaining some composure, I started to try to do my job and call the gusts but I could see nothing to our left or right due to the sheets of spray we were kicking up as we blasted downwind. Dealing with the waves was a nightmare. We managed to leap over most but also ploughed into the back of several, slowing our progress dramatically and causing us to look nervously each time at the straining rig.
In a darted glance behind I was able to identify two Italian teams Joe Fly and Altea about twenty boat lengths back, each also screaming downwind engulfed in balls of spray. I turned my attention back to our boat just in time to watch in horror as we leapt off the crest of one huge wave and buried ourselves in the back of the next even bigger one. We ground to a halt and the boat stood on its nose, the bow completely underwater beyond the hatch. Whilst Jamie and I had been able to use the pushpit to stay upright, Nigel and Stuart had been thrown forwards like crash test dummies into the foaming water at the front of the cockpit. In other circumstances the scene before me would have been comical. There and then however it was deadly serious.
Remarkably, and after what seemed like an age, the bow eventually surfaced from the wave. As soon as a somewhat stunned Nigel scrambled back into position and sheeted on the kite, we were off again. As the deluge left the cockpit via the transom, it took with it the mainsheet along with the Velocitek GPS and most of the contents of the rope bags. Meanwhile the two Italian teams had somehow managed to gybe and so with some trepidation we set up to do the same. Waiting for our moment to carry out the manoeuvre at top speed as we surged down yet another big wave, we took a collective breath and went for it.
To be fair to us we got most of it right. The steering was good, the spinnaker came round sweetly and for a moment it looked like we had pulled off a masterful big breeze gybe. Right up to that is, the point at which the boom hit the backstay and stopped dead. Too much ease on the vang was the problem and it laid us flat in an instant. I mean a full on capsize – mast in the water, keel in the air, the full hit.
It is a testimony to the resilience of the Melges 24 that, despite our best efforts to send it to the bottom, our boat required only that we ease and rehoist the spinnaker halliard, to send us charging off downwind again (now on port gybe) towards the gate. Rounding the leeward marks somewhere in the teens we set about nursing our now heavily water laden boat around the course. After a thoroughly unpleasant second beat we rounded the top mark and set off downwind again.
If anything, the conditions were more severe the second time around and I have to say that by this point, although we were definitely still racing, there was also an element of survival creeping into our collective consciousness. Up ahead the Joe Fly team were putting on masterclass performance which saw them win the race easily. A little further back in the fleet I could see the Full Throttle crew in what looked like a Championship winning position inside the top five. However without warning I saw them get brutally slapped down as their tackline cleat exploded in the extreme conditions and skied the chute. With their world title dreams in tatters, they were still on their side a couple of minutes later when we sailed past.
As we approached the finish at top speed from the left of the course we could see that we were in a multi-way battle for the line. With a top fifteen position on offer, all our thoughts of survival sailing were gone as we got fully engaged in the dogfight for the finish. Two high speed gybes later (vang on this time) we surfed across the line in eleventh place, just feet ahead of a chasing pack of ten boats. Only in the Melges 24 class could you get a finish like that in those conditions.
Behind us amongst the rest of the fleet finishing we could see flogging kites, capsized boats, boats without rigs and the eventual Corinthian champions on Gannet finishing with a jury rig based on the stump of their broken mast.
Exhilarated, exhausted and not a little shell shocked we dropped the chute, shook hands with each other before heading for the sanctuary of the Santa Cruz marina. As the fleet arrived in the buzz of individual stories grew to almost a roar as we along with everyone else began the first telling of their own ‘Melges 24 Big Day Out.’