I endorse Allan Beswick’s congratulations entirely. I tracked, with amazement, Hummer of Hamble all day as she sailed around the Island in, at times, gusts of Gale Force 8. I would love to know what sails she had; was it a fully reefed main and a storm jib? My crew and I decided we would not compete and, wondered if we had wimped out needlessly until we saw the huge numbers who had take the same decision and/or retired. We must get Roger Hayward to reveal his secret.
Mark Mathews
I asked Roger on FB about his sail wardrobe for the race and he said:
upwind - 25% rolled Genoa and 2 reefs main
downwind - Genoa unrolled back to mast and 2 reefs main. Plus holding on for dear life!
I too had thought a storm jib or staysail involved as we find we have to roll our Genoa to a pretty small sail above 25knots already to avoid that over canvassed feel.
Impressive. I did head out but within an hour of start decided discretion was the better part of valour. We saw 40+ kts over the deck and were having to dodge the large number of bigger broken boats retiring back down towards Cowes.
With the number of Pan Pans we heard and the two Maydays thrown in, it was approaching survival sailing.
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