Accepting the 12-meter Challenge
By David and “We’re going to need a bigger boat!” That refrain, from a famous movie a few years ago, often rolls through our heads when we pack our Lightning for a day of racing. After stowing the cooler, the dry box, the lunches, the extra clothing, the spare PFDs, the anchor, the paddles, the spare rope bag, and the spinnaker, and fastening the hiking straps, we glance around the cockpit wondering where there might be a place for the three of us to comfortably sit, and hoping that someday we might have a boat large enough to seat us all with room to spare. We think again, “ … We’re going to need a bigger boat.” Leaving the cold of Northern Virginia’s mid-December (think ice storm – milk; bread; TP, snow shovels, etc. …) for a week’s escape to the Caribbean we found ourselves in Phillipsburg, St. Maarten, Netherlands Antilles, reading about an opportunity to take a “12-meter challenge.” That turns out to be a well-organized adventure for 40 sailboat racing enthusiasts to crew on 12-meter yachts in a race at the mouth of Great Bay, south of Phillipsburg. Four yachts go out, each carrying a skipper, two deckhands, and 10 paying guests, and participate in one-on-one match racing for half a day. A 12-meter yacht is bigger than a Lightning. Here was our opportunity to try sailing on a bigger boat! The 12-meter yachts are the Americas Cup boats, and there are actually five of them moored in the harbor in Phillipsburg, including Dennis Connor’s 1987 winner, the Stars and Stripes (one of four boats of the same name – one for the actual Americas Cup race and three backups for use when needed). These boats have an open cockpit and a long foredeck and are somewhat like a much longer Lightning – 70 feet long in most cases. [The actual measurement must compute to a number less than or at most equal to 12 (hence the designation, "12-meter Yacht"), following this formula:
[L + Sqrt(SA) + 2D – F] / 2.37 LE 12, So we showed up on a sunny, 80-degree Thursday morning at the 12-meter Challenge office, located at Bobby’s Marina (sorry, not Bobby Astrove’s Marina) in Phillipsburg, paid our $75 per person admission, and were given free passes to the nearby St. Maarten Yacht Club to enjoy coffee and the company of the other 38 participants. Shortly thereafter the 12-meter Challenge Director of Racing came by to get us organized into teams of 10, with 4 appointed team captains. After hearing a brief history of Americas Cup Racing we were encouraged to do some team building to help achieve a good competitive spirit before heading out to the moored boats. On the way out we were given our crew assignments – we could choose an intense-level activity or a moderate-level activity – and based on our preferences we became grinders, tailers, timers, or winch wenches, with assurances that we would be adequately trained for our assignments. The intense-level people became grinders – four primary grinders; two main grinders, and a backstay grinder. David was the designated lead primary grinder. Barbara, looking for a more moderate assignment, was selected to be the timer. Once on board we were introduced to the professional crew – two from South Africa, one from England – the skipper Paul; and the two deckhands Ian and Julian, and then were led in another round of team spirit building. We were reminded that we were on board the Stars and Stripes, which has a tradition of winning that we were not to let the other boats forget. Our match-racing competitor was the Canadian True North IV, and we were encourage to hurl trash-talking insults to them over the water (“Hey – we heard that you Canadians have very small dinghies!” was one of our better ones). During our training we were reminded to keep our hands away from things that might hurt us – the track on the deck on which the base of the vang slides; the winches; and the sheets (that carry an incredible load – 12,000 to 15,000 pounds of force) and were given instruction on the equipment we would operate. Barb, as timer, was emphatically reminded of the importance of her job – starting the watch exactly when the flag went up; calling out the time remaining; and accepting responsibility for the success of the start – not being OCS, and not being late to the line – making her in fact solely responsible for the result of the race – a somewhat overstated burden, but offered up in the spirit of team building and camaraderie. The four primary grinders stood in a line at the front of the cockpit, two facing forward, two aft, and turned the crank that powered the winches for the jibsheets. The two professional crew deckhands tailed these winches, operated the winch/gearshift selector, and gave the commands for cranking. First gear was for speed; second gear was for some speed and some power; third gear for pure power – just opposite of the normal gear designations in an automobile. The crank turns clockwise for first and third gears, and counterclockwise for second gear. There were brief flurries of intense cranking during our tacks – first gear to trim in before the jib filled; second gear as it was filling; and third gear to trim it in to final position. The flurry of cranking as we rounded the leeward marks was longer and more intense, as you would expect. It didn’t take us long to figure out the sequence – clockwise; counterclockwise; clockwise, but the cranking was intense enough to cause us to breathe hard before we finished each time. The two main grinders stood amidships, facing each other port-to-starboard, and were responsible for turning the crank that powered the mainsheet winch. The skipper gave them the commands to crank whenever the mainsheet needed trimming. He also commanded the backstay trimmer who turned a single crank as needed to power the backstay winch. Our tailer was responsible for pulling in the slack on the mainsheet as the main grinders cranked. The winch wenches (one of whom was team captain) were responsible for keeping up our team spirit. Soon we were ready for a race, and we lined up for a start in a 10-knot breeze on a triangular course of about a mile on each leg – not unlike the way we set a triangular course right here on the Potomac. Our skipper asked us to agree on a strategy for the day – did we want to try to just pull ahead and stay ahead; or, alternately, did we want to play down and dirty and make things difficult for the other boat? The unanimous decision was to play down and dirty! So we positioned ourselves approaching the start line on starboard tack, with True North IV below us on port, forcing them to duck behind us as we crossed the start line first. From there it was a few short tacks to the windward mark; after rounding we kept the Canadians above us for as long as we could before gybing around the reaching mark; then breaking for the left side of the gate at the leeward mark. We were then neck-and-neck on the tacking duel back to the windward mark, but we kept our lead, and the second trip around the course was a repeat of the first. On the third trip we confused the opposition by rounding the leeward mark at the right side of the gate, gaining considerably on them as they went around the left side of the gate. They were out of it after that, fighting gallantly to catch up on the remaining tacks to the finish line, but eating our bad air all the way up. We won!
After a couple of victory laps around the bay and a trip past the five cruise ships moored at the Phillipsburg docks we headed in for a celebratory rum punch at the 12-meter Challenge dock, then headed over to the Yacht Club for lunch with some of our racing team mates. What a thrill to be part of the 12-meter Challenge! And yes, the 12-meter yacht’s cockpit definitely was roomier. We think we may have found the needed bigger boat [now all we need to do is to come up with the millions needed to purchase one …] For more information about the 12-meter Challenge, see http://www.experiencestmaarten.com/activities/watersports.html
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