Winning the 1st race of the Quarterfinals

It was a great way to be welcomed back into the area, an awesome day to get to drive a Melges, and a lot of fun to sail on my home waters!  I’m looking forward to watching the 32s race this weekend and getting to see a day of the 18 ft skiffs racing (and maybe even sail myself on the woman’s team) next Monday, before leaving again on Tuesday for the next match race and a big month of training and events leading to the Match Racing Worlds at the end of September.

To sum up our end at Weymouth: we had a very great, close quarterfinal against Renee Groeneveld of the Netherlands, with a number of penalties against us ultimately determining our fate and a 2-3 loss.  The unfortunate part was that the majority of our penalties we actually had the right of way, but the umpires decided we had either not given enough room or time for the other boat to keep clear.  Tough loss, but good learning experience and some great sailing.  We then went on to defeat Aussie Katie Spithill in the sail-off, but then lost to #1 ranked British team of Lucy Macgregor, to end up placed 6th overall.

Weymouth was a wonderful learning experience for me overall.  In some ways it is easier to know what’s happening in the race from the middle spot, as the skipper is often more busy with the speed of the boat and the telltales.  Especially with a shifty, puffy racecourse, the skipper has to be constantly in tune to the boats every need while the tactician can look

Photos by Fried Elliott--Friedbits.com

around the course and at the other boat a lot more.  I learned a lot about the weather conditions and race course area in Weymouth, much different from the racing we did there last year at Sail For Gold, as this time it was in the course area and the time of year that the 2012 Olympics will be.  I also learned a lot about the middle/spinnaker trimmer’s role on the downwind in the Elliotts, and what the skipper and bow can do to help make the kite-trimmer’s job easier and thus the boat go faster.  All really valuable information for me to take forward as we race the Elliotts in the Buddy Melges challenge and then gear up for the Match Racing Worlds at NYYC September 20-25th!!!

For now, it’s a couple days of reorganizing at home and getting to see some great racing on the SF Bay!
Genny

(Sorry I couldn’t actually send this out last night as our house internet doesn’t work, but as we’re the third match racing group to start today, we won’t start until about 3 PM England time.  We’ve already gone out to watch our USSTAG teammates go 3-0 this morning, then I met with our physio to get my slightly strained calf muscle worked on and my hand burn taped up, and I still have a bit more time to send this e-mail out.  Unfortunately no pictures, but will send some on later.)

With racing at the Weymouth Sail for Gold Regatta starting tomorrow (today now!), I wanted to check-in and recap the very full summer I’ve had since the last mailing.  After winning the US Women’s MR Champs over competitor Sally Barkow’s team, I then spent the following week and weekend calling tactics and trimming main on a Tom 28 with Sally in the Chicago Match Race Center summer series.  We won the weekend, having finished 2nd in the first event behind Bill Hardesty and then winning the second event.  I flew back for two days at home to regroup and repack before heading over to a month in Europe!

First I was off to Valencia doing some commentary work with BMW Oracle during their Media and TV Trials, where I got to see (and comment on) some awesome, very close match racing both in mono and multihulls.  There were pretty interesting ideas being thrown around: involving race courses, rules, types of boats, and ways to portray sailing best to the media.  It was also extraordinary to see some of the footage they were able to come up with using hi-def cameras and interesting on-board angles, you can check it all out here: http://www.youtube.com/34thAC, and with more info on the trials here: http://www.americascup.com/blogpage.

From there it was straight to Weymouth, where we’ve had 12 great days of training at the venue for the Olympic Games.  I’m in a different position than usual here—trimming main and calling tactics with Sally Barkow again, but this time on the Elliots, the Olympic class boats.  I’m learning a lot that will help my sailing as a skipper; with boat-handling, tactics, and communication, as well as the wind and weather variables at the Olympic venue.   We’ve been training with our American teammates as well as the top British team-who are currently ranked the top team in the world.  Needless to say, we’ve trained hard and are ready and psyched for racing to start!  Results can be found on the regatta website here:  www.skandiasailforgoldregatta.co.uk

Wish us luck!
Genny

All photos by Walter Cooper/US SAILING

We just finished up four days of racing in Sheboygan, WI where we won the 2010 US Women’s Match Racing Championship and defended our title from last year! In addition to being our national championship, this was an important event for us because it gave us a chance to get racing experience in Sonars in preparation for the World Championship this September, and the win qualified us to represent the United States in the 2011 ISAF Nations Cup in Sheboygan next September. Our team for this event was Genny Tulloch, Alice Manard, Karina Shelton, and Lindsay Bartel. The competition included Sally Barkow, Katy Lovell, Maegan Ruhlman, and several top collegiate sailors and recent grads that are relatively new to match racing but already showing a lot of potential.

The conditions in Sheboygan were less than ideal for the first three days of racing, with fog, light air, and thunderstorms hampering the racing effort. Although the race committee did a very admirable job of getting in as many races as possible, we were only able to complete one and a half round robins in the first three days. We had some close matches in the round robins and used that time to work on our teamwork and communication since we had never sailed together as a team. We went 10-1 in the round robins, with our only loss to Sally Barkow and her team in the first round. That put us in second place after the first stage, and put us up against Stephanie Roble’s team in the semifinals.

Fortunately the conditions for the semis and finals on Sunday were much more cooperative! The breeze started out at about 3-6 knots with pretty big shifts and puffs across the course. We had a close prestart in our first semifinal match against Steph’s team, but managed to pull ahead on the first beat and stayed ahead to the finish. In the second race, we led them around most of the course and were about 4 boat lengths ahead half way down the last leg. A big wind shift and an error on our part brought them right back into the race, and they were able to roll over us right at the finish line to take the race. It was a tough one to lose, but we were ready to take them on again for the last semifinal match. In the third race we executed our prestart strategy well, and led them off the line and around the course to advance to the finals against Sally’s team.

The finals were first to 3 points, and we knew it was going to be a hard-fought series no matter what. The breeze was up to about 5-8 knots for our first race, but was still pretty shifty. We got a penalty in the prestart, but managed to win the boat and get the right side of the course, which is what we wanted. We rounded the windward mark ahead and maintained our lead on the run, which left us on the final beat, ahead but with a penalty outstanding against us. We covered Sally out to the right side of the course and managed to gain just enough lead that we were able to spin our penalty turn on the starboard layline and still barely lead her into the windward mark. We held onto our lead down the final run to go up 1-0.

During the boat swap the breeze started building, and by the start of the second race was up to 10-12 knots. In both the second and third races, we trailed off the starting line and Sally was able to use her upwind speed in the steadier and windier conditions to stay ahead of us around the course. That put us down 1-2 and in a must-win situation for the fourth race. In race four we came off the line fairly even, but Sally was able to get just out to the right of us and had a one boatlength lead at the windward mark. We managed to close the gap down the run and ended up to leeward of them on starboard heading out toward the layline. Just before the layline we did a double-gybe; Sally meanwhile gybed to port and we had to avoid her, which ended up earning a penalty for her. We took her past the layline and then led around the leeward mark. We maintained our lead up the next beat and stayed just ahead of her on the final run to take the fourth race and bring the score to 2-2.

With 10 minutes to spare before the deadline for racing to end, the race committee started up race five of the finals. We wanted the right side of the course and executed our pre-start strategy well to end up with a split start with us on port tack at the boat and Sally on starboard mid-line. The upwind leg was a drag race out to the right side of the course, and we were able to be bow out just enough that she couldn’t leebow us on the starboard tack layline. We led out of the windward mark by a boatlength, but Sally’s team was able to pull up to us and overlap us to leeward as we approached the leeward mark. But they held us up past their proper course, earning another penalty, and we were able to round the leeward mark just barely ahead. On the final beat we again protected the right side and led by half a boatlength at the windward mark. With a penalty outstanding against them, we were in a strong position and were able to gybe to starboard at the layline to the finish and take the win. It was an exciting series and we were  thrilled to come away with the win!

We’d like to thank Sail Sheboygan and the Sheboygan Yacht Club for putting on a great event, our housing hosts Mike and Stephanie Larson, the US Sailing Team AlphaGraphics, Kaenon Polarized; and Gu.

The Allegra Knapp Mertz Trophy!

For a final wrap-up of Kiel Week: teammate Alice Manard and I were fortunate to have Jenn Chamberlin as our new middle, and after a great week of training at the Chicago Match Race Center and some travel difficulties on Alice’s end, we setup at the USTTAG Base in Germany for the 6^th event of the 2010 World Cup. Twenty-four teams qualified for the event, and when we won our initial grouping we advanced through to an automatic spot in the quarterfinals, and Gold Round Robin Racing. The week was light air, but the match racers completed almost all of our racing while the other fleets were mostly postponed. We enjoyed the benefits of being close to land and on short courses; even if it made for some very shifty races, some big chop as the other fleets towed in and out, and some late nights.

In the end we were seeded against #1 World Ranked British team of Lucy Macgregor for the quarterfinals, and were initially down 1-2, sailing late into the night on Tuesday. With all the races needing to be done before 3 pm the next day, the Race Committee had us out early, and we won our two do-or-die races against Lucy to advance to the Semifinals against Claire Leroy. The conditions had us close to the shore with a very shifty and puffy offshore breeze, and it was often who won the start and got to the first shift would be able to control the race. We were happy to have done that to Lucy’s team, but then unfortunately lost the next 2 races to Claire off the line. The third race we led around the course but she got some better shifts on the final upwind, was close on our tail at the weather mark and was able to gybe inside at the mark and pass us on the downwind, sending us to the petit finals, against our own American teammates, Team Tunnicliffe.

Photo by Fried Elliott--friedbits.com

The duke-out for bronze was interesting, with Anna’s team winning the first race but as the clock ticked down there would only be time for one last race, so whoever won the final race would win the bronze. We saw pressure coming down on the left, won the pin and tacked on the left shift, leading them by three boatlenghths or more. But as we approached the weather mark the race committee abandoned the race due to the windshift, and rushed us back to restart. Unfortunately the next race went to their team, with us getting a penalty right at the start for tacking too close with them at our stern, so we ended up fourth for the event.

For a first time sailing with a new teammate we were pleased to have finished fourth, having won our initial round over Claire Leroy, and defeated Lucy Macgregor in the quarterfinals. We left some to be desired in the final races, but very much know what we can continue to improve upon. We’d like to thank USSTAG—it was a great week for our entire American team at Kiel, with 7 teams in the top five, and was a great time for all of us staying together at The Farm. We’d also like to thank the St. Francis Foundation and the Ragnot Amateur Sailing Associatiaon for their support, our suppliers GU Energy and Kaenon Polarized, and Fried Elliott for his wonderful pictures from the week. From here we go on to defend our title at the US Women’s Match Racing Championship next week in Sheboygan, WI, in Sonars, then continue to have a very full summer after that, leading up to the Women’s Match Racing Worlds in September in Newport, RI.

Best,
Genny

Photos by Fried Elliott/friedbits.com

After two days of racing at Kiel Week, we have advanced through to the Gold Round Robin as the top seed of our Group B. We went 3-0 today, including wins against #2 World Ranked Claire Leroy and last year’s World Champion Nicky Souter.  It was a light, very shifty and puffy day on the water, with less rain and more sun than we anticipated. With a skewed starting line for most of our races, our game plan was to win the pin and get the first cross, and we were able to execute that plan when needed.
Our closest race was against Claire Leroy, where we got a penalty in the pre-start, were able to get ahead on the upwind, and then got into a luffing match on the downwind near the leeward mark.  We did a fake gybe and they took the bait and gybed into us, with a Port/Starboard foul offsetting our initial penalty.  However, Claire gybed so hard she forced us onto Port with her, then into the zone, so we called for a red penalty as it was clearly a change of control for the race.  The umpires gave her the red, which meant she had to take her penalty turn immediately but we still had our initial penalty.  We got to the right for big right pressure and a shift, and were able to take our penalty on the upwind leg and still win by a good margin.

We won the other two races today and went 3-1 yesterday to go 6-1 for the round, putting us as the top seed in our group and advancing us to the Gold Round Robin, along with Claire Leroy’s team who finished 2nd.  Nicky Souter and Ekatarina Skudina (the team that beat us) advance to the repechage to fight for the last two spots in the quarterfinals.  The Gold Round Robin consists of the top two seeds from each of the three groups, and we now race the other 5 teams in the Gold Round for seeding placement going into the quarterfinals.  The other American team of Anna Tunnicliffe, Molly Vandemoer and Debbie Capozzi also made it through to the Gold with a 3-0 today and 6-1 record, so it was a great day for US Women’s Match Racing.  Alice, Jenn and I have been working on improving as a new team, especially in communication and boathandling, so are really looking forward to some good close racing over the next couple days.

We’d like to thank coach Dave Dellenbaugh for his help this week, Dean Brenner for coming out to support today, USSTAG and St. Francis YC for their assistance, as well as suppliers GU and Kaenon Polarized.  You can continue to follow results here.

We spent the last 5 days training in the Elliotts at the Chicago Match Race Center, and it was great for Alice and I to get back into the Elliott and to welcome a new teammate, Jen Chamberlain, to the middle of the boat.  Jen was an All-American Crew at St. Mary’s College, where she helped the team to win each of the three spring nationals championships (women’s, team racing and coed) during her collegiate sailing career. Last year she led their team as a captain to win the Coed National Championship in San Francisco, famously taking the tiller to cross the line in a massive lead in the last B-division race, taking the race and regatta. Jenn is an instructor at Annapolis Yacht Club and, after spending a little time last year in the 470, she’s now getting into the match racing field.  Her learning curve is tremendous and we are very happy to have Jenn on the team for Kiel Week! We’ve had a great week of practice here in Chicago with USSTAG teammates Anna Tunnicliffe, Debbie Capozzi, and Molly Vandemoer, as well as coach Dave Perry.  With varying wind and water conditions throughout the week, we got a lot of quality practice in. We worked on match racing situations against Anna’s team and boathandling in everything from 22 kts and flat water to 2-4 kts and big chop.  We feel much more confident in our teamwork now and look forward to flying out to Germany tomorrow! You can follow the racing at Kiel week on the regatta website at: http://www.kieler-woche.de/eng/englishdefault.php

We’d like to thank coach Dave Perry and USSTAG; Chicago Match Race Center for providing their great training facility, tons of volunteers, and for letting us play on the Tom 28s with their members; and especially would like to thank Lindsey Duda for housing our team in Chicago.

Stay tuned!
Genny

Photos by Fried Elliott--friedbits.com

The Boat U.S. Santa Maria Cup finished up yesterday, with a typical shifty and puffy Annapolis day giving us a very intense and long day of racing, and we finished up second overall, losing to #2 world ranked Claire Leroy 3-2 in the finals. Sailing with me was a brand new team, with Molly Carapiet on main, Katie Pettibone on Jib/spinnaker trim, and Jenn Chamberlin on the bow.   We worked on our communication throughout the double round robin, and were seeded fourth against top seed Sally Barkow for the semis.   We went 1-1 Friday night, tying it up. Saturday morning we lost initially then won the last two races against Sally to finish 3-2 in the semis, leading us to meet # 2 world-ranked Claire Leroy in the finals.  The finals also went to five races, so at the end of the day we were joking that we’d gotten our money’s worth with the maximum number of races we ever could have done.

The racing was difficult with big shifts and pressure differences throughout the day and across the course, and a lot of the wins were determined by who had the better start headed to the first shift.  But with the big shifts and pressure changes the pre-starts were very interesting and calling laylines and time to the start were big stresses and very important to winning the start headed the right way. Claire won the first race, we won the second, then the third was a very close fight, with a luffing match at the top mark and both downwind legs.  We had a close gybe incident on the final downwind with contact that we believe would have been a penalty on Claire, but the umpires didn’t see it so the incident was green flagged and Claire beat us across the line.  We then won the fourth race, tying it up for a winner take all in the last race.

The last pre-start was as aggressive as all of the previous had been, and as we luffed near the end we picked the left side and won the pin.  Unfortunately Claire won the boat and the right, and was able to get a right shift and crossed us up the course.  At the leeward mark the RC signaled a course change and the change mark was being dropped by the weather mark boat far left of the original mark.  Unfortunately since the breeze had gone even further right, so the rest of the race was mostly a one tack one gybe to the finish, and Claire Leroy’s team took the win and the title. For a first-time team we were very happy to have gotten better and better throughout the week and to be able to finish second in this great group.  (But I do have to say after losing to Claire in the finals of this event two years in a row I really want to take it next year!!)

I’d especially like to thank my teammates this week for doing an excellent job, our housing hosts Dick and Phyllis for taking care of us, our regatta hosts Nancy and Phil for keeping us entertained (and well-fed!), and the club and all of the volunteers for putting on an excellent event.  I also would like to thank USSTAG for their support.

Next up is the Kiel Week World Cup event in Germany, and I leave on Tuesday for training in the Elliotts in Chicago then straight to Germany.

Second Place!

The Chicago Match Race Center just got four new Elliott 6ms and hardworking team got the ready for the sailors three US teams and a NZL training partner.  Our coach Dave Perry and a slew of umpires, RC, riggers, and other helpers were there to make our long on the water Elliott sessions really worthwhile. On top of that, we got to come in from Elliot sailing two of the days to go out for evening practices on the Tom 28s with some of the local Chicago Match Race Center sailors.  It was a great week and turned out to be a wonderful setup: we felt like we saw the best Chicago could offer, not only with the CMRC, but also with almost 80 degree (!?!) temps and a really disparate set of conditions.  Light and choppy one day; windy choppy the next; light and flat; then windy, flat and shifty, which really helped us to feel comfortable and ready for anything.  A huge thanks goes to the Chicago Match Race Center and everyone there for making this week possible!

Now we have a couple days at home to regroup, pack, and cover our varied tasks: mine is finalizing transportation and getting warm team midlayers, Alice is to update our callbook and gather pictures, and Karina is to make some trademark delicious granola bars and finish knitting the third team hat!  Then we are heading to France on Wednesday.

Also—I’ll be speaking at the Strictly Sail Pacific show in Oakland tomorrow—my brief 1-hr session is called “Racing Rules Made Easy”.  If you’re in the bay area and interested in coming please stop by!  More info HERE.

All photos by Walter Cooper

Today we leave Colorado Springs, where Karina, Alice and I have been partaking in an intense US Sailing Team Alphagraphics physical training camp at the US Olympic Training Center.  While Michael Phelps wasn’t here this time (he was a big hit last year at our camp last year), we did have a very intense four days of physical training and testing while also learning about nutrition, periodization, peak performance, visualization and sports psychology.  We had a great group of US Sailing coaches and staff as well as nutritionist Bob Seebohar, psychologist Rick Campbell, Jaguar Trainers Chris, Brandon and Tara, and guest speaker Curt Tomasevicz, who just won the Gold medal in the bobsled in Vancouver and talked to us about athlete mentality.  We learned a lot of valuable information that will greatly assist in our individual programs in the future.
At the core of the training camp, the physical testing allows us to keep track of our levels of fitness–comparing our scores in times/weights to previous scores, giving us the ability to chart our progress over time.  Tests included squats, planks, pushups, pull-ups, rows, rope climb, long jump, running, as well as boat-specific tests like tacking, sheeting, grip strength and neck strength.  Everyone on the team improved dramatically from their times last year, and we’re clearly getting closer to head coach Kenneth’s goal of ‘fittest sailing team on the planet’.

Photo by Walter Cooper

We also did some team exercises.  On the third day, we completed a grueling pool test—a 3-person team relay consisting of each person swimming half a lap, doing 20 pushups, half a lap, 20 situps, half a lap, wall sit till partner returns, half a lap, 20 burpees… then the same all over again for 16…12…8…4…1…1…4…8…12.  Luckily they let us stop there, before anyone actually passed out straight in the pool.  We followed that up with a fun group exercise of developing a minute long synchronized swimming program and carrying it out.  Our group won with 3 perfect tens on the creativity, lifts, and synchronization scores—but not without casualties.  I was elbowed to the face underwater after being lifted into a dive by my underwater partner, and a teammate was cannoballed directly onto underwater, after lifting his teammate straight up for the cannonball to end the program.  It was the third day of the camp, and while our bodies were already well-fatigued from all of the previous training and testing, the pool test added some additional eye and ear and overall soreness that made us all feel that the week was well worth it, and hopefully almost over!  Yesterday finished with the boat specific testing, and this morning after the final team challenge, we were all headed our separate ways.
We flew directly here from 4 days of on the water training in the Elliott 6ms in Miami, and I fly out tonight directly to Long Beach for the Congressional Cup, the only Open Grade 1 Match Race in the US, where I’ll be sailing as the main trimmer with Sally Barkow helming and Dave Dellenbaugh calling tactics.  We’ll be competing against some top America’s Cup match racers, many fresh off the Louis Vuitton trophy in New Zealand.  Should be great racing!  You can check out the results or follow it live here.

Aboard Sin Duda!

Last week I had the privilege of racing the Heineken Regatta in beautiful St. Maarten, where the biggest concerns where the need to constantly reapply sunscreen and the race to make the bridge times every day.  Unfortunately many of us missed on the sunscreen front, and my forearms are slightly peeling this week to prove it, but luckily our Santa Cruz 52 Sin Duda! edged out the competition to win our Spinnaker 2 division.  Lindsey Duda is the helm and our tactician was Robbie Haines, so it was a great reunion for me with both of them: Robbie who I spent a lot of time with through the Morning Light Program, and Lindsey who I sailed with in 470s and coached/lived with at Chicago YC the summer before my freshman year of college.  A couple of the other instructors who I coached at Chicago with were on board (as well as one kid…now adult whom I coached!), and we had a great time with the buoy racing and round the island races over the 4-day series.  The final day was the only gloomy day, with rain squalls and cloudy skies making most of us wish we had brought full foulie sets, but the only real problem was that with our sights set on the 1st place and our eyes set on our competition–double-masted Sojana, we couldn’t see them through the fog and had to just hope we were doing well enough on corrected time.

Getting blown away at the airport bar

With few mistakes throughout the week we finished 5 pts ahead for the overall win!  Next up for this team is the BVI Spring Cup in Tortola in April, where I will be filling big shoes as tactician.

Trophies!