29er XX Camp

Jen here,

We spent this weekend sailing with 29er XX sailors from Victoria and Seattle. From the Victoria fleet we had Anne Round and Liam, Jess Round and Erin Berry (Youth Worlds team), Sam and Ian, Jon Hey, Kristine Williams, and Fraser and Erik from the 470 fleet. Mat and Katie brought three rigs up from Seattle for a total of five 29er XX's on the water.  We got off to a great start on Saturday morning in about 15 knots.  The rigs are lots of fun and there was plenty of action on and in the waters of Caddy Bay!  Around noon the breeze picked up to about 23 knots, and so Erin and I opted to get into our 470 and let the skiff sailors have fun in the breeze.  This fall has seen nothing but extremely light conditions, so we're eager to get some time 470 sailing in breeze whenever possible.  At this point, the 29er XX's headed in and, sadly, I forfeited my opportunity to skiff sail for the day in order to get some much needed practice!

This morning when we got down to the club to rig the XX's,  we found that there were two masts with fractures running up the masts from the base.  These fractures seem to originate from where the mast butt is bolted into the base of the mast.  In one boat, there was a crack running about 18" up the carbon fibre rig.  Given that this happened to two rigs in one day, we're wondering if it has to do with the design or construction of the rigs.  Katie and Mat indicated that this was a problem for the XX's who sailed at CORK in Kingston this summer as well.  Nonetheless, it was a great weekend and a good opportunity to spend time with our skiffy friends.  Big thanks to Anne Round for arranging the camp, to Jen Glass, Mat, and Katie for bringing up the rigs, and to the Round family, the Berry family, and Kelsey Stroppel for lending us their boats!

Take care,
Jen