Second Sol Closing Party is Sunday

All good things must come to an end sometime… 🙂

Image courtesy of Dil Spitz

MoonCats Win Second Sol Crown

The sailing was tough in North Sea on Saturday, but five great teams donned their foul weather gear and raised sail to fight it out one last time to decide the winner of the Second Sol Regatta.

Here’s a brief rundown on the racing action.

Race 1 Results: Course A

In R1 the Blue Marlins took the lead initially, but then Poseidon Linden reared his ugly head, and all the race boats crashed!

Only one team, Moons Love Cats,  had the presence of mind to re-rez and officially cross the raceline. The judges initially considered abandoning R1 and re-running the first race. However, as soon as one boat legally crossed the Finish line, that choice was not an option.

R1 Race Results
1: Moontears Vought ID16 — 00:17:24
2: SerenityAeon Resident ID4 — not Finished
3: diamond Marchant ID2 — not Finished
4: Alain Gloster ID15 — not Finished
5: Ronin Zane ID9 — not Finished
Lap Times:
Moontears Vought ID16 — Start: 00:00:09 — Last lap: 00:17:15
SerenityAeon Resident ID4 — Start: 00:00:00 — Last lap: not finished
diamond Marchant ID2 — Start: 00:00:01 — Last lap: not finished
Alain Gloster ID15 — Start: 00:00:05 — Last lap: not finished
Ronin Zane ID9 — Start: 00:00:05 — Last lap: not finished

Race 2 Course B

R2 began with a remarkable start; four boats simultaneously crossed the line with times of +00:01 or +00:02, with NYC just slightly behind at +00:07. It was a pretty great demonstration of the sailing skill of the Finalist Fleet.

Alain Gloster’s Eureka quickly took the lead and held it, shutting down a strong challenge by Blue Marlins, with Moon Cats placing third. Crashes again disrupted the races, but not to an extreme degree.

R2 Race Results
1: Alain Gloster ID15 — 00:12:19
2: SerenityAeon Resident ID4 — 00:16:30
3: Moontears Vought ID16 — 00:17:33
4: Ronin Zane ID9 — not Finished
5: diamond Marchant ID2 — not Finished
Lap Times:
Alain Gloster ID15 — Start: 00:00:02 — Last lap: 00:12:17
SerenityAeon Resident ID4 — Start: 00:00:02 — Last lap: 00:16:28
Moontears Vought ID16 — Start: 00:00:01 — Last lap: 00:17:32
Ronin Zane ID9 — Start: 00:00:01 — Last lap: not finished
diamond Marchant ID2 — Start: 00:00:07 — Last lap: not finished

Race 3 Course C

The third heat on Course C was the best of the Finals set, full of strategy and close tacking. The image below shows how close the fleet was half way through the race, with boats converging from opposing tacks. In fact, Armano led SerenityAeon by only four seconds as they crossed the Finish Line!

R3 Race Results
1: Moontears Vought ID16 — 00:13:48
2: SerenityAeon Resident ID4 — 00:13:52
3: Alain Gloster ID15 — 00:14:23
4: Ronin Zane ID9 — 00:14:42
5: Diamond marchant DSQ – DSQ
Lap Times: 
diamond Marchant ID2 — Start: 00:00:02 — Last lap: 00:08:15
Moontears Vought ID16 — Start: 00:00:10 — Last lap: 00:13:38
SerenityAeon Resident ID4 — Start: 00:00:02 — Last lap: 00:13:50
Alain Gloster ID15 — Start: 00:00:02 — Last lap: 00:14:21
Ronin Zane ID9 — Start: 00:00:05 — Last lap: 00:14:37

Race 4 Course C

R4 used the same couse as R3, and once again the race was very tight and hard fought. So much so, that coming around Ziziphus Island three boats converged in near-collision (see below)! Woots!

R4 Race Results
1: Moontears Vought ID16 — 00:14:17
2: Alain Gloster ID15 — 00:14:28
3: diamond Marchant ID2 — 00:15:13- DSQ
4: SerenityAeon Resident ID4 — 00:19:38
5: Ronin Zane ID9 — not Finished
Lap Times: 
Alain Gloster ID15 — Start: 00:00:02 — Last lap: 00:14:21
Ronin Zane ID9 — Start: 00:00:05 — Last lap: 00:14:37

At the conclusion of four heats, the Moon’s Love Cats team emerged as the clear winner, racking up three first place wins out of four heats. Here’s the Results table, calculated with Sailwave. With one discard, Moon’s Love Cats scored a ‘perfect’ 3.0 and won First Place. Eureka came in Second Place with a strong 6.0 showing, and Blue Marlins was right behind with a score of 7.0. The sim conditions had the greatest impact on Ronin Zane and Diamond Marchant. Their Grumpy Men and NYC1 entries sufferred lag and repeated crashes, resulting in Fourth and Fifth position totals.

Scoring Comment

The judges had an extended discussion about how to deal with Race 1, since all the boats crashed in that heat. However, under the ISAF Rules of Sailing the solution was  straightforward. Rule 35 states:

35 TIME LIMIT AND SCORES
… If one boat sails the course as required by rule 28 and finishes within
the time limit, if any, all boats that finish shall be scored according to
their finishing places unless the race is abandoned. If no boat finishes
within the time limit, the race committee shall abandon the race.

In other words, the race committee must abandon and potentially re-run a race when all the competitors fail to Finish. However, in R1 Armano re-rezzed the Moon boat and drove it across the line, legally finishing the course. Once he did that, under Rule 32.1 the race was valid for scoring purposes and the race committee could not simply abandon it. Here’s what Rule 32.1 says:

32 SHORTENING OR ABANDONING AFTER THE START
32.1 After the starting signal, the race committee may… abandon the race… as appropriate… because of foul weather…
However, after one boat has sailed the course and finished within the
time limit, if any, the race committee shall not abandon the race
without considering the consequences for all boats in the race or
series.

Rule 90.3(a) also emphasizes this point:

90.3 Scoring
(a) … A race shall be scored if it is not abandoned and if one boat sails
the course in compliance with rule 28 and finishes within the time limit,
if any, even if she retires after finishing or is disqualified.

The Race Committee might have added a fifth heat to the series in lieu of abandoning R1. I think that would violate the regatta rules (and probably ISAF racing rules too), but I bring it up here to make a point. Even if the fleet raced a fifth heat with Alain finishing First and Armano Last, the Finals Rank would still be the same, as shown below.

Moon’s Love Cats finished the four heat Finals with a decisive record of 1-3-1-1, and they well earned the Second Sol Championship. I’d like to argue their victory was ‘predictable,’ since they also won every single qualifying race they sailed with Armano as team skipper.

Image courtesy of Orca Flotta

However, going back over the records for the past several weeks of Sec Sol races, the truth is that all five teams won their Finalist spots with near-perfect race scores in the Qualifying Rounds. Going into Saturday’s event it was a real toss-up who would emerge this year’s winner.

I think that says something great about the extent of interest, skill and enthusiasm of so many sailors that make up the Sailing Community in Second Life. Thank you to all of you who helped make this year’s S4L race event huge fun.

I’ll have a lot more to say about this as we get closer to the Award Ceremony and Second Sol Regatta Closing Party this Sunday, July 28 @ 13:30 in Eden Estate!!

GO MOON CATS!

The 2013 Second Sol Champions!

Second Sol Finals set for July 20

 

Second Sol Quals Close

The Second Sol Qualifying Races finished on Saturday, June 22. Twenty teams signed up to compete in the regatta, and each contributed $L5,000 to Sail4Life and the American Cancer Society as an Entry Donation. In return, each team received a free copy of the Patchogue II raceboat, generously provided by Jacqueline Trudeau.

The fleet of twenty contestants was broken into five ‘timeslot groups’  that raced against each other. The five winners then earned the right to compete in an upcoming Finals \Regatta that will be held in North Sea.

The timeslot qualifying rounds consisted of eight race heats for each group of four boats. The results were scored using the Standard Low Point System, using four discards. In other words, only a team’s best four races counted.

There are several advantages to using such a large number of discards in a SL sailboat race. Those benefits were clear in past multi-race events, including the J-Classic and ONE World competitions. On the other hand, four discards increased the risk of a potential tie between boats competing in any particular Second Sol timeslot group. Actually, as the races played out this past week, that never happened. In each group there turned out to be one team that clearly distingushed itself as the ‘best of the best‘ in a very skilled peer group.

Here are the scores for each team identified by contact person and sail number. Please remember that this was a boat race, not a skipper race. The person named below as the “Helm Name” was the contact person responsible for the team, but that person did not necessarily skipper the boat in every (or perhaps any) race. That’s a good thing; in most cases the race team members took turns at the tiller in different races; it was a cooperative venture. 🙂

If you take a few minutes and look at the table above, you will see that in each timeslot group there was one team that amassed a “perfect score” of 4.0, meaning that they sailed at least four First Place races. You can’t do better than 4.0 in this Regatta, but in all five groups there was one team that slam-dunked the races so skillfully they ended up with a perfect score.

That perfect quintet are:

02- Diamond Marchant- NYC1
05- Ariel Gallais- Moontear’s Lovecats
09- Ronin Zane- Grumpy Old Men Yacht Club
04- SerenityAeon Resident- Blue Marlins
15- Alain Gloster- Eureka

These five will now advance to the Finals Round, where a series of four fleet races will determine the overall champion for this year’s Second Sol competition.

Moontears Lovecats

NYC1

Grumpy Old Men

Blue Marlins

Eureka

(photos courtesy of Dil Spitz)

Round Two Takes Off!

(photo courtesy of Dil Spitz)

Second Sol Round Two Lineup

The Second Sol Regatta Round Two takes off this weekend, with five timeslot races on June 21-22. Here’s a list of the timeslot teams and the race venues.

RACE TEAMS AND ROUND TWO RACE LOCATIONS

FRI 12:30 – SLCC/ Farragut raceline
013 Pazzo Pestana — FIYC 1
012 Pensive Mission — DYC Mowmows
002 Diamond Marchant — NYC1
008 EmmanuelMara Resident — MSRSC TeamDM

SAT 09:00 – Tradewinds YC/ Siracusa raceline
003 lesbo charisma — Team Arimto
006 ariel gallais — Moon’s love cats
020 Us Vemo — Kingfisher
018 Mami Charmann — WYC1

SAT 12:00 – Starboards YC/ Pacific raceline
007 Allie Tomsen — Seafarers
011 Anstett Brandenburg — Sea Lions
019 Bear Silvershade — Shadow Seekers
009 Ronin Zane — Grumpy Old Men Yacht Club

SAT 15:00 – FIYC/ Plum Gut raceline 
021 KalEl Tryce — Bistro on Blake
014 Aquarius Paravane– Echo Beach Bums
004 SerenityAeon Resident — Blue Marlins
005 Victor Cruiser — Wind on face

SAT 18:00 – Three Pines Sail Center/ Sulu raceline
015 Alain Gloster — Eureka
010 Chaos Mandelbrot — Penguin Racing Team
017 SachBee Resident — WYC2
001 Arrekusu Muramichi — Kazenojin Seiringu

I’ll update the list of skippers and teams prior to raceday. If any team has a scheduling problem and would like to switch groups, please contact Jane Fossett in Second Life and we’ll swap things around. 🙂

Here are the charts for Round Two. Please be sure to check the Discussion Thread for chart updates over the next few days.

JUN 21 1230 – FARRAGUT

JUN 22 0900 – SIRACUSA

JUN 22 1200 – PACIFIC

JUN 22 1500 – PLUM GUT

JUN 22 1800 – SULU

Second Sol FINALS Race

At the end of Round Two, we’ll tally up the point scores and determine the winners of each of the timeslot groups. Those five teams will then compete in a Finals Regatta hosted by North Sea that will decide the Second Sol Champions. 🙂

The Finals event was originally scheduled for June 23. However, several sailors pointed out that date was too inflexible. There would be no practice time, and sailors on the Final Five teams might well have RL obligations that day.

I’ve therefore agreed to postpone the Finals. Once we have the Five Finalist teams late on Saturday, we’ll work to pick a new date and time over the subsequent two weeks that is acceptable to all the competing boats. It’s their race, after all; we can’t sail a Finals unless all the boats make it to the Startline, full of hot air and ready to roar. 🙂

Second Sol Round One

Kudos to everyone who sailed, hosted, and helped staff the five timeslot events and twenty race heats of Second Sol Round One. Next weekend we’ll do Round Two, and then combine the scores to pick the Finalists who will sail for the Second Sol Championship on June 23.

Here’s a summary of the point totals so far, using Standard, Low-Point Scoring under Appendix A of the Race Rules.

Click to enlarge

Remember, the boats will race again on June 21-22, and the final scoring will only count each team’s top four races.  In case of a tie, we’ll use Appendix A 8.1 and 8.2 to break the tie to get five Finalist boats to compete for the championship in North Sea on June 23.

image courtesy of Dil Spitz!

Three Second Sol “Rules” for Virtual Sailing.

The Second Sol Regatta begins June 14. Twenty teams are ready to compete in a total of 84 fleet races.

Before the start gun goes off however, I wanted to bring up three specific racing issues for the Patchogue II fleet.

Skipper/Crew Side-Switching Downwind

This issue primarily affects boats with a solo skipper. When sailing on a far broad reach or a run, the wind forces come from behind a boat and generate very little “heel.” A Patchogue II with a solo skipper will heel to the side where the skipper is seated.

However, Patchogue II likes to sail flat, with no heel. Often the only way a solo skipper can flatten the boat on a run is to first sit on the windward side until the boat heels too far in that direction, then move to the leeward side to bring the boat back past zero heel. The skipper then repeats the process, usually every 10-15 seconds. That maneuver can reliably produce a 5-8% speed boost by keeping the boat ‘balanced.’ However, this gain is so small that a skipper will probably only think to use it during a race.

Flat gives the best Boatspeed

There are several ISAF rules that prohibit non-wind methods of boat propulsion, including versions of tiller-waggling, sail back-winding, and crew weight-shifting.

However, I think a good argument can be made that skipper side-shifting in the Patch II is intended to enhance wind effects; side-switching downwind is therefore not an abnormal means of boat propulsion. Sailors who use this in Second Sol should not be penalized.

Rapid Reefing

Ronin Zane reports a similar effect with reefing upwind or on a reach. If a solo skipper or small number of crew sail a beam reach in a stiff breeze, they may often find that they have excess heel if they don’t reef. However, they may also find they lose too much speed when they add a reef point.

What’s the fix? Well, they can put all of the crew on windward rail, wait till heel is ‘too much,’ and then reef. That will right the boat back into the ‘go‘ zone. At the point the boat has a good heel angle, the the skipper can then free the reef again. That will cause the boat to accelerate and start to heel once more…

Ronin was concerned that repeated reefing might be illegal in a race, under the RRS Rules and guidelines against non-wind propulsion.

Ronin’s point is well taken. A real-life skipper would never change reef several times each minute. However, within the physical constraints of virtual sailing, in my opinion a sailor who tries to gain a small advantage by rapid-reefing is within his/her rights to do so. Reefing is a wind management tool, hence a racing technique. It’s not an exploit.

Equally important, recent Trudeau boats have a built-in reefing penalty. A boat will lose momentum for a few seconds with each reef change. That means any gain from ‘Rapid-Reefing’ is guaranteed to be small.

Having said that, let me again comment that although any rapid-reef benefit is small, in my opinion it’s legal.

Crew Alts

Ok ok, your crew doenn’t show up for the big match; what do you do? Well, it’s simple to rez a few of your favorite Alt-avatars, and use them to crew for you, Right?

Well Wrong. From every vantage I can think of, sailing with an Alt differs extremely from sailing with ‘human’ crew. I could write several pages on this topic, but I think I’d bore everyone to tears and put myself to sleep in the process. This is an obvious issue.

Bottom line, I think sailing with one’s own ALT in a race is illegal. (It’s probably also an abomination against man, god, and nature). Any skipper who deceptively races with their ALT in Second Sol should, by vote of the Judges, be DSQ for that race.

The above comments are just my opinions and apply only to Second Sol. I’m happy to hear other angles on these issues, and I’ll likely change my own view if someone makes a truly cogent argument over any of the ‘rules’ points raised above. 🙂

Second Sol 2013 begins June 14

The Second Sol Regatta begins Friday June 14. Twenty teams of sailors will compete in two rounds of qualifying races, broken into five different time slots to accommodate the large size of the entry fleet. Round One is June 14 – 15, and Round Two is June 21 – 22. The winners of the timeslot races will then meet for a Final regatta shootout in North Sea on June 23.

Here’s the list of team leaders and team names with their sail numbers and their Round One group assignments.

RACE TEAMS AND ROUND ONE RACE LOCATIONS

FRI 12:30 NYC/ Atlantic
013 JoyofRLC Acker — FIYC 1
012 Pensive Mission — DYC Mowmows
002 Diamond Marchant — NYC1
008 EmmanuelMara Resident — MSRSC TeamDM

SAT 09:00 North Sea/ Breadnut
003 lesbo charisma — Team Arimto
006 ariel gallais — Moon’s love cats
020 Us Vemo — Kingfisher
018 Mami Charmann — WYC1

SAT12:00 TrYC/Farragut
007 Allie Tomsen — Seafarers
011 Sara Solo — Sea Lions
019 Bear Silvershade — Shadow Seekers
009 Ronin Zane — Grumpy Old Men Yacht Club

SAT 15:00 DYC/ Queequeg
021 KalEl Tryce — Bistro on Blake
014 Aquarius Paravane– Echo Beach Bums
004 SerenityAeon Resident — Blue Marlins
005 Victor Cruiser — Wind on face

SAT 18:00 FIYC/ Plum Gut
015 Alain Gloster — Eureka
010 Chaos Mandelbrot — Penguin Racing Team
017 SachBee Resident — WYC2
001 Arrekusu Muramichi — Kazenojin Seiringu

Here are charts for each of the five timeslots in Round One. (Note: North Sea has two additional charts that may be used at the RD’s option).

JUN 22 1500 – PLUM GUT

On June 21-22 the fleet will sail the second half of the qualifying series. I’ll post the details for Round Two on Monday!

Three Weeks to Second Sol!

The Second Sol Regatta is only three weeks away!

Second Sol is a Sail4Life fundraising regatta that will cover two weekends, from June 15-June 23; you can read all about it here and here. A few days ago the race version of the boat was released, and delivered to fifteen race teams that are already signed up :-). Here are Team Coordinators for the fleet so far, followed by their assigned race number for the event:

Arrekusu Muromachi 001
Phill Plasma 002
lesbo charisma 003
SerenityAeon Resident 004
VitorCr Resident 005
ariel gallais 006
Allie Tomsen 007
EmmanuelMara 008
Ronin Zane 009
Chaos Mandelbrot 010
Sarah Solo 011
Pensive Mission 012
JoyofRLC Acker 013
erickson 014
Alain Gloster 015
moontears vought 016

Please note:

1. Only one race boat goes to each team, but we’ll deploy a demo vendor so all team sailors can practice on the boat.
2. The boats are eached numbered in the order sailors signed up to race; that number will be displayed on the team’s sails. Please use it as your race ID for this regatta!
3. The race ID for each team boat is different from the “Channel ID.” Teams are encouraged to use whatever channel is most convenient for them (other then “Channel 1,” of course).
4. The sails have fixed textures for this event. Each one is preprinted with the team’s assigned race number. When the Patchogue II officially launches, the race boats will be replaced with an official release version that is fully texturizible!

Please also note:

1. Although we initially planned for a total of only 16 raceboats in four qualifying timeslots on Saturday, June 15 and June 22, the response was impressive and several sailors have asked for an additional Friday time slot. If enough sailors sign up, that time slot will be 12:30 on Friday, June 14 and June 21.
2. That means right now we still have five more slots for race teams that want to sign up! You can join the fleet by signing up here, or you can contact Jane Fossett for more information in Second Life. 🙂

Go SECOND SOL!