22:00, Monday 19th September 2022, Alimos, Greece.
Another fun and competitive weekend concluded for AETHER, LAVORO III and OPTIMUM 4, all OSA boats posting podium results. Agistri is another picturesque island 20 miles from Athens and we get to visit it in racing mode and enjoy a Saturday night island summer hospitality. On the opening leg from Faliro Bay to Agistri LAVORO III, the “blue” OSA Dehler 30od, posted a convincing 3rd place in the ORCi Performance Division in light and shifting conditions. On Sunday, the return leg back to Athens was a broad reach in medium to fresh conditions up to 25 knots of breeze and AETHER scored 1st in the ORCi Double Handed Division managing at the same time to cross the finish line second overall to the 1st fully crewed boat in the Performance Division of 15 entries! In this leg too, OPTIMUM 4 scored another bullet in ORCi Performance Division taking advantage of the impressive form stability of the Dehler 30od that allowed her to hold on the spinnaker more time than anyone else in the fully crewed Performance division. As such, AETHER ended up 3rd (5,1), OPTIMUM 4 in 7th place (13,1) and LAVORO III in 8th place (3, 11).
“Racing an OPTIMUM Sailing Academy Dehler 30od is always an educating experience for me. I am passionate sailing enthusiast and O.S.A. provides the opportunity to anyone like me who doesn’t own a boat to skipper a super modern yacht and be coached by super competent and experienced OSA personnel. I brought along my friend Eirini Dekoli and Team OPTIMUM members Vaggelis Karas and Periklis Livas offered a full hands on sailing masterclass from start to finish in both legs of the race. There is so much to learn if you want to up your game and sailing with OSA for third time is a game changer for me, boosting my confidence in helming crowded starts, steering to speed targets, sail selection process, trimming sails, weight distribution, planning and executing course and boat to boat tactics, boat set up and a myriad other details you get to talk about and realise during racing. I also find huge value on the casual debriefings with the crews of all three OSA Dehler 30s where I understand the effect of different choices during the race in sail combinations, boat set up, rating choices as the OSA guys work and share info to up their game altogether. The most important lesson learned this weekend was that you keep pushing all the way until you reach the finish line. In about 2/3 in the leg back to Athens the wind headed and picked up significantly. We had a poor spinnaker drop that costed us time and distance, and hoisted back the jib to aim to the finish line. About 4-5 miles from the finish the wind lifted and dropped a bit and we hoisted back the spinnaker although it was marginal and nobody else nearby followed. OPTIMUM 4 lifted her bow and screamed towards the finish line recording speeds in my hands up to 16.2 knots in 20 knots breeze! That little push in the end exonerated our poor drop and underlined our leg win”, confesses OSA student Anastasia Samara who skippered OPTIMUM 4 in Agistri 2022 Race.
This is the first season that OSA operates all three Dehler 30ods and we try different set ups and modes entering the three boats in the same race. We check real time the effect of the use of water ballast, two types of Code Os and full crew or double handed mode in ORCi rating certification. We will keep doing so until December so next year we will be able to mode the boats effectively depending on the race and crew equation. Most importantly we enjoy boat to boat racing within the races all our three boats compete, and share our observations and findings only to get faster and better every day. Next stop is the ORCi Double Handed Nationals in two weeks for all three O.S.A. Dehler 30ods, a true testing event for crews and boats.
In O.S.A. we welcome anyone who wants to try sailing once, all the way to anyone who wants to learn more or just sail on a Dehler 30od. Male or Female, join now!