No complaints regarding the wind in the past month; i am sailing every weekend and for sure not slow! My previous record was 16.something knots, but thanks to a nice 33 knots gust (looked it up on the clubs weather station), i raised the bar to 20.6 knots. Never before i hiked more aft at the transom, trying to keep the rudder IN the water. The rest of the boat was simply flying.

 

Edit 2020-03-14 :

The Speedpuck display says "19.2". I've imported the track in GPS Track Editor, which then showed a max of 20.6 knots. i now know the reason of the difference in speed. My Speed puck was set to: Max Speed Display = Display Max Ten Seconds Avg Speed" . I've set it now to "Flash between Both".

 

 

 

 

 

 

Just came ashore, after sailing in storm Dennis, Our lake (Fishers Green, UK) is nicely sheltered. With conditions reaching 40mph gusts just as we were returning to shore.

 

 

Will add video footage later (if they managed to capture the moment).

New speeds since April 2016 will be included and the new list will be added to the previous list with the new additions highlighted.

 

Screen shot from Chunky's video of 19 March at Northampton, UK.

Shows 20kn at 1:15 and you can see a nice steady increase to it, with no 'spike'.

 

 

 

 

I don't have a video or a photo but last Saturday I touched 11.45 knots in an Aero 5. The Garmin track is here https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1127530432 

 

It is nearly a year now since we kicked off our International GPS Speed Challenge and with all the activity, time now for a summary!

 

The GPS Challenge has proven great fun and helped keep us entertained when it is too windy for racing. Read all about it here;

 

Ron Fergusson reports from the south side of Port Philip Bay, Victoria...

 

Mostly flat water with the sea breeze coming over the Bellarine Peninsula, very gusty and shifty, quite a blast.

Lymington, 21st Feb

No big speed to report today. Alex got his first score on the board of 14.5kn, a starter to improve on no doubt. Achieved during racing, wind was initially 22kn gusting 27kn but steadily dropped.

 

 

  Here is Chunky's Valentines day offering; a momentary 33kph = 17.8kn on 14th Feb to take the lead in the Speed Freaks challenge. 

 Later his traveller knot pulled out resulting in a backwards dunking! Make sure you check them and pull them tight with pliers if the tails are short.

 Our Winter Training was at Northampton that weekend, is that them in the background? 

  

 

Our webmaster Anthony 'Chunky' York has had his boat a month and is already producing race results and big speeds. Here is his opening speed, but judging from the way he came past me at the Steve Nicholson Trophy downwind (twice!) there is definitely more to come from Northampton...

(ed; Is there a way to get that readout onto kn, rather than kmh? RichardW had the same issue)

 

Chunky reports;
30kmh = 16.2kn  (Sunday 7th Feb, Northampton)
Playing around in the breeze, trying out telemetry, not perfect sync but not far off. Unfortunately I must have stopped the GPS as it only got part of the first race and not the windy stuff! This is the first time I've taken the gps out with me. It got a lot windier in the last race and was just holding on a couple of reaches which was definitely quicker, so who knows!
RS Aero 7 - Garmin Edge 520 - Go Pro HD Hero 4 Silver - Garmin Virb edit software (this allows you to import your gpx file from your gps and overlays on video).

 

Here is my offering from 15th November at Lymington. Not a record but it is my personal best recorded.

Just inside the mouth of the Lymington River at high tide, negligible current, wind about 25kn and gusting just over 30kn occasionally. Sailing with Ben Paton and about 20 tough Lymington Oppies!

 

 

16.8 kts.  Sorry, cheesy grin missing, but there was a very cheesy one.  Two week old boat (1635) at Salcombe in breezy but variable conditions on 28th July.  It was shortly before high water neaps so very little tide. 7 rig.

 

P.S. What do I do to reduce the size of the image?  I've resized it in Picture Manager, but it seems to come back the same size in the forum.

 

 

15.0 kn - Not sure if this counts - no cheesy grin and picture as data was on phone.

 

 It was a quiet day racing on Wimbleball lake last Sunday when a large squall came through between races. I was with a 7 rig, took off in the squall and then caught a gust inside the squall and the boat kept on going faster. I would guess 25-30 knots wind with the water fairly flat but rapidly developing  lumps. As can be seen from the average speed the rest of the day was something of an anticlimax

 

 

The Lymington aero open was great fun. I have to admit the 9 rig in 20kt + breeze is a bit of a handful : )
 
I have been sailing with a Sony AS30V action cam for a while, the bonus feature of this bit of kit is that it also records GPS speed. For some reason I can only get it to give my speed in km/h (I used google to convert to kts). Attached is a screen shot of the video I took on the way out to the start on the saturday.
 
I only managed to get about an hour of footage before I ran out of juice, next time I will remember to fully charge the battery! I think many aeros on the day would have broken the 15 kts barrier, I only managed to get 14.5 kts (26.9 km/h) recorded before the camera died.

 

Leg selfie @ 14.5 kts

 

 

Happy Sailing,

 

Rich Watsham

GBR 1298

 

OK. You wanted a selfie of Eric Aker with a cheesy grin. Well this wasn't a selfie and it wasn't the day he set the 15 knot speed record, but it was the day he won the first RS Aero Regatta on the east coast of the United States, at Massapoag  YC near Boston on May 30.

 

 

Photo credit: Annie Pennington 

Sorry Peter, didn't realise i'd missed the ability for you to edit your images, you should now be able to do this.

 

If you have any issues like this, just let me know and i'll get them fixed. 

Chunks 

A simple GPS based Speed Competition.

 

All you need is a simple GPS like a Velocitec Speedpuck or Garmin Foretrex 401. Maybe an iPhone app or a bike GPS would work in a waterproof case (can anyone recommend the best app?).

 

All you need to do is get out in some breeze in your RS Aero, record a fully cranking Max Speed. When you get ashore take a selfie of the Max Speed (in Knots) reading with a cheesy grin. Post the photo here, together with a brief summary of the conditions and your adventure. Simple!

 

Don't worry if you are not the fastest. Lets record everyone's 'Personal Best' and you can then re-post every time you improve, logging your progress here.

 

So we can have a fully International Competition without the need to pack up and travel!

 

Remember - without a photo it never happened!

 

*Tips for inserting pics* A photo set '400' wide and aligned to the 'right' works well.  Smaller readouts on other GPSs will need a closer photo, try 'selfie' range.