Downwind Sails on Panda ROSSO
This morning Amanda and I were chatting about downwind sails over some coffee (yes, as you may have already guessed, most of our conversations revolve around sailing or the weather). The topic was fresh on our minds since we just had two days of great medium to light wind running in the Virgin Islands. So, lets have a quick discussion about what downwind sails we have and their use!
First, a quick inventory of all sails aboard Panda ROSSO:
Mainsail with two reefing points - 60m2
Genoa on a furler (or J1) - 40m2
Jib on an inner stay furler (or J2) - 20m2
North Sails G1 - Spinnaker
Incidence Sails A2 - Spinnaker
North Sails G1 - ‘Sharki’
We absolutely love this sail. Sharki is an all-white spinnaker with tell tales and built-in sheet holders, as well as both luff and leech tensioners. This sail is termed ‘G1’ by North Sails as a cruising spinnaker, optimized for reaching. She performs well with TWA from 145-90deg. In light airs, we can push her up to about 70deg AWA with the foot super tight. In heavy wind, we fly her a little deeper than intended, but it’s more easily managed than our A2. We have flown Sharki in up to 22kts true, and higher for short gusts.
Incidence Sails A2-ish - ‘Matilda Falcon’
This sail is simply photogenic. Especially when running in the trades near sunset. We had Matilda Falcon up for maybe 10 of the 16 days for our Atlantic crossing. Her main purpose is for light to medium air running VMG and some reaching. Best angles are 165-120 TWA. We can reach up to 85 AWA. We have flown her running in 25kts true, but prefer to douse anything over 20kts. Our A2 is still cut more flat than a true downwind only spinnaker, but carries her girth super high. Lots of sail area up top and projected to windward for deep reaching and running VMG.
A ‘Sock’ us used to hoist and douse both of our spinnakers.
Both our G1 and A2 are tacked on our bowsprit and handled via a ‘sock’. Its a simple and robust method for short-handed cruising crew to handle spinnakers, we endorse this setup completely. We have not yet had first-hand experience with furlers, and for our boat, would need to make some serious modifications to fit one. They are all the rage these days, but I do have to say, if not properly setup, they can be a hassle. In our multihull rally, several boats had consistent issues with furling or unfurling their spinnakers, which we then had huge gains with our simple setup.
-Darren Seltzer