A new foresail and spinnaker

new foresailAfter sailing through squalls on the way to Bermuda, I realized that my aging 150% genoa was just too big after, the trailing edge (the leach)  got shredded whilst I was struggling to furl it in a gust of wind. Later I spent 2 days sewing it back together.

Now Blue Horizon has a 110% genoa with a foot length of 16’ 9” compared to the old sail’s 21ft. It also means that when the wind picks up I can shrink it with the furler and  it will still retain it’s shape. Another advantage is that the sleeve of the storm jib will more easily fit over this smaller sail when in the furled position. The bigger genoa was just too bulky and made it hard to raise the storm jib. The other lesson I learnt was that we poorly equipped for light winds and  the big heavy main and genoa just flogged around making a lot of noise. I picked up a 38 ft spinnaker recently and bought a spinnaker sock (otherwise a snuffer) to handle it. I now look forward to ghosting along along with this large light weight sail in gentle 5 knot winds.