Kerry Klingler from UK-Halsey New York, is a past J/80 World Champion and two time North American Champion. As UK-Halsey’s sail designer for the class, Kerry spends a lot of time racing the 80. After winning the class at Key West for his third time, Kerry wrote about three of the keys to his success this year:

After sailing Key West Race Week, it’s hard to believe why any sailor would not attend this regatta. The combination of great race management, super weather, crystal clear water and fun competition makes Key West one of the premier regattas in the world. Sailing with my crew Doug Lynn (sail trimmer), Neil Bresnan (Pit and Tactics), and Jay Lurie (Bow and Tactics), we won the 17-boat J/80 division by the narrow margin of six points over RUMOR, sailed by John Storck, Jr. and John Storck, III. The Storcks pressed us to the end with finishes of 2, 3, 1, 1, in the last four races of the nine-race series. They sailed a great regatta. This year race week was sailed in mostly light air, with wind speeds from 4-8 knots.

One of the important things we worked on was sailing in the lighter conditions with slightly looser upper shrouds than in the past. By backing off the upper shrouds three turns, the rig powered up and the boat speed was great. The other thing we did was to make sure the jib lead was far enough forward so that the sail broke evenly on the luff. Finally, we pulled the traveler to windward to keep the end of the boom on centerline, and sheeted the mainsheet hard enough to stall the top batten. When the boat started to slow up, I eased the mainsheet enough to get the top batten to flow. This allowed the boat to accelerate yet maintain good pointing ability.

One of the things you have to be aware of is to change gears when you sail into a puff. If the traveler is too high when the puff comes on, the boat will not build speed. When the boat starts to heel with the crew on the rail and hiking, I eased the traveler six inches, tensioned the backstay slightly, and sheeted the main harder. This kept the boat on its feet and sailing fast. When the wind died I reversed the process – pulling the traveler to windward, easing the sheet and backstay. We never stopped working the sails to try and keep the boat pointing with good speed through the water.

The other advantage we enjoyed was great downwind speed. There were key times when we were able to reel in the competition and pass boats. I think this was due to our spinnaker, which is a great downwind sail. This design was developed over five years of hard R&D work, testing countless designs. The thing I like about this design is its ability to rotate to windward and project maximum area to the wind while easy to trim. Along with having a fast chute, the crew knew how to sail deep, but recognized when to heat up the boat to get speed. A lot of times our competition was trying to sail too deep, only losing distance to the competition. I think one of the keys we used was to match angle of our competitors and not sail deeper. While sailing downwind, make speed your primary goal.

The final ingredient to our success was good crew work. My guys worked together as a team and had consistently good boat handling, which allowed me to attack the race and push our competitors. I could not have won the event without them – thanks guys.

Shown above is the staff of UK-Hong Kong with John Fries on the brand new ACC mainsail for CHN 95.

The delivery of these sails represents a worldwide effort by the UK-Halsey group. Sylvain Barrielle (UK-Halsey San Francisco) is the project manager and sail coordinator for the China Team. John Fries (UK-Halsey Mystic) is the sail designer and created the construction standards. Sail production man-power was supplied by UK-Halsey Hong Kong, which is one of the largest sail lofts in the world with over 60 employees. Said John Fries, “We are making the most of our large and diverse sailmaking group. UK-Halsey Hong Kong has been an enormous asset in building these large and complex sails.”

San Francisco Bay area magazine “Latitude 38” ran an article about Sylvain in their February 2007 issue and here’s a quote from that story:

UK-Halsey’s Multihull Guru Dave Calvert Reports on Racing his Own Boat in the Ft. Lauderdale to Key West Race

This year's 160-mile Ft. Lauderdale to Key West Race was a great sleigh ride. Forecasts predicted 15 to 20 knots from the northeast at the start, veering to the east and increasing to 20 to 25 knots later that night. This was the recipe for the perfect downwind race since the course starts out heading south and then follows the arc of the Florida Keys to the southwest and then west.

We sailed with one of the first production sails from UK-Halsey’s FST (UK-Halsey’s Fiber Sail Technology) production facility. Unfortunately it was a press to get the sail finished in time. And that meant it was a press to move the boat north 100 miles to the start of the race. We made it with about 12 hours to spare. After a short night of sleep we were back on the boat and out to the starting line. We won the start of Multihull Class A convincingly. We were ahead of everyone, including the 60-foot catamaran STARS AND STRIPES. With the high apparent wind at the start, we opted for the full main, full batten jib and carbon screacher. Twenty-five miles into the race we were sailing above our PHRF numbers. I called for the asymmetrical spinnaker as the apparent wind angle freed-up 15 degrees. The sail change felt great but, after five minutes the head of the spinnaker blew out. This was a three-year-old Airx 900 sail and the loads were just too high. For the remaining 130 miles we had to make the best of it with the close-winded screacher on the downwind course to the finish. Loosing the spinnaker cost us the chance of winning. We finished second, just over an hour out of first on the handicap. Next time I’ll be more patient and I’ll build a stronger spinnaker.

On the other hand, the FST mainsail was great. It has a massive square head that is over eight feet wide. Even with a layer of protective polyester taffeta, this main is much lighter than the tri-radial sail it replaced – and that sail was just film-on-film. Even though we haven’t reefed the sail yet, I can see that the reef points were made to be used. There are plenty of yarns going between the reef tack and the reef clew, and they go way up into the body of the sail. Tri-radial sails tend to rip when reefed because of the off-threadline loadings.

I’m really looking forward to using this sail hard since it was designed to be used racing and cruising. Stay tuned for future reports.

Michael and David Von Felton showing off their downwind speed, which they used to become the Australia National champs in the Cherub class. Andrew Burvill photo.

We have had a great start to 2007 and look forward to many more victories throughout the year. We’ve proved that we have the sail designs and the technology to make our customers extremely fast.

Firstly we would like to congratulate Michael Von Felton who went on to win the Cherub Nationals keeping UK-Halsey at the front of the fleet. Going into the last race there were only three points separating the top three. Michael won the last heat, putting all three in a tie that forced a count back. Two of the top three could note be separate on points and it hinged on the results of the last race. Michael’s victory was obviously very important. On receiving the National Championship, Michael and his crew David thanked UK-Halsey Fremantle for producing another fast mainsail and jib.

This capped off another great National Cherub Championship for UK-Halsey; five of the top 10 boats used our sails

The offshore sailing season for 2007 is now under way off Fremantle. The Pot of Gold was the first race of the year and the new C&C 115 CREWS CONTROL had her first race on IRC after waiting the first half of the season for a new mast, as the original was broken in transit. CREWS CONTROL hit the line for the first time with her set of UK-Halsey sails.

As the starting gun blasted, CREWS CONTROL powered away beating her bigger rivals to the top mark and went on to win the race by nearly seven minutes over second place. “This boat is unreal,” said Geoff Bishop of UK-Halsey Fremantle. “After a long wait we are finally sailing. Today we surprised not only ourselves but the competition with our boatspeed both upwind and downwind. The boat is well set up and the UK-Halsey sails looked fantastic.”

Bishop was relieved to be able to show off UK-Halsey’s latest sails. “Because of the delay with the mast, the sails have been sitting in the loft waiting for a boat. We wanted to get these out at the start of the season to show of our new development in both sail design and technology, but unfortunately the mast mishap delayed the launch. The CREWS CONTROL team and myself worked hard to optimise the C&C 115 for IRC and Western Australia’s conditions. Today proved we are on the right track.

What was even more pleasing was that UK-Halsey sails took the top two places under IRC. The second boat was the Titan 36 VARYING DEPTH with another new product, UK-Halsey’s Titanium mainsail and Tape-Drive headsails. Both CREWS CONTROL and VARYING DEPTH have full UK-Halsey Wardrobes.

"Pictured above are two photos of the Salona 37, which won Best Cruiser/Racer in Sailing World magazine’s 2006 Boat of the Year contest. The Salona 37 is a product of J&J Design and built by AD Boats in Croatia. The key dimensions are as follows:



“This award confirms Salona's proposition that it is possible to have elegant, well fitted, accommodations in a high-performance cruiser-racer,” says Matt Brunner of Salona Yachts. For more information contact: matthew.brunner@salonayachts.com" 

Clay Burkhalter's Mini 6.5 ACADIA. He will be singlehanding this 21-footer trans-Atlantic later this year against a fleet of 70 other Mini 6.5s.

Lia Ditton taken aboard DANGEROUS WHEN WET during the 2006 Route de Rhum

ACADIA's designer Rod Johnstone and Clay Burkhalter

On the U.S. side of the Atlantic, UK-Halsey Mystic in Connecticut has been working with Clay Burkhalter who is campaigning his Mini 6.5 (a powered up 21 foot box rule design) with the goal of racing in the 2007 Mini TransAt. This is a 4240-mile ocean race from France to Brazil. Clay’s boat, ACADIA, designed by his uncle Rod Johnstone, will be the first US-designed boat to compete in the event since 1979.

Clay started out his campaign with another sailmaker, even though UK-Halsey Mystic is the nearest loft to the boat’s home base. Clay thought he had to go with a sailmaker with a reputation, but he quickly found out that it’s more important to use a sailmaker who will work with him, not just drop off sail bags. Clay says his boat is definitely faster since switching to UK-Halsey. UK-Halsey Mystic’s designer John Fries says, “Clay and Rod are very happy with the sails and support they have received from our loft. ACADIA will be a full UK-Halsey boat for the 2007 Mini TransAt.”

For more information about Clay’s effort keep reading future issues of our newsletter or go to Clay’s web site: www.teamacadia.org. Clay is still looking for a naming level sponsor.

     Pedro Gianotti is proud to announce that his loft, UK-Halsey Texas, has grown to the point that he had to move it to a new, larger facility. The new loft is located in Kemah, five miles south of the original location. (See attached map)
     This loft is a complete manufacturing facility and serves not only the Texas market but produces sails for many of the other UK-Halsey lofts around the US.

The new address is:
UK-Halsey Texas
2031 Anders Lane, Suite J
Kemah, TX 77565
Phone: 281-334-3464
Fax: 281-334-3874