I'm thinking of doing the ledge to lanno for the first time and I have a few questions I hope some people here can answer:

How do I know if I have the skills and fitness to do it?
How far is it?
What do people do to prepare (fitness wise)?
What sort of gear do you need?
Why is there no mens division in the Miss Flying Objects competition?

It is around 35 or 36 km... You will NEED a 9 or 10sqm sail and a big slalom or formula board plus a weed fin to suit It is also useful to know how to jump craypot lines with said kit

Preparation is pretty simple... SAIL LOTS... That'll get you fit. Know how to rig all your kit. Skills required: ability to sail downwind. Gybing is useful but not essential.

You need a life jacket (PFD 1 or 2, not 3) and a flare. You can hire/buy some of these on the day.

Male, MISS FO -

9 or 10 sail? What are the usual wind strengths like?

That is a little tongue in cheek The weather usually troughs out for the marathon I think the was around 12 or 13 knots last year.

This year will be DIFFERENT... 28 knots on wave gear Stopping for a wave before the end of the race!

BTW, if you have a life jacket, practice sailing in it! I find it difficult!

do u still need a life jacket, if you have ...ahem....inbuilt natural float

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WINDY MILLER said...

do u still need a life jacket, if you have ...ahem....inbuilt natural float

That depends - if your natural buoyancy has a PFD rating of 2 or better and this can be confirmed by the race officials on the day, you'll be fine

He means he had an operation last year where they increased the size of his penis with 10L of polyurethane foam.

you'll be right WM

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Mark _australia said...

He means he had an operation last year where they increased the size of his penis with 10L of polyurethane foam.

you'll be right WM

That would not help much. You would end up drowning coz you can't breath through your donger.

Does anyone know where I would find a map of the course?

It starts from Ledge Point and ends at the Endeavour Tavern in Lancelin. There are four outside markers and three inside so eight legs in total for about 26km. The first leg is generally pretty tight and the rest range from broad to very broad. I wore my gps last year so when I get the chance I will load my tracks into Google Earth and you can see the course from there.

Last year was only 13-15 knots but there is a 25 knot seabreeze scheduled for it this year so you can sail on anything from a Windrush Clubman to an F2 Missile XS.

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AUS1111 said...

It starts from Ledge Point and ends at the Endeavour Tavern in Lancelin. There are four outside markers and three inside so eight legs in total for about 26km. The first leg is generally pretty tight and the rest range from broad to very broad. I wore my gps last year so when I get the chance I will load my tracks into Google Earth and you can see the course from there.

.

C'arn Add's your holding us all in suspence, have you loaded it into Google yet?
Its 12 k's as ther crow flies (well a direct flying one, anyway)

DL, a great place to do long distance ocean runs for training, where you can practice pointing up-wind or bearing off is at Safety Bay. Launch from the lagoon and head up to Penguin Island. From there head up towards Warnboro/Port Kennedy and back. I dont know the exact distance as I dont have a GPS, but guessing it must be around the 4-5km mark. If you can do that for a few hours that is guaranteed to get the sailing fitness up. I know that early in the season I struggle to do a few with the legs cramping up etc. By the end of the season I am out there for a good few hours.

OK, the race course has now been added into the photos section. I have measured it out and the course is almost exactly 20km.

As you can see the first leg is a little tighter than the rest - probably around a beam reach depending on your start position, and it is 3.2 km out to the first boat. The second leg tends to run pretty deep and it's not uncommon to need to gybe upwind of the boat in order to get around it as it can be too deep to make it in a straight line.

The next few legs tend to be good deep broad reaches until the final outgoing leg which is again very deep off the breeze. You can see from my track that I haven't been able to sail direct to the mark, which is actually positioned in the dog-leg of the final run in through South Passage to the pub.