{"id":434,"date":"2016-02-16T00:46:39","date_gmt":"2016-02-16T00:46:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.forespar.com\/blog\/?p=434"},"modified":"2016-02-16T01:34:21","modified_gmt":"2016-02-16T01:34:21","slug":"sailing-downwind-with-double-headsails","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.forespar.com\/blog\/2016\/02\/sailing-downwind-with-double-headsails\/","title":{"rendered":"Sailing Downwind with Double Headsails"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"float: right; margin-left: 10px;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/share\" class=\"twitter-share-button\" data-count=\"vertical\" data-url=\"https:\/\/www.forespar.com\/blog\/2016\/02\/sailing-downwind-with-double-headsails\/\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n<p>It sounds a lot more complicated than it is. All you need is:<br \/>\n\u2022 your usual genoa<br \/>\n\u2022 a second headsail<br \/>\n\u2022 a mast with two foresail halyards<br \/>\n\u2022 a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.forespar.com\/products\/twist-lock-whisker-poles.shtml\">whisker pole<\/a><br \/>\nYour destination is deep off the wind. The breeze is light to moderate, and you\u2019d like to be moving faster, but either don\u2019t have a spinnaker aboard, or just don\u2019t want to wrestle with it. Wing-and-wing isn\u2019t working because your course isn\u2019t dead down wind, or you just don\u2019t want to deal with the constant trimming.\u00a0 The usual solution is to come up on the wind, heat it up and get some boat speed, gybing your way to your mark. It\u2019s more work, but it can get you there faster if you plan your gybes well.<br \/>\nOr go with two headsails.<br \/>\nGet the other sail on deck (it doesn\u2019t matter if it\u2019s your jib, another genoa, or in light air an appropriate sail). You can rig a new, separate sheet for the windward side, or even detach the lazy sheet from the working sail, as long as you remember to re-attach it before any gybes. Get the free halyard and new sheet hooked up with plenty of slack, and the new sail tacked on. Make sure the pole is ready to go. (We use a Forespar twist-lock pole, which adjusts to the right length for whatever sail we\u2019re using).<br \/>\nHoist the new windward sail, attach the pole as close to the sail clew as you can, adjust the pole length, and trim on. The rest is adjustment for the course and breeze. Then watch the boat go faster, especially in light air. You might even lower the mainsail, just go with the headsails.<br \/>\nYou can go faster and deeper, with a lot less work. Ocean cruisers sometimes go hundreds of miles with a whisker pole &#8211; or even two headsails and two poles. Some races even allow double headsails (we\u2019ve had great success in \u201cinside\u201d races using a light 155 genoa and our drifter).\u00a0 Try it on light days when you\u2019ve got room to work, adjust and trim. It\u2019s easy to do with two people, and requires a lot less muscle.<br \/>\nGo sailing. Have fun.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Dwight<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Tweet It sounds a lot more complicated than it is. All you need is: \u2022 your usual genoa \u2022 a second headsail \u2022 a mast with two foresail halyards \u2022 a whisker pole Your destination is deep off the wind. The breeze is light to moderate, and you\u2019d like to be moving faster, but either&#8230; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.forespar.com\/blog\/2016\/02\/sailing-downwind-with-double-headsails\/\">Read more: Sailing Downwind with Double Headsails<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1001004,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[52,80,81,79,82,70,78],"class_list":["post-434","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-forespar","tag-genoa","tag-halyard","tag-headsail","tag-lazy-sheet","tag-sailing","tag-whisker-pole-spinnaker-pole"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.forespar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.forespar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.forespar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.forespar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1001004"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.forespar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=434"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.forespar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":442,"href":"https:\/\/www.forespar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434\/revisions\/442"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.forespar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=434"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.forespar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=434"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.forespar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=434"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}