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I race small sailboats, and there’s a group of them that actively race on Monterrey Bay. A couple of friends had a whale, rather larger that an orca, surface be

I race small sailboats, and there’s a group of them that actively race on Monterrey Bay. A couple of friends had a whale, rather larger that an orca, surface below them. They’re pretty high tech boats. Carbon fiber, Kevlar, nomex sandwich. Ripped the back of the boat off from the rudder. One of the two guys was hanging off the side of the boat at the time (sounds strange,but normal), and so he suddenly found himself lying on a whale. Thought they had capsized. He said his first coherent thought was, “that’s not water?” Then promptly realized the barnacles on the whale were cutting through his 4mm wetsuit! The whale dove and disappeared, none the wiser apparently. They got towed in by one of the safety boats.

alistairSH 7y ago
For anybody who hasn't seen it, here's some video of "hanging off the side of the boat" in a trapeze... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8NwT9JBQJk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8NwT9JBQJk Perfectly normal on faster small-to-midsize boats (usually double-handed racing dinghies). The body weight and extra leverage helps keep the boat from capsizing. Some boats have only the crew in the trapeze, others have crew and captain.
- dustinmr 7y ago
  Well...since you're breaking out the examples despite my being coy for the non-sailors. Here's a video of the boats I was talking about. Trapeze sailing is really a blast and for the technically inclined, they are great boats: https://youtu.be/njSrgwlClNE https://youtu.be/njSrgwlClNE If those kinds of things grab your attention, foiling boats are a whole other level of tech and adrenaline. Since there's so many in the audience in the Bay Area, this is going on in SF next month and should be fabulous spectating. https://sailgp.com/races/san-francisco/ https://sailgp.com/races/san-francisco/ I expect the catamarans would fare worse than the 505s in a meet up with a whale.

alistairSH 7y ago

For anybody who hasn't seen it, here's some video of "hanging off the side of the boat" in a trapeze... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8NwT9JBQJk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8NwT9JBQJk Perfectly normal on faster small-to-midsize boats (usually double-handed racing dinghies). The body weight and extra leverage helps keep the boat from capsizing. Some boats have only the crew in the trapeze, others have crew and captain.

dustinmr 7y ago
Well...since you're breaking out the examples despite my being coy for the non-sailors. Here's a video of the boats I was talking about. Trapeze sailing is really a blast and for the technically inclined, they are great boats: https://youtu.be/njSrgwlClNE https://youtu.be/njSrgwlClNE If those kinds of things grab your attention, foiling boats are a whole other level of tech and adrenaline. Since there's so many in the audience in the Bay Area, this is going on in SF next month and should be fabulous spectating. https://sailgp.com/races/san-francisco/ https://sailgp.com/races/san-francisco/ I expect the catamarans would fare worse than the 505s in a meet up with a whale.