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2007 
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Well, here we are again, the 3rd and final year of my campaign and as usual there are heaps of things to do before sailing to France for the first race. For the last week I have been working at Kemp sail loft making my mainsail, with more than a little help from the pros! It has been really satisfying to go through the design process with Mark, Rob and Matt and then go on to stitch it all together along with help from Toby and the loft team. This way I've been able to make some changes as I'm going and hopefully that means we've got a really nice all round sail that benefits from the knowledge gleaned from last seasons racing.
Andrew building his 2007 mainsail at Kemp Sails The Classe mini have made a few changes to the rules this year, none of which are drastic, but the most irritating is the change of maximum distance between stanchions. This may be reasonable on a large racing yacht, but when your boat measures 6.5 x 3m, and you're asked to add another stanchion or two, it's quite a tricky little operation to carry out! Other than the rule change conformations, Domosofa.com is out of the water and is going through a general refit, with a few changes here and there based on my experiences from last season which I hope will make boat speed a little higher as well as improve on general handling. This year Classe Mini have also allowed the use of lithium ion batteries on the boats. They are much lighter than wet lead batteries and have a deeper cycle, but of course they cost a fortune and as all the top boats will have them, it is an essential for me too if we want to remain competitive. I am a little disappointed with this decision from the class, as batteries are essentially a non sailing related item and can only be afforded by those with a large budget, which could seriously handicap the self funded campaigners. The class maintains that for example, high tech mainsail laminates can not be used in order to keep the costs down and the boats relatively affordable, but this new decision clearly goes against that fundamental principle. Oh well! some good news though, Musto are supplying me with all new kit this year from their new ocean range, developed directly with the input of the Volvo Ocean guys, [the nutters], so this high tech gear is going to seriously help me in the battle to stay dry and on top form for the early season races and I'm really proud that they are continuing to support my campaign. Also on the 'up' front, I have successfully been granted positions on all four races I entered this year as well as the transat. This might not sound that remarkable, but due to the massive over subscription for this seasons races, (over 100% in some cases), the Classe Mini introduced a new system whereby you had to list your preferred races in order. If each particular race was still oversubscribed after this it went to a lottery. There are a number of top boats that have missed the entry for some important races, and no doubt they are hugely frustrated by the results. So, I'm really getting fired up as the season draws close and can't wait to get domosofa.com on the water and myself into practice mode. I intend on keeping more of a video diary this year which will be downloadable as a podcast, so keep an eye out for that. The season race schedule is as follows... 1) May 6th - 8th 2) May 18th - 20th 3) June 7th - 10th 4) July 22nd - August 1st 5) Start on September, 16th
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