Frank,
There are three way to turn a boat. Rudder is the
most common. You can also steer by the sails.
Over the trimming the main moves the CE aft of the
CLR causing the boat to turn upwind. You can also
steer by heeling. Heeling the boat to starboard
will cause it to turn to port. Better dinghy
sailors figure this out and can almost tack the
boat without the use of the rudder.
In your situation, you have two working against
one. Your bowman should be looking for puffs and
calling them back. As the puff comes on, ease the
traveler, and hike harder. As the boat
accelerates, trim. Ease, hike, trim.
S.

"Frank Boettcher" wrote
in message
...
:
: Question for you technical sailers
:
: So I did a regatta this weekend (sorry, no pics,
weather was terrible
: and I didn't even get the camera out) on a
friends brand new Beneteau
: 343.
:
: Conditions were strong winds with frequent gusts
(15-18 with gust to
: 25). Seems like no matter what sail set or reef
selection we chose
: the boat had a really bad tendency to round up
on gusts. Once it
: started up, helm became useless with no feel.
Since the boat was new
: to the owner and none of the crew of four had
sailed together we were
: not sure if it was us (probably) or the boat.
:
: We had a crew member assigned to flagging the
main upon command when
: the gust came up.
:
: Admittedly, most of the time we were probably
carrying too much sail.
: It was a race, after all.
:
: This is a boat of the modern thinking of great
big mainsails. we were
: carrying a 150 with roller furling and
experimented with taking it in
: with limited sucess. also reefed the main once,
also limited success.
:
: So what do you do first to control this? reef
the main with full jib;
: reef the jib with full main? reef both at
simultaneously? Quicker
: anticipation between the helmsman and the crew
member assigned to
: dumping the main?
:
: We did take third in class, but this boat can do
much better in light
: air.
:
: Frank