Velocitek

Congratulations to Velocitek Pro Team members USA751 Quantum Racing for their victory in the 2008 Melges 24 North Americans!

Here's what Quantum Racing Tactician, Scott Nixon had to say about the role played by the Velocitek SC-1 in their outstanding performance...

"We relied on the Velocitek SC-1 to help us determine how much current we were sailing in. Since the SC-1 accurately shows the direction that the boat is traveling, rather than where the bow is aimed, we could determine if the current was pushing us to the lay lines or holding us off. This feature was key to helping us win the North Americans on a very tricky Chesapeake Bay with lots of shifts, strong currents, and tough competition." - Scott Nixon, Tactician, USA751

Annapolis, MD – Day 2 of the Melges 24 North Americans. Unlike the last two days of brutally gusty conditions when Velocitek devices were logging maximum speeds north of 20 knots, day 2 was all about efficiency.

"I am continually impressed with the focus of the Melges sailors whether they are sailing at the top end of the wind range or in a standard sea breeze they are always focused on getting every last fraction of performance out of the boat. At Velocitek, we are more than happy to help in this quest to maximize boatspeed." - Alec Stewart, President and Founder, Velocitek

With $1,000 in cash on the line, the top Melges 24 teams were working hard to eke out that critical extra 10th of a knot in the 10-12 knot marginal planing conditions. In these challenging conditions the real-time performance feedback provided by the Velocitek SC-1 high-accuracy GPS speedometer proved to be extremely useful in getting the most out of the Melges 24's. At the end of the day the fastest boat proved to be West Marine Rigging/New England Ropes skippered by Chris Larson with a best 10 second average speed of 14.9 knots.

Full Results for the Velocitek Speed Challenge are available here.

Three years ago, Velocitek released the world’s first GPS sail training tool, creating what has become a whole new instrument category. Today Velocitek is shaking things up again by releasing its own race replay application called Velocitek SpeedPlay.

Velocitek SpeedPlay is fully integrated with Velocitek GPS devices to make the process of getting GPS data off a group of GPS devices and formatted into a replay as fast and convenient as possible. SpeedPlay allows users to download GPS data from up to 21 Velocitek GPS devices in one batch using USB hubs. Once the data has been downloaded race start and end times can be specified with a single mouse click and marks can be added using a convenient drag and drop interface.

As an added bonus, when connected to the internet, detailed, accurate map backgrounds are automatically imported into race replays from Microsoft Virtual Earth, providing an interested geographical context for any event. Watch the demo video below to see how this works or click here to download a 30 day free trial of Velocitek SpeedPlay.

• The prize for top speed achieved at this event is one thousand US dollars and will be presented at the final awards ceremony of the 2008 Melges 24 North American Championship.
  
  
• The Competition will take place at the 2008 Melges North American Championship on Oct. 30.
  
  
• Competitors’ top speeds must be presented to the Velocitek Speed Challenge Race official before 6:00pm on October 30th.
  
  
• Participants must register for the Velocitek $1000 speed challenge in order to be eligible for the competition. Registration will take place on Oct. 30 from 8am to 9am.
  
  
• Top speeds must be recorded between 9am and 5pm on the day of the event.
  
  
• Competitors must be sailing out of Eastport Yacht Club, the 2008 Melges 24 North American Championship venue.
  
  
• Competitors must use only equipment that is legal for racing in the Melges 24 class and be powered by wind only.
  
  
• Top speed is defined by the boat with the highest 10 second average speed (in the event of a tie the tie will be broken by the boat with the highest instantaneous recorded speed).
  
  
• Participating boats can use any Velocitek device to record their speed (for those without a Velocitek device a limited number of demo units can be reserved on a first come first served basis by filling out the online form at: store.velocitek.com/fastcash
  
  
• Top speeds will be checked with the Velocitek device best 10 second average speed recall. For the top three competitors Velocitek device data will be downloaded to a PC in order to verify the results.