You are up late!
You are in good company being an acoustic engineer in this fleet.
"High Performance Sailing" by Frank Bethwaite is a good start. The first third about the weather is v hard.
"Aerohydrodynamics of Sailing" by Tony Marchaj may be out of print. but ebay may provide.
The other thing to do is to ask people you respect questions and try to work it all out for yourself. Watch out though: There are many people (some of whom are v good sailors) who have completely the wrong idea about how sailing boats work! The giveaway is if they give you an explanation that can't possibly be true. Your challenge is to work backwards from the thing they are telling you to the thing they observed, and then work out what is really happening.
In the meantime, here is one for you:
Lee bow efffect.
This has nothing to do with 'lee-bowing' someone. This is when you are beating against the tide, but the tide is about 45degs fromthe wind. That is, on one tack it is pushing you down, but on the other tack it is pretty much on the nose. If there was no tide, then clearly you should do your normal angle. Lee bow theory says you should pinch a bit so the tide is on your lee bow when you are punching the tide, that way the tide is pushing you up to the buoy. Opinions differ about this
http://www.ussailing.org/member/library/wiodcurrent.htm . Dave Perry (author of "winning in one designs" says no :
http://www.j105.org/docs/noleebow.pdf.
Anyway, my experience says it certainly seems to be there, and many people swear by it. I have an explanation which is quite boring. What's your theory?
