Starting and light air - advice from the experts:

Here is what I picked up from coaches and sailors during the worlds. I will be focusing on all this stuff for the next few months:

You must be able to execute perfect starts and roll tacks in light air so that you can always sail in clear air. Otherwise you are screwed.

Light air modes upwind in the Radial: 

• mega vang vs. looser vang
• Marit sails with mega vang - Luther argues twist.
• Look at the sail and see the luff and knuckle, also see the leech.
• Vang bends mast which helps flatten the entry (luff) - it sort of opens the leech by pulling material forward except that it also pulls the boom down which tightens the leech.
• Vanging in light air is a compromise between flattening the luff and opening the leech.
• Once flow and pressure are established over the blades the mega vang may work great, but twist helps acceleration and it may make sense to ease vang to accelerate when you are slow.
• The most important factor to overall upwind speed in light air is applying pressure (leaning out) as much as possible without stalling. To do this you must have a good sense for flow over the blades. More flow means you can apply more pressure. Too much pressure on the rail means you heel to windward and lose your grip on the foils. 
• The bow knuckle helps establish flow and grip - so sit far forward. (over the daggerboard
• Ease-Hike-Trim - this applies in light air too. When you have slowed down, moving in to the boat very slowly allows you to heel the boat a bit without losing flow over the blades - ease main at the same time slowly to establish twist in the sail. When pressure starts to build again in the sail, apply pressure to the rail and slow squeeze the mainsheet in again.

Starting:

• Be able to hold flow over blades at very slow speed. The better you can do this the better you can hold your spot on the line without slipping sideways. That way you build your hole to leeward.
• Be bow even - not bow forward and not bow back
• To do a good acceleration you must have grip on foils (flow)
• Beat your neighbor - a good acceleration involves 1) bow down, 2) heel, 3) flatten
• Two good roll tacks after the start can help you build an awesome lane with clear air.
• Starting at the ends in light air is important - there is more wind at the ends.
• Starting at the ends also gives you a better sense of where you are on the line.
• The only time you can start in the middle is if 1) you are a lot faster than most of the fleet - especially the boats starting near you, and 2) you know exactly where you are on the line.
• Nick Thompson starts near the ends when his confidence about where he is on the line is low.
• Robert Scheidt starts a little farther away from the ends but he is extremely fast. - he was also OCS in one race in this series
• Starting in the middle when you have no line sight is risky in light air because: 1) it is hard to know if you are on the line so you risk being over early, or late, 2) the wind always fill in from one side or the other, 2) if you have a perfect start you might make it to an edge in clear air, if you don't you will either get bounced up the middle which is slow, or you will have to sail in a lot of dirty air to get to an edge
• If you start at an end and have a bad start - at least it is a little easier to get to clear air on an edge - which is where you want to be in light air.
• Erika Reineke was successfully using reverse line sights in this Worlds to get good starts (looking over your shoulder at the committee boat and a sight on land) - practice this. 
• Also practice looking at the eyes of the person sighting the line from the committee boat.

The Move:

• Accelerations are the key when the line is crowded.
• Bow down - heel the boat (step on the deck) - flatten hard and trim in.
• experiment with mainsheet and vang trim for this move
• Pre-flow helps your acceleration
• know how long it takes on any given race day for those conditions

Roll Tacks:

• move back in the boat when entering tack to maintain flow over the boat and foils all the way through the tack
• when jumping to the high side jump forward so that the bow is dug in to the water for flow over the boat.
• hit the perfect exit angle and flatten the boat coming up to close hauled when fast.
• be super smooth