LEE BOW EFFECT

Of course, if you're sailing inland in zero current, and concentrate really hard, and put extra effort into hiking, so that you're pointing higher than your opposition but going the same speed as them, then you might just find yourself doing pretty well also. 

A speed or height advantage make things much easier. Speed AND height..... 

Maniac,

And again I agree with your last point - but that doesn't explain why in those circumstances one "feels" the lee bow effect.

Read any tactical book, they'll all explain about getting away in clean air at the start, and as I used to say during those heady days when people would queue for hours just to hear me speak on the subject, in a 60 strong start line, make any kind of mistake at the gun and potentially you can lose 59 places in one seconds hesitation, make that same mistake at the weather mark and you might not even lose one place.

So at the start there are two tacks you can take (assuming you can get out the back door of the pin end) there is say a 5 knot cross tide (And ignoring any time/tidal calculation you might have made re time of the beat and virtual position of the weather mark in relation to the end of the line you start at.) there is only 5knots true wind, so on the one tack lets say starboard with the tide going right to left across the course, with the water heading your way you'll be going down tide at five knots and <insert appropriate tide v wind calculation to establish boat speed over the water> say six knots over the water, whereas on the other tack you'll be maintaining station over the bottom but making windward ground at <insert calculation of combined forces of five knots tide and five knots wind, say nine knots, so those elements of the fleet that have taken the down tide tack first will be travelling faster over the bottom sideways, but slower through the water toward the weather mark than the boats that take the uptide tack initially, they move slower sideways over the bottom but make ground to weather and over the water faster, so at the half way mark are closer to their final destination.

OK, logic says yeah but.. the reverse will be true in the second leg, but hey you're a tactical racer, where would you rather be at the half way mark? And how many races have you ever experienced where conditions remain exactly constant throughout an entire beat, never mind the whole race.

Sure in deep water Ocean racing with miles of mind numbing boredom going on, it may make no odds, but this is about the cut and thrust of small boat tactical division by error and he who makes least wins..

I know what I'd do.