Tom Kirkman wrote:
The higher the wind, the more power your sail will generate. Thus, going upwind gets easier and faster as the wind increases.
If you're still having trouble, furl a bit of the sail. You'll be surprised how much this may help you and in very high winds a partially furled sail will very likely perform better than one that is all out, where the amount of heel becomes detrimental to your progress. If you're having to sheet out constantly to maintain control, then you'd probably be better off furling a bit of sail and staying sheeted in. You can only use so much wind...
I cancelled one camping trip a couple years ago because the headwinds were too strong. As I tried to make forward progress, the bow of my 2011 AI was continually being driven below the waves preventing any real forward movement. Even furling the sail helped little. Finally, it became obvious that, in order to keep the bow on top of the waves, I needed to furl the sail so much, I could no longer make forward progress. Ball game over. I quit, went back to the marina, packed up and went home. You can read about it here
http://www.hobiecat.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=70&t=7276&start=375 Scroll down until you come to
My camping trip—I crashedEdit: "... I could no longer make forward progress." As I remember, I could make 1 mph, and that included pedaling. I wanted to go 15 mi & it was already afternoon. I could have gone to a bailout campsite 4 miles away. At 1 mph, that did not appeal to me, so I canceled.
Keith