Anyone have experience flying their cruising spinnaker without the main sail to improve downwind performance? Stress-wise it shouldn't be any worse than sailing under genoa alone. The advantage I see is the main is no longer blocking the spinnaker. The disadvantages are in dousing the spinnaker (nothing to block the wind) and possible stability problems. What about reefing the main to allow more wind to get to the spinnaker?
I searched but didn't see anything else written about it here.
I do that occasionally, but I find that I prefer trimming the main (not reefed) to a point more appropriate for a reach. I feel like I get a bit extra power by having the main up, but I have no scientific or competitive data to support this claim (which has never stopped me before).
If I'm going downwind I'll run them wing-and-wing with the spinnaker poled out with the whisker pole.
Jon and Ted,
Thanks for the suggestions, I didn't think of either. Both are setups to try.
Kyle