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SCUTTLEBUTT 2441 - September 27, 2007Scuttlebutt is a digest of major sailing news, commentary, opinions,features and dock talk . . . with a North American focus. Scuttlebutt is distributed each weekday with the support of its sponsors. THE BILLIONAIRE AND THE MECHANIC After half a dozen years of trying to win the America's Cup and bring the oldest trophy in sport back to the San Francisco Bay, the gold collar-blue collar partnership of Larry Ellison and Norbert Bajurin - the billionaire and the mechanic - is going strong. Now into their third America's Cup challenge (they made it to the finals in 2003 and the semifinals in 2007), theirs was a marriage of convenience. In America's Cup racing, only clubs, not individuals, can challenge. In 2001, Ellison, billionaire CEO of Oracle Corporation and owner of Oracle racing team, wanted to challenge for the America's Cup. Ellison needed a partner. At that time Larkspur's Bajurin, owner of a radiator repair business in San Francisco's Western Addition, had just taken over as commodore of the Golden Gate Yacht Club. He was shocked when he opened the club's books and discovered $450,000 of debt. Bajurin had inherited a struggling yacht club and he needed a savior. In an October 2002 article for San Francisco Magazine, writer Julian Guthrie gave the newly-formed partnership the moniker "The Billionaire and The Mechanic." Guthrie wrote: "In this most unlikely of partnerships, the little club landed a sugar daddy and the corporate chieftain snagged a cheerleader. The prenuptial agreement had perks for both sides. The mechanic turned dealmaker steered the club from bankruptcy and onto center stage of the world's most elite nautical show. The technology titan pulled off a quiet coup. He found a way to set the rules, pick the players, run the show, and be a part of the team." -- by Jan Pehrson, Marin Independent Journal, read on: http://www.marinij.com/sports/ci_7005936 ISAF ROLEX WORLD SAILOR OF THE YEAR NOMINEES ISAF has announced the shortlisted nominees for the ISAF Rolex World Sailor of the Year Awards 2007. The criteria for nomination for the ISAF Rolex World Sailor of the Year Awards 2007 was "outstanding sailing achievement" in the period 1 September 2006 to 31 August 2007. ISAF received numerous nominations for sailors from across the world and in a variety of disciplines who met the criteria. The nominees are: Female Sarah Ayton, Sarah Webb & Pippa Wilson (GBR) - Yngling World Champs Marcelien De Koning & Lobke Berkhout (NED) - 470 World Champion title Claire Leroy (FRA) - #1 ranked ISAF Women’s World Match Race skipper Evi Van Acker (BEL) - #2 ranked ISAF Laser Radial skipper Male Ed Baird (USA) - Winning helmsman for America’s Cup defender Alinghi Franck Cammas (FRA) - Multiple world speed record holder Vincenzo Onorato (ITA) - Farr 40 World champ Robert Scheidt & Bruno Prada (BRA) - Star World Champs Rohan Veal (AUS) - International Moth World Champ The ISAF Member National Authorities (MNAs) - the national governing bodies for sailing around the world – now will vote for the one female nominee and one male nominee, with the winners to be announced at the ISAF Rolex World Sailor of the Year Awards Dinner and Presentation on Tuesday 6 November 2007 in Estoril, Portugal. -- Full details on nominees at http://www.sailing.org/20355.php * Curmudgeon’s Comment: Not to take anything away from Evi Van Acker, who had a tremendous year in winning seven of the ten ISAF Graded events she has entered, including three Grade 1 events, and successfully defended her European Laser Radial crown, but we can’t help but wonder if Anna Tunnicliffe (USA) should also be on the list. Tunnicliffe is the #1 ranked Laser Radial skipper, has beaten Van Acker in the last three World Championships, and won the Olympic Test Event in August, beating Van Acker by 17 points. When asked about her omission, Anna was predictably gracious, “If I had a vote, I would have cast it for Evi too. I retained my ranking, but Evi had a remarkable season, with the Worlds being the only event where she wasn’t in the top three.” Comments? WHO ARE THE TOP US YACHTIES IN 2007? US Sailing is now accepting nominations for its Rolex Yachtsman and Yachtswoman of the Year awards, widely acknowledged as the foremost individual sailing honors in the nation. Through November 30, 2007, every member of US Sailing may nominate the male and female sailor they think has turned in the most outstanding on-the-water performance during the 2007 calendar year. Last year’s winners were Jud Smith and Paige Railey. To insure that the most deserving people are nominated, Scuttlebutt is asking for suggestions on worthy candidates. If you know of someone who has had a heck of year, post your nomination here: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=5338 If you are a US Sailing member, and already know who you want to vote for, go to http://www.ussailing.org/awards/rolex/ MELGES 24 US NATIONALS SHOWCASE FOR TOP COMPETITORS Ullman Sails customers had outstanding finishes at last weekend’s highly competitive 2007 Audi U.S. Melges 24 National Championship in Detroit, Michigan. Scott Holmgren’s ‘Rosebud,’ helmed by Dave Ullman, finished second, followed closely by Alan Field’s ‘WTF’ in third place. The regatta, hosted by Bayview Yacht Club, was marked by shifty conditions on Lake St. Clair and tough competition from local Melges 24 competitors. Both Holmgren and Field competed with full inventories of Ullman Sails. When there is no room for error, top competitors keep relying on the ‘Fastest Sails on the Planet.’ Contact a local loft and visit http://www.ullmansails.com SAIL AMERICA GENERAL MEMBERS MEETING Sail America’s General Members Meeting on Oct. 5 in Annapolis, MD, will have a new meeting format with an in-depth interactive discussion about sailing’s current and future outlook, featuring viewpoints from industry leaders and an experienced economist. Gary Jobson, ESPN sailing analyst, author, lecturer and editor-at-large for Sailing World and Cruising World, will moderate the meeting and discussion at the Phillips Annapolis Harbor Restaurant on 12 Dock Street. Open to members and non-members alike, the Sail America General Members Meeting runs from 8:00 a.m.-10 a.m. and the free event includes a complimentary Continental Breakfast. “Our goal is to encourage a far greater degree of involvement and participation by our audience by structuring the meeting as a discussion, rather than a series of formal presentations,” said Sail America Executive Director Jonathan Banks. “We expect that Gary Jobson will stimulate a lively discussion with the panel of speakers, who will answer questions about topics, ranging from new membership services to the global economy.” The speakers and topics that will be covered at the Sail America General Members meeting include: > Membership Services and Benefits – Sail America Executive Director Jonathan Banks > Boat Show Plans – Sail America National Show Manager Kevin Murphy > Boating Industry Initiatives – NMMA President Thom Dammrich > Sailing Industry Trends – Beneteau USA President Wayne Burdick > International Opportunities – Ronstan International Managing Director Alistair Murray and Harken Commercial Manager Bill Goggins > Economic Trends – Investors Guaranty Fund, Ltd. Executive Vice President, CIO and Treasurer Dr. Douglas A. Love, also a member of the Executive Directorate. * If you are unable to attend, but would like to convey your comments, concerns, questions, please post them here: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=5339 VIDEO OF THE WEEK The eighty-nine entrants in the 4,200-mile Transat 6,50 Charente Maritime Bahia (Mini Tranast) are now at the half way point, having completed the first 1,100-mile leg from La Rochelle (France) to Madera (Portugal), and will begin the final 3,100-mile leg to Salvador de Bahia (Brazil) on October 6th. All competitors are sailing the Open 6.5, the smallest of the Open Class, ocean-racing sailboats. Within the race, there are two divisions of the class: production version and prototype version. The Minis look and perform like miniature Open 60 monohulls which is not surprising as much of the technology and materials deployed on the big Open 60s – twin rudders, canting keels, water ballast, carbon fiber – was first developed and prototyped on Minis. Likewise, many of the world’s top offshore racing skippers – Ellen MacArthur, Michel Desjoyeaux, Yves Parlier, Isabelle Autissier, Bernard Stamm, Jean Luc Van Den Heede, Bruno & Loick Peyron – began their sailing careers in Minis. Minis are to Open 60s what go karts are to Formula One racing. In baseball parlance, they are the farm leagues of Major League Baseball. This week’s 4:58 minute video is an exciting and informative presentation of the Mini Transat 650 campaign of Lucas Schroder, NED 633, who currently sits 5th in the Production class. Also, if you have a video you like, please send us your suggestions for next week’s Video of the Week. Click here for this week’s video: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/media/07/0924 * If you’ve never had a chance to sail on San Francisco Bay, to experience the current cone of Alcatraz Island, to short-tack the city front in search of tidal relief, to see the fog loom over the Golden Gate Bridge, or to take on the strong thermal winds, this week we have a 2:09 minute bonus video that was taken during this month’s Rolex Big Boat Series. And if you were at this year’s BBS, click thru to see if you made the final edit: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/media/07/0925 THE NOMINEES ARE IN – THE JUDGES ARE READY Every year, thousands of people head for the International Sailboat Show in Annapolis, Md. Among those thousands will be Sailing World's Boat of the Year (BOTY) judges. They'll attend the final two days of the show, where they'll get their first impressions of the 15 boats entered in this year's contest, and the following week, while all the boats are still conveniently located nearby, they'll test sail each nominee. Come the afternoon of Friday, October 12th, the judges will have chosen this year's BOTY winners. But before all this gets going, we thought we'd give you a peek inside the process. Our judges this year include two veterans, Alan Andrews, designer of rocket ships like Magnitude 80 and Alchemy, and Chuck Allen, head of North Sails One-Design New England. Joining the team for his first-ever judging stint is Barrett Holby, builder of the Quest 33 and other raceboats. – Sailing World, read on to see the list of 19 boats that are nominated: http://tinyurl.com/2jatv6 * Scuttlebutt will be at the show, and will walk the docks to see the list of 19 nominees. If you have a vested interest in any of the nominees, and you think that delivering a Pussers Rum drinkee to publisher Craig Leweck might enhance his opinion, come by the Harken Yacht Equipment booth on Thursday, October 4th from 2-4pm, where he would enjoy meeting you (and be happy to accept your offer of libation). OUTRAGED ... AGAIN Back in March, Scuttleblog posted a report regarding the list of suggested events that the US Olympic Sailing Committee had submitted to ISAF as their preferred choices for the 2012 Games. Following the ISAF directive to reduce the number of events from eleven down to ten, the US identified 8 of the 10 events that they felt most strongly about. When it was learned that the US list did not include multihulls, it did not take long for that community to stand up and scream. If the USOSC was feeling singled out back then, they now have company as England’s sailing federation, the Royal Yachting Association, has found itself amid a similar brouhaha. According to the Daily Sail subscription website, “Over the last few days cat sailors across the UK have been outraged after the discovery of two recent submissions by the RYA to ISAF for discussion at the November ISAF Annual Conference. The first submission fails to include the Tornado in a list of proposed classes at the 2012 Olympic Games and the second calls for the removal of multihull sailing at the ISAF Youth World Championships. Although the submissions are held on a public web-page and are viewable by all, it is felt by many to be proof of an anti-cat sentiment within the RYA as well as an unacceptable lack of discussion between the RYA and cat sailors.” * Scuttleblog report: http://tinyurl.com/2tlbq8 * Daily Sail story: http://tinyurl.com/2u6jjl * RYA submissions (103-07 & 129-07): http://tinyurl.com/2v2pfm BROKERAGE BONANZA Have you checked out JK3 Nautical Enterprises, Inc and their latest brokerage boats? We have the largest selection of used J/Boats on the market. Give our team a call and make an appointment to see these high quality listings. We currently have listed J/65 #2, 2-J/120's, J/109, J/100, J/29, 3-J/80's, along with numerous other makes and models. Our team of Jeff Brown, John Bohne, and Ken Bertino look forward to speaking with you and working with you. Give us a call at 619-224-6200, or take a look at our website at http://www.jk3yachts.com EVOLVING FOR THE FUTURE Porto Cervo, Sardinia, Italy (September 26, 2007) With the dogs well and truly blown off the chains, racing at the Rolex TP52 Global Championship was very sensibly cancelled Wednesday, with gusts in the Straits of Bonifacio clocking 50 knots and a forecast of 30 knots over the entire available race area. The weather forecast for Thursday calls for winds decreasing to the 15-20 knot range. On Tuesday night, the owners gathered for the TP52 Class Association annual meeting. Among the measures that were adopted: * Changes to the byelaws and rules were approved that will allow further discussion with ISAF to enable the TP52 to become a recognized Class. * Taking steps to fully manage its commercial and image rights for the benefit of owners, sponsors, and event organizers. * Initiating a yearlong research process into the updating of the TP52 box rule, with a view toward establishing a revised version for the next ten years. * Lifting the restriction on the eligibility of helmsman. The Class rules will become Open on this point, although there will be a Corinthian Driver category within Class competitions. -- Complete report: http://www.regattanews.com/pressrelease.asp?pid=1736&lang=1 Current Provisional Standings (Top 5 of 15) 1. Artemis - Torbjorn Tornqvist, SWE, 6-1-1-2-4, 14 2. Patches - Eamon Conneely IRL, 1-5-9-8-1, 24 3. Mean Machine - Peter de Ridder, MON, 7-4-6-3-6, 26 4. Stay Calm - Stuart Robinson, GBR, 12-7-2-4-3, 28 5. Windquest - Doug DeVos, USA, 8-6-5-1-11, 31 Complete results: http://www.rolextp52globals2007.com/results07/tp52_1.htm SAILING SHORTS * Applications for the 2008 US Elite Youth Development Sailing Team are now being accepted. Launched by US Sailing in January 2007, the Elite Youth Development Team was created for sailors under the age of 21 who have been identified as future Olympic prospects. Made up of the country’s top youth sailors in the Laser and Laser Radial classes, the team provides its members with national coaching, educational, administrative, and financial-support structure. To help these young athletes gain more sailing experience at the highest levels, team members travel to major international regattas worldwide and are supported by elite-level coaches. -- Full details: http://www.ussailing.org/pressreleases/2007/08EYDTapplications.asp * BoatUS Foundation’s annual Boating Safety Grant program is making $50,000 available in its latest grant cycle, providing up to $4,000 each to local community organizations and non-profit groups for programs designed to help make our waterways safer. -- Full details: http://www.boatus.com/news/releases/2007/september/grant.asp * Cannes, France (September 26, 2007) With the Mistral blowing 40 knots just to the west, and a strong downpour of rain and a swirling wind blowing between 10 and 25 knots and shifting from Northwest to Northeast and back, the committee decided to keep the fleet at the dock during the second scheduled race day at the 12 Meter World Championship. -- Current results: http://www.yachtclubdecannes.com/12results.html LETTERS TO THE CURMUDGEON Letters selected for publication must include the writer's name, and may be edited for clarity or simplicity (letters shall be no longer than 250 words). You only get one letter per subject, so give it your best shot, don't whine if others disagree, and save your bashing and personal attacks for elsewhere. As an alternative, a more open environment for discussion is available on the Scuttlebutt Forum. -- Scuttlebutt Letters: editor@sailingscuttlebutt.com -- Scuttlebutt Forum: http://sailingscuttlebutt.com/forum * From John Turvill: As a Brit that has spent many years in the US, I pay attention when someone implies that the trans-atlantic divide might vanish, regardless of the timeframe! As an erstwhile geologist, I feel the current situation in the Atlantic was misrepresented in your headline “Atlantic Ocean Disappearing’ (in Issue 2439). While it may well disappear a couple of hundred million years from now, for now it is actually growing wider. Since the order of magnitude is an inch a year, I don’t think the record books should be too concerned. For the Atlantic to shrink, the seafloor has to go somewhere. The Pacific is a role model for the implications of this: broadly, seafloor is flowing under the West coast of South America (volcanoes and earthquakes) and sliding along the coast of North America (earthquakes). So regardless of any cultural issues, geographically the US and Europe are very gently drifting apart, and any coming together will likely be somewhat more disruptive. * From Justin Scott (Pres., Viper 640 Class Association): In Issue 2440, Peter Norton expressed a valid concern that new sportboats in the 20 foot range might cannibalize from existing keelboat fleets such as the Sonar and the J/22. I thought it might be useful to relate the Marblehead experience. The Viper 640 (a high performance, 3-person sportsboat) has grown from 6 boats to 18 in the past two and a half years. So far, not one of the new owners has come from any of the existing One-Design fleets. The new skippers have all been sailors of various accomplishments living locally who, for one reason or another, had dropped out of the competitive racing scene. The Viper re-ignited their interest in racing One-Design again. The Viper has also introduced many new crews to the One Design racing series run by the Marblehead Racing Association. All together, the Viper has resulted in over 70 new participants and members of MRA who were not racing with us three years ago. Several of these crew members were racing in those very same Sonar Worlds last weekend that Peter referred to. The 20-foot sportboat may be exactly the shot in the arm that the One-Design scene in this country needs. I hope that Buttheads will visit the Viper at The Annapolis Boat Show on Pier H as well as the SB3 and Melges 20. * From Ron Rosenberg, McLube: (re: McLube on sandpaper application) While I certainly would never question the "instinct" of Mr. Priest (letter in Issue 2440), I would like to share a feature of McLube that is so different than any other lubricant and mold release currently on the market. When McLube Sailkote is properly applied to any clean, dry surface (including, but not limited to sandpaper), within seconds it dries completely and bonds to the desired surface. Once McLube has been properly applied, has dried and bonded, it will not transfer to any other surface. The fact that McLube's dry film bonds so tenaciously is precisely why it works so well on sandpaper. The general rule of thumb when applying McLube is that just a little McLube goes a very long way... there is no need to over-apply McLube for any application. I encourage all the ‘buttheads to check out our "How to apply" section of the website for more specific instructions. Lastly, if anyone would like to further discuss any uses of McLube, please contact me directly at mailto:Ron@McLube.com CURMUDGEON’S OBSERVATION Figuratively speaking, when the blind lead the blind, get out of the way. Special thanks to Ullman Sails and JK3 Nautical Enterprises. |
