SCUTTLEBUTT No. 623 - August 11, 2000

HIGH PERFORMANCE

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SANTA BARBARA TO KING HARBOR RACE
The annual 81-mile Santa Barbara to King Harbor Race last weekend was Mr. Toad's Wild Ride for 125 entrants. Just about everyone experienced knockdowns, ripped spinnakers, or some sort of damage when the race switched gears from the doldrums behind Anacapa Island to a fast and windy 25-30 knot run to Redondo Beach. Many racers reached their personal best in speeds; the Henderson 30 hit 18 knots and a Farr 40 reported doing 20 knots.

Two Roland 36 catamarans were unofficial racers when organizers refused their entries for lack of safety equipment. One of them later flipped in heavy seas and its crew was rescued by the sled VICKI. At least one dismasting was reported. Some damage was reported even before the race started. The 70 foot GRAND ILLUSION suffered major keel damage off of Conception when they hit a whale while surfing downwind on their way to Santa Barbara.

PENDRAGON 4, John MacLaurin's beautiful Davidson 52 swept the honors in the big boat class (ULDB A) finishing in 7 hours and 7 minutes; followed by Medicine Man. In ULDB B, Mike Campbell beat out 14 other boats including three other Schock 40s to take first place on CINCOS. The yellow Schock CITA was winning the class hands down until their rudderpost gave it up. A Kiwi 35 called MUFASSA (What does that mean?) out of South Coast Corinthian YC took ULDB C followed by the Henderson 30 from Santa Barbara BUZZ with owners John Bishop and Doug Deaver.

Lots of Olson 30s fought for ULDB D class with Larry Spencer's BLUE STAR taking the trophy. The Schock 35 Class had 11 entries and MINNESOTA FAST (Jim Maslon DRYC) finished a little over a minute in front of RESTLESS (Tom Parker SBYC).

The J-160 STARK RAVING MAD from Newport (James Madden and Keith Lorence) took first in PHRF A; JAMES EARL, Bill Daffron's Dencho 33 from Ventura YC took first in PHRF B. Two boats from South Coast Corinthian took PHRF C & D; Al Berg on Whisper and Bill Barnard on his Cal 30-3 ENAMORADA. The ORCA trimaran class was won by Boyd Schultz of Cal Yacht Club on BETHANY and the Cruising Class was won by Gerald Sobel's SHPRITZ, the highest rater in the race at 264. -Jane Watkins

Complete results: http://www.sbyc.org

LETTERS TO THE CURMUDGEON (leweck@earthlink.net)
Letters selected to be printed are edited for clarity, space (250 words max) or to exclude unfounded speculation or personal attacks. This is not a chat room - you only get one letter per subject, so give it your best shot and don't whine if others disagree.

-- From Peter Dreyfuss - I have to say with a bit of prejudice that part of the reason that America's Europe (Becker-Dey) and Laser (Myrdal) Olympic representatives are ranked lowest has to do with the fact that those are the most competitive classes. I am speaking not only in terms of talent, but in shear numbers. In the US, the Laser had so many competitors who wanted to compete at the Olympic Trials, that qualification events were needed. 32 US Lasers were at the closed-regatta Trials.... more than 120 tried to qualify, but didn't (me included)... now look at the 470 trials (9 men teams, 7 women teams)... Mistal (10 women)... and those were open regattas...

-- From Stephen Bailey (Re the new RRS) - The reason why there are fewer protests is because the competitors are much less sure of which side of the rules they are on now. The vast majority of the competitors out there know drastically less about the rules now than ever before. This also applies to protest committee members, so who wants to take the risk?

This is only partially a result of the new rules being new. I started racing in 1989, and within one year, I had a solid understanding of the rules. Furthermore, it was quite clear which rules everybody would know well, and which were obscure, and less likely to produce predictable on-the-water behavior.

The old rules side with the notion of crisp distinction between legal and illegal, where the new rules apply `reasonability' (a distant cousin of fairness) in the face of the assumption that boats just happen to be sharing the course and occasionally encounter one another by chance.

When you have two boats that want to occupy the same space, the distinction should be crystal clear about who gets it. Sailing is a game, and like all games, rules are what define the edges. The new rules do not define crisp edges and so make the outcome of many moves in the game really unpredictable.

The reason why there will not be substantive changes for April 2001 is exactly what Peter Isler was lamenting---there have been ongoing, substantive changes to fill gaping holes throughout the current quadrennium.

-- From Harry Pattison - How is it possible that Santa Barbara to King Harbor race officials could deny Al Schultz's protest asking for redress for stopping to pick up people in the water needing help? I wasn't present on the boat, or at the protest hearing, but it is my understanding they disallowed the protest on the grounds that the rescued sailors were not officially in the race. Not only does this fly in the face of human character and dignity, but it is also in direct violation of our own sailing rules.

The very first rule in the book is 1.1 and I quote "Helping Those in anger - A boat or competitor shall give all possible help to any person or vessel in danger."

Then rule 62.1 says "A request for redress shall be based on a claim that a boat's finishing place in a race or series has, through no fault of her own, been made significantly worse by (c) giving help (except to herself or her crew) in compliance with rule 1.1"

There is nothing about the people needing help being in the race, and heaven help us if that is ever what it comes to! First hand reports from the rescued sailors say that several other boats sailed right by with no offer of assistance during the time that "Vicki" was getting sails down and working to get back to them, and well before "Vicki" was actually able to render assistance. Let's hope that the race committee reconsiders!

From Jane Watkins - As a staunch advocate of the Corinthian spirit and as past Chair (three years) of the Santa Barbara to King Harbor Race, I literally fell off my chair when reading Ben Mitchell's letter yesterday. I could not believe that VICKI had not received redress for rescuing three sailors in those dangerous conditions. The answer from KHYC appears to be that no one from VICKI showed up for the redress hearing. In fact, quite a few other boats received redress because they came upon the upside down hulls later and dropped their sails to look for survivors only to find out from the Coast Guard that VICKI had already made the heroic rescue.

Looking at 63.3(b) I don't really see that they had to attend the meeting for the committee to be able to make the obvious decision. In addition, rule 64.2 states "when the protest committee decides that a boat is entitled to redress it shall make as fair an arrangement as possible for all boats affected, whether or not they asked for redress."

So it seems like VICKI should have been given redress even without asking. At any rate, this needs to be fixed. We ALL owe Al, Mark, Ben, Chris, Tiny and the rest of the VICKI crew our gratitude for their rescue efforts in this incident. They deserve a lot more than a trophy, gold halos all around, you guys are great.

-- From Whit Davis: My mind is not confused by facts:
1. I did the Molokai Destruction Derby in 82 and have the T-shirt to prove it.
2. I have been sailing since 1941 and ocean racing since 1948.
3. I am an IOR, IMS, Star, Etchells, and Melges 24 Measurer and have measure to the Storm Trysail, CCA, 12-Meter rules.
4. I am a US Sailing Senior Judge and Umpire.

I note with pride that two yachts turned around and gave assistance to another yacht in distress. They were granted redress, which I believe they deserved. You may argue the exact amount but if I am in trouble I want to know that my fellow competitors can come to my assistance and not loose out in the race.

I have read Ben Mitchell's account of the Santa Barbara Race and their rescue of people on a catamaran that were in serious trouble. I also read that the race officials refused to grant redress in this situation. Again I am not confused by facts!

In my opinion, if the facts are close to what Ben said, the "Race Officials" should be charged under rule 69, Gross Misconduct, for bringing the sport into disrepute.

-- From Mark Folkman - With all due respect, I think Ben Mitchell is a bit off base with his bashing of the Santa Barbara to King Harbor Race officials. I don't think there was an official, yacht club member, racer, or anyone else involved with the race who did not fully appreciate what the crew of "Vicki" had done. The crew of the catamaran was in serious trouble and the assistance provided by "Vicki" as well as several other yachts was outstanding. Vicki, along with three other yachts, did file for redress at the end of the race and I led the committee which had the interesting job of deciding how much redress should be given.

My committee spent 4 hours that day investigating the time lost by each of the boats and assessing the time correction to be given. We gave 22 minutes redress to "Mar Caballo". We gave 13 minutes redress to "M Project" who investigated another catamaran that had been dismasted. We called for any representative from the yacht "Vicki" no fewer than 5 times during that 4-hour period and no one responded. Unable to clearly establish the amount of time to give in redress we were forced to deny the request. It should be noted that the time requested by "Vicki" would have resulted in their winning of the race. This may have been the appropriate outcome but with no representative to help the committee establish the facts there was little the committee could do.

CURMUDGEON'S COMMENT: This is obviously a very emotional issue, because the email I received from Ben Mitchell, Harry Pattison, Jane Watkins and Mark Folkman were all well over our 250-word limited, but all were (necessarily) pruned to those guidelines.

-- From Stewart Carter Director, Pacific Winds Mexico S.A. de C.V. Mazatlan, Sinaloa, Mexico (re the quick stop MOB recovery method - edited to our 250-word limit) - (I find that new students can easily grasp the concept of sailing reach to reach, as in the quick turn method, by the second day of instruction. They can reliably recover an object after 3 or 4 practice runs. These same students are baffeled by the dynamics of the quick stop method. Possibly because they have just spent two days learning about basic sail trim and are now being told to disregard what they have learned. The small keelboats used for entry level classes can also exhibit some disconcerting handling idiosyncrasies while sailing around the compass with the main trimmed hard and the jib back winded half the time.

At a US Sailing instructor certification seminar in Berkeley several years ago at least 30% of the instructor candidates had problems driving the quick stop method in J/24's. The average experience level for these instructor canidates was 30 years of sailing. It has been explained to me that the quick stop method was adopted as the prefered recovery method by US Sailing because it worked well in big boats, in heavy weather and, it kept the vessel close to the person in the water. This does not seem to me as though it should be the primary criteria when teaching new sailors how to get someone back in the boat. Most of these people will likely be spending there first few years sailing in smaller vessels in light to moderate conditions.

-- From Aileen Clarke - I must correct Rick Peters comment that he has never seen or heard of a woman sailing a finn. Valerie Foster (USA) and I (CAN) raced a Finn in Bermuda Race Week in 1965 or 1966. I've raced many dinghies, including international 14's, and found the Finn one of the most forgiving. My son, Richard Clarke, won the recent Finn N.A.s in Toronto, without having to sail the last race. His sister, Felicity Clarke, raced his Finn in the last race. She finished 3rd, beating Mark Herrman, defending champion, and Paul Henderson, President of the ISAF, who represented Canada in the Finn Class in the 1968 Olympics. Her result did not count in the overall results.

The fact remains that women raced Finns 30+ years ago and still do!! I do not suggest that it be an open class in the Olympics, I would reserve that for the 470 class and object to the innuendo that such a decision might result in marital or extra- marital discord.

CALENDAR OF MAJOR EVENTS
August 15-20: Danish Open, Swedish Match Grand Prix Sailing Tour, Royal Danish YC and Skovshoved YC. http://www.danishopen.dk

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KENWOOD CUP
(Kenwood Cup organizer Ken Morrison travels the globe to preach the goodness of his regatta, which gives him a unique perspective on the state of big-boat racing. Following is an excerpt from a story by Ivor Wilkins on the Quokka website.)

This is the 22nd year Morrison has run the Hawaii-based regatta. He is a tireless campaigner for the event, spending six or seven months of every year flying to other events to preach the Kenwood Cup gospel, urging owners and sailors to come and enjoy the "winds of paradise."

On average, he racks up 100,000 air miles a year. This year, he officially passed the million-air-miles mark, earning lifelong Premier Executive status with United Airlines. "In 22 years, I have looked to see who my customers are," he said. "When IOR started to wane and IMS started to rise, my gut feeling was that we had better embrace IMS quickly, or we would be in trouble. That is why I ran the two fleets in 1990.

"For the past couple of years, I have been trying to attract the one-design groups here, because I see them as the growth area in offshore racing." This year, there were four Farr 40s and six J/105s, in both cases fewer than expected. The Farr 40s had a Pacific Championship running within the Kenwood Cup, but when the Australian dollar took a dive, six boats from that fleet bailed out. - Ivor Wilkins, for Quokka Sports

Full story: http://www.quokkasailing.com/stories/08/SLQ__0809_s_kenwood_WFC.html

PREVIEW OF COMING ATTRACTIONS
http://www.oracleracing.com/

THE CURMUDGEON'S OBSERVATIONS
When trouble arises and things look bad, there is always one individual who perceives a solution and is willing to take command. Very often, that individual is a half-wit.