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SCUTTLEBUTT No. 606 - July 17, 2000SNIPE NATIONALSGeorge Szabo, sailing with Carol Newman Cronin, wins the Snipe Nationals for the forth straight year. On the final day, we all sat on shore until 3 PM, only to head out for 2 races in 5-10 knots, very shifty and mentally draining. The races saw lead changes all around the course, and were nail-biters from start to finish. Top 4 teams qualify for 2001 World Championship in Punta del Este, Uruguay. - Ned Jones HEINZERLING TROPHY (6 races, 1 drop): 1 George Szabo & Carol Cronin (17.75) 2 Bill Hardesty & Carol Merriman (20.75) 3 Chris Snow & Yumio Dornberg (30) 4 Hal Gilreath & Ned Jones (32) 5 Kevin Funsch & Watt Duffy (32.75) Complete Results: http://www.sailoklahoma.com/snipe14/daily_results.htm SWEDISH MATCH TOUR Swedish skipper Magnus Holmberg and his Stora Enso Team have won the Trofeo Challenge Roberto Trombini, in Marina de Ravenna, Italy, sixth event on the Swedish Match Grand Prix Sailing Tour. On a sparkling day off Ravenna, on Italy's Adriatic coast, the Swede first demolished Italy's Nicola Celon 3 - 0 in the semi-finals, before taking the final against Danish skipper Sten Mohr 2 - 1. Holmberg has dominated this event since it started, leading at the end of every day, and sailing with a confidence that has been absent from his game in the earlier events on the Tour. Describing the conditions for the day the winner said, "it was nice conditions, it was very shifty, tactically it was very difficult, but all week Stefan Rahm has done just a fantastic job with the tactics, and we've felt pretty confident with what we are doing." This victory lifts Holmberg from sixth to fifth place on the Tour scoreboard, while the defeated finalist, Sten Mohr also moved up a place from fifth to fourth. Although Tour leader, Frenchman Bertrand Pace, finished way down the leaderboard in eighth place, he maintains his lead in the series, with just two more events to go. The seventh Tour regatta is the Danish Open in Copenhagen next month, with the finale in Bermuda at the end of October. - John Roberson FINAL RESULTS: 1. Magnus Holmberg (Sweden), 2. Sten Mohr (Denmark), 3. Peter Holmberg (U.S. Virgin Islands), 4. Nicola Celon (Italy), 5. Peter Gilmour (Australia), 6. Jochen Schumann (Germany), 7. Ed Baird (U.S.A.), 8. Bertrand Pace (France), 9. Kelvin Happap (New Zealand), 10. Cameron Appleton (New Zealand), 11. Georgi Shaidouko (Russia), 12. Federico Strocchi (Italy). OVERALL (Swedish Match Tour points after six events): 1. Bertrand Pace (France) 98 pts, 2. Dean Barker (New Zealand) 93, 3. Peter Gilmour (Australia) 71, 4. Sten Mohr (Denmark) 50, 5. Magnus Holmberg (Sweden) 47, 6. Luc Pillot (France) 40, 7. Peter Holmberg (U.S. Virgin Islands) 31, 8. Cameron Appleton (New Zealand) 20. Website: http://www.sports.com/sailing NYYC RACE WEEK AT NEWPORT In stark contrast to fighting Saturday's furious wind and chop, 34 IMS yachts bobbed for 3 ? hours Sunday on Rhode Island Sound, waiting for any kind of breeze that would allow the start of a third race in the Rolex IMS Offshore World Championship series. Part of the New York Yacht Club (NYYC) Race Week at Newport presented by Rolex, the Worlds are being held simultaneously with PHRF racing for the New York Yacht Club Trophy. Racing began Saturday and highlights the first part of the NYYC's unique split-format regatta, which features One-Design racing later this week. The IMS fleet eventually started and completed a single race after the race committee moved to find wind, repositioning the course north of the Newport Bridge on Narragansett Bay where the 51-boat PHRF fleet had been relishing superb racing conditions since the daily start time of 11:00 a.m. In fact, the PHRF boats handily completed three races by the end of the day, allowing new leaders to rise to the top in six classes. Turning in a stellar performance in PHRF Class F was Moondance, a Swan 48 skippered by Donald Opatrny of Greenwich, Conn. Moondance won all three races to post six points to Peter Brinckerhoff's Hooligan, an Evelyn 42 out of Riverside, Conn. In class E, Newporter Tim Woodhouse's Rumours, a Thompson 35, which had broken its boom yesterday and suffered five points for not finishing the race, redeemed itself with finish positions of 2-1-1 today. In scoring, however, it still falls behind leader Wairere, a Thomson 30 owned by Chris Bouzaid of Jamestown, which won yesterday's race and posted a 1-2-2 today After tomorrow's distance race, the PHRF fleet will top off its regatta with around-the buoys racing on Tuesday while the IMS fleet finishes up its overnight distance race on Tuesday and concludes the Rolex IMS Offshore World Championship with around-the buoys racing on Wednesday. Rolex IMS Offshore World Championship 2000 Bruce Nelson's design adjustments continued to pay dividends for the Nelson Marek 43 Vim, in the third race of the Rolex IMS Offshore World Championship 2000. After notching up two race wins in yesterday's extreme conditions of 25 knot breezes on a vicious six-foot swell, she was equally successful at the opposite end of the range - six knots in the flat water of Narragansett Bay. - Barby MacGowan CLASS LEADERS: IMS Racer Division - Vim 3, Craig Speck, IMS Cruiser/Racer Division - Mascalzone Latino, Vincenzo Onorato, PHRF D - Courageous, 12m, Edgar Cato, Newport, PHRF E - Wairere, Thom30, Chris Bouzaid, PHRF F - Moondance, Swan 48-2, Donald Opatrny, PHRF G - Troubador, Exp 37, Morton Weintraub, PHRF H - Avalanche, J/105, Craig Albrecht, Glen Head, PHRF J - 1.Hustler, J 29 MH, John Esposito. Complete results: http://www.nyyc.org OFFSHORE Gill have been the market leaders in boating boots for many years. Whilst performance marine clothing has developed in leaps and bounds over the years: boots had not until now! During the past two years Gill has worked closely with WL Gore to develop a completely new and revolutionary marine boot. Style 910 Features include: waterproof, breathable, and light weight. Cordura and Kevlar tough upper. Unique rear lacing system. Superman grip with wrap around 3D sole unit. Reflective strip near to the ankle support. No offshore sailor should leave home without a pair. For more information: http://www.gillna.com VOLVO OCEAN RACE Oslo, Norway - Knut Frostad, a veteran of two Whitbread Round the World Races, announced yesterday there will be a Norwegian entry on the starting line of the Volvo Ocean Race in Southampton 23rd September 2001. This is the third Norwegian entry in the history of the race, the latest being Innovation Kvaerner '97-'98, skippered by Knut Frostad. The management teams of Kvaerner Innovation Whitbread Team have joined Knut Frostad yet again, and are well on their way with the preparations for the world's premier ocean race. The post-analysis of the Kvaerner Innovation Whitbread Team Campaign made a good foundation for the new syndicate, and there is a strong and enthusiastic project organisation backing the new campaign. The team will build two new Volvo Ocean 60s to make the most out of the two-boat training period prior to and during the race itself, and the team will focus a lot of time and resources on sail-design and sail-testing. Several of the sailors from the Kvaerner Innovation Whitbread Team Campaign will be among the crew. Ed Baird (USA), Skipper of the Americas Cup entry Young America and tactician on Innovation Kvaerner will be involved in the new campaign. The new campaign has a total budget of US$ 14 million. The Kvaerner Innovation Whitbread Team Campaign had an estimated marketing value of US$ 52,5 million, which indicates a good return on investment for the sponsors. Boat construction will commence this autumn. Both new boats will be used in two-boat testing from the day they hit the water, with the new crew in place. The teams training base will most likely be located in Southern-Europe, or on the East Coast of the USA, during the winter of 2002. The last period before the race, the team plans to spend in Norway with Sandefjord or Fredrikstad as two likely candidate cities. VOR website: http://www.VolvoOceanRace.org THE RACE * Loick PEYRON will be participating in THE RACE / La Course du Millenaire as co-skipper of the maxi catamaran currently known under her provisional name as Code One. This Gilles OLLIER design (sister ship of the catamaran Club Med), which is in the final stages of construction at the MULTIPLAST yard in Vannes should be launched in the beginning of September. The international but predominantly French crew will be made up of experienced and complementary sailors stemming from all sectors of top class sailing (Open, Whitbread, America1s Cup and Olympics). It is already known that the role of film producer aboard imposed by the regulations of The Race has been entrusted to Stephane Peyron (with already more than 50 films to his credit). For the first time together racing on the same boat the three PEYRON brothers will be making an attempt on the West-East Atlantic record (New York - The Lizard), at the same time as qualifying the boat for The Race. The identity of the co-skipper and the name of the boat will be unveiled at the end of the round table currently in progress. - http://www.therace.org * Skipper Steve Fossett has announced that PlayStation's new Chief Meteorologist will be legendary weather router Bob Rice (USA). Bob will be working in conjunction with onboard navigator, Stan Honey, for future PlayStation record attempts starting with the NY-UK TransAtlantic later this month. PlayStation and her crew will make their way from Newport, RI to New York City soon where they will wait for a suitable weather window for an attack on the West-to-East TransAtlantic record (1990 Serge Madec 6 d 13 h 3 m 32 s). http://www.fossettchallenge.com/ LETTERS TO THE CURMUDGEON (leweck@earthlink.net) Letters selected to be printed are routinely edited for clarity, space (250 words max) and to exclude unfounded speculation or personal attacks. You only get one letter per subject, so give it your best shot and don't whine if others disagree. -- From Steve Orosz - Why don't they publicise what the circumstances were that caused someone to be penalized under Rule 69? If US Sailing is going to publicize that a guy is banned from even drinking water for two years (ok, I exaggerate a little) then they could let us know what he did that was so heinous. CURMUDGEON'S COMMENT: Scuttlebutt has received lots of email asking for more details of the incident that got Andrew Blom two years on the beach. 'Butt reader Chick Pyle wrote to US Sailing requesting details of the situation and received this reply: "We received your request for more information about the Andrew Blom case. In disciplinary actions we must balance the need to enforce with the opportunity to educate. Likewise, we must balance the opportunity to educate with the individual's right (and especially a minor's right) to confidentiality regarding the proceedings. Just as juvenile courts are highly protective of those facts that involve a minor's behavior, US SAILING must be sensitive to disclosing the background in such matters. In such cases, the scales tip in favor of (1) enforcing the penalty - thus the notice of action taken, and (2) the confidentiality of disciplinary proceedings that involve minors. By definition, that implies that the scales must tip against using the opportunity to educate others regarding an individual's conduct." - Penny Piva Rego, Communications Manager, US SAILING HOWEVER, THERE IS MORE: The Sail magazine website did a story on the incident that contains many of the details. Here's an excerpt: "An altercation between Laser sailors at the Great South Bay Yacht Racing Association Invitational, hosted by Long Island, New York's Sayville Yacht Club on July 25, 1999, has led to the imposition of Rule 69 penalties on junior sailor Adam Blom of Miami, Florida. According to Blom, he was applying a tight cover over fellow junior sailor Adam Bennett of Belport, New York. "Adam headed up, hit my stern, and I flipped. We were all tangled up. I jumped up on his boat, we exchanged words, and I hit him," said Blom as he described the incident. "We sailed back to the dock. I apologized to Adam but was kicked out of the regatta under Rule 69." - Sail magazine website - http://www.sailmag.com/html/briefing.html#havana --From Glenn T. McCarthy - I have asked the question before, to the more long term Judges, what actions of competitors does it take to wind up with a Rule 69 hearing? I asked if a "guidebook" could be created to give some guidance to judges as to when to initiate a Rule 69. I asked about the use of foul language, the threat of violence, actual violence, using a boat to intentionally hit another competitors boat (very difficult to prove), tomfoolery, underage drinking, bawdy behavior, and other scenarios. Clearly the response differs from situation to situation, but alike situations should be handled with a standard, like State and Federal Judges have Sentencing Guidelines. We know that the standardization is to occur when the violation is automatically sent to US SAILING, where US SAILING standardizes sentencing, but when the situations come to us Judges in the first place, is it a yawn or something we Judges should step up to the plate and enter into a 69 hearing? A side note, as a risk management technique, it is strongly recommended that the original panel of judges be assembled of US SAILING Certified Judges. In a few cases when a wrongdoer was found guilty, some judges have been sued in court and the US SAILING Certified and Senior Judges have had US SAILING's insurance backing them up, where uncertified judges have dug out of their own pockets to defend against suit, which was a very expensive proposition for those judges. -- From Chris Welsh - My prediction for the next rule: PHIOR. Yep, IOR retreaded on a friendly basis. Here in the LA area a number of fat old gals (IOR boats from the glory days) are being refurbished from top to bottom and are out racing again. The natural evolution? Get out those old IOR certificates, apply reasonable adjustments for interiors added, etc, come up with a number, fuggeddabout the hassle of actually measuring, and go racing. The best of both worlds, and the boats are cheap today, but well enough built to have lasted. Why IOR vs. PHRF? It makes the most sense for similar boats to race against each other - equivalent response to changing conditions. In PHIOR, only the fat ladies would be allowed - no ultralights, bowsprits, canting keels, etc, with their extraordinary response to "their" conditions which are impossible to rate fairly. Maybe it should be called PHAT IOR... Bullfrog/Checkmate, Tomahawk, Carat, Brooke Ann/Crazy Horse, Scarlett O'Hara, Blade Runner, Dog Patch, and dozens of others - Your day is here again, and I get goose bumps thinking about the days when those boats were on the starting line. It'll work - until people get too competitive, so that means about 24-36 months, maybe longer if arbitrary PH type factors are applied. My fingers are crossed. -- From Diane Swintal - So, the Swedish Match tour has "live commentary piped over a PA system and local AM/FM radio" and "the action is telecast live to on-site viewers via big-screen monitors that are fed from several camera angles." Are the America's Cup organizers listening???? -- From Tom Pollack - Looks like Tucker Strasser missed the point in Butt #604. The box rule needs to prohibit water ballast in addition to restricting keel, pole length, rudder, and minimum weight issues. Here's why. If you allow water ballast you'll end up with a throw away boat as the winning hull form will dictate a wider stern to take advantage of the water ballast. In return, you end up with a fat and slow around -the- buoy boat after the race is over. Dump the water ballast issue and you'll end up with a fleet of nearly identical 40 and 50 foot boats with "Normal" Mast & Keel combos that have a life after the 2000 mile dash is over. I predict a fleet of very fast 50' buoy boats in Southern California that are almost the same if TPYC dumps the water ballast issue. Great for designers, builders, sailmakers and especially owners who fork over the dough. Slap on an ungodly PHRF rating and your all set for wet Wednesday racing as well as Volvo Inshore, Golison Regatta, Long Beach Race week etc... Even if a boat has water ballast, the crew is still going to sit on the rail for the first three days of Transpac if they want to win. So no one wins with water ballast. The box rule is a great idea for owners tired of building a boat for one race and throwing it away. It just needs one more refinement. -- From Dave Millett (Regarding Tucker Strasser's comments on the new Transpac Classes and limitations) - Don't know if I agree all classes should have limitations lifted but I agree one or two should at least. The biggest and fastest boats on the line for Transpac are built for breaking records. Why Transpac committee insists on raising their "speed limit" in tiny increments or allowing transparent changes like they have by allowing any type of sail is beyond me. What are they afraid of, faster boats, more publicity, larger audience? I was on Medicine Man in 97 when we broke Merlin's record. Believe me, radical looking boats and boats that break records raise the level of publicity and notoriety faster than anything. We got three days of press and TV all over the Islands until the bigger boats broke our record. It's an experience that a lot more sailors deserve a shot at. Ask anyone on one of the new maxi cats or a Volvo boat, or an AC boat. Yea, I know that AC's and Volvo's are "Class" boats. But they are more innovative and radical than Transpac wants to let in. In this arena fast and radical gets the attention, the press, and draws in the money not limited classes with limited boats. I will give the Transpac committee kudos though for thinking of the smaller boat sailors and the classes that don't have the ability to be first to finish. It's a great idea to offer more trophies for all the hard work and money that owner's and crews put into this race. PRICEWATERHOUSECOOPERS VIC-MAUI RACE This year's race ends with everybody safely home. It's been an almost ideal event. The record was broken by two boats, and the oldest (and arguably prettiest) boat in the fleet looks like taking first overall on corrected time. There were some hotly-contested places within the classes, and of course there was PRAIRIE VOYAGER's run without a real rudder. Many others had their share of unexpected drama too. Sails blew out, halyards parted and blocks blew up, often at night. Boats arrived without all the gear they started with. All manner of living things were spotted in and above the ocean, and various inanimate objects were picked up or dodged according to their nature. Final Results - Class A: 1. GRAND ILLUSION, James McDowell, 2. RENEGADE, Dan Sinclair, 3. SHOW ME, Lester Fike Jr., Class B. 1. FARR-ARI, William Walton, 2. PURSUIT, Norm Dawley, 3. JOIA, Tom Huseby, Class C. 1. NIGHT RUNNER, Doug Fryer 2. GREYHOUND, Bill Moore, 3. WINDS OF TIME, Steve/Susan Clark, 3. TURICUM, Warren Hale / June Arnett, Class D: 1. HMCS ORIOLE Cdr. Scott Crawshaw, 2. DREAM CATCHER, Denny Thompson. Overall winner: HMCS ORIOLE - http://www.vicmaui.org/main.htm COLLEGIATE SAILING The Board of Directors of the Inter-Collegiate Yacht Racing Association (ICYRA) of North America voted to change the name of the organization to the Inter-Collegiate Sailing Association (ICSA) of North America. The change was effective July 1, 2000. The Inter-Collegiate Sailing Association is the governing authority for sailing competition at colleges and universities throughout the United States and in some parts of Canada. - Barby MacGowan ICSA web site: http://www.collegesailing.org
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