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SCUTTLEBUTT 2596 - May 14, 2008Scuttlebutt is a digest of major sailing news, commentary, opinions,features and dock talk . . . with a North American focus. Scuttlebutt is published each weekday with the support of its sponsors. SHOULD CERTIFICATION FOR JUDGES/UMPIRES BE UPGRADED? by Ernie Bain, Jr., Senior Judge and Umpire I believe US SAILING Judge's/Umpires are in a professional category, just like any other professional classification. These other professional classifications are required to take a test to qualify for certification when they start their profession, and then each year thereafter are required so many units annually, depending on their profession, to keep their certification. They can receive these units by attending seminars and/or through home study courses by mail or the Internet. If they do not obtain these units in a given year, they lose their certification and to be re-certified must re-take the test. The main intent is to upgrade the knowledge of their profession, i.e., keeping them abreast of any changes in their field. Currently, US SAILING only requires a test every 4 years, wherein the individual "crams" the rule book every 4 years to pass the test. Of course, that individual must have been active in regattas, both locally and out of their area, and is required to have been a Chief Judge/Umpire for some of these regattas. My suggestion is to follow the certification for other professions, i.e., annual participation in seminars/ round tables and home study courses through the mail and or the Internet, to be filled out and sent to a certified organization, for unit certification. I know many Judge's/ Umpire's are in agreement with this concept, and it would seem to be a better model for maintaining the skills needed for the position. * Care to comment? Post it here: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/blog/2008/05/certification-process.html PUMA CHRISTENS "THE MONSTER" Boston, MA (May 12, 2008) -- Five months before the start of the Volvo Ocean Race 2008-2009, PUMA Ocean Racing had its new racing boat christened "il mostro" by Oscar-nominated actress Salma Hayek in a waterfront ceremony at the Institute of Contemporary Art/ Boston at Fan Pier on Monday, May 12th. The evening included the ceremonial breaking of a bottle of champagne across the Volvo Open 70's bow by Hayek, the boat's 'godmother' and short speeches by Chairman and CEO of PUMA, Jochen Zeitz, Chief Marketing Officer Antonio Bertone and PUMA Ocean Racing Skipper Ken Read. Il mostro was designed by the team of Botin Carkeek and built at Goetz Custom Boats in Bristol, Rhode Island in conjunction with Customline Yachts, before being launched at the Newport Shipyard in Newport, RI, in late April. PUMA Ocean Racing's training base will be in Newport throughout the next four months, as the team prepares for the 10-month, 37,000 mile race around the globe. The new boat design is one of the new cutting-edge, second-generation Volvo Open 70s that are the world's fastest monohulls. Its graphic details include a unique PUMA twist with il mostro resembling a virtual 3-D "flying shoe," inspired by PUMA's popular style of the same name. * Look for the new boat to be on the start line next month for the Newport to Bermuda Race. The team also has its website up and running, with a pretty slick video on the boat's construction and an interactive tool for viewing the race course. Unfortunately there is not a news index feature yet on the site, but at least there are 29 ways in the Puma store to tell the "suits" that yacht sponsorship was a brilliant move: http://pumaoceanracing.com COURT DECISION BACKS BOTH TEAMS INTO A CORNER by Cory Friedman, Scuttlebutt Legal Analyst (May 13, 2008) By now most 'Buttheads know that Justice Cahn ordered that the DoG Match commence "ten calendar months from the date of service of a copy of this order, with notice of entry, upon the attorneys who have appeared herein." Indeed, Societe Nautique de Geneve (SNG) managed to get the clerk to enter the order and perfected an appeal of the May 12, 2008 Order on May 13, 2008. The Appellate Division ordered the two appeals consolidated, with an extra week's briefing, to be heard on June 5, 2008, so SNG has succeeded on two fronts. It has avoided a 2008 DoG Match and it has cured all the potentially fatal procedural infirmities of the original appeal. However, it is not home free, as it faces a Southern Hemisphere defense in 10 months (because the deed states that "no race shall be sailed in the days intervening between November first and May first if the races are to be conducted in the Northern Hemisphere"), with no infrastructure in place - except in New Zealand (which will never happen because of all the bad blood) and possibly Australia. Even worse, there is no sponsorship or TV in place and the Match could give new meaning to the term financial black hole. CDO's on steroids. Lawyers often sloppily talk about cutting the baby in half when the plaintiff is awarded half of the demand. A really Solomonic decision is what we saw Justice Cahn hand down on May 12, 2008 -- a decision that forces the litigants to make difficult choices and has the potential to force a resolution by the parties themselves. Anyone who thinks that Justice Cahn made a careless mistake is dreaming. He knew exactly what he was doing. -- Read on: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/news/07/cf/#p24 NEWPORT LEUKEMIA CUP REGATTA GAINS NEW SUPPORT Goetz Custom Boats is pleased to announce its support of the 2008 Leukemia Cup Regatta, to be held September 12 and 13 at the New York Yacht Club. This year's event will feature IRC racing, in addition to PHRF, as well as attendance by Gary Jobson, national chair for the event. For more information about the weekend's activities, and how to become a participant or a sponsor, please contact Jill Jessup at the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society at jill.jessup@lls.org or visit the event site at www.leukemiacup.org/ri. For the latest from Goetz, please visit http://www.goetzboats.com AMAZING COMEBACK LEADS TO CHAMPIONSHIP A few years ago, Severn School made a conscious decision to upgrade its club sailing program. Administrators at the private school in Severna Park hired a full-time head coach and approved a plan to have the team practice out of its own facility using its own fleet of boats. Those efforts paid off handsomely this past weekend when Severn School captured the Interscholastic Sailing Association Fleet Racing National Championship. Senior skipper Joe Morris placed first in A Division to lead the Admirals, who mounted an amazing comeback to overtake defending champ Newport Harbor and runner-up Point Loma on the final day of competition. Severn becomes the first Chesapeake Bay school to capture the prestigious Clifford D. Mallory Trophy, which has been awarded since 1930. The Admirals had placed third each of the past three years, which made the title even sweeter. -- The Capital, read on: http://www.hometownannapolis.com/cgi-bin/read/2008/05_13-06/HIG FIRST STOP FOR TP 52 MEDCUP CIRCUIT Alicante, Spain (May 13, 2008) -- Sixteen TP52 starters, two races but just one winner on the first day of the 2008 Audi MedCup Circuit. The mainly amateur crewed Tau Ceramica Andalucia, with 2007 J/80 World Champion with Jose Maria Torcida (ESP) driving, put aside their modest budget and lack of practice to win both of the first two races. Spanish boats hold top three places with Mutua Madrilena, helmed by Flavio Favini in second, and the Dean Barker riven Bribon in third. For a crew which have only two full-time paid professionals on board and a budget which committed mainly to buying the 2007 MedCup champion boat Artemis to which they only added two new sails and practised only three days prior to coming to Alicante, today was a fairytale start to the season for the newcomers. -- Read on: http://2008.medcup.org/news/?id=110 SAILING AS A SECOND LANGUAGE by John Riise, Latitude 38 It's not like it's ever going to happen, but I've long felt the world - at least the sailing world - would be a better place without all the salty lingo of days gone by... especially when it comes to drawing new people into the sport. On top of wind angles, heeling, sail trim and everything else that newbies have to soak up, why further confuse them with a blizzard of outdated words to explain what can much more easily be passed on with 'regular' English? Doesn't 'downstairs' convey the idea more accurately than 'down below' (which is redundant anyway)? And 'port' can mean either a direction - or that glass thing in the side of the cabin that you look through. So how about 'left' and 'window'? Is it 'anchors aweigh' (up) or 'anchors away' (down)? And 'knots' . . . would that be a measurement of speed, or do you want me to attach a rope to something? And WHY knots? Why not miles per hour? Easy to understand for both terrestrial or maritime drivers (not helmsmen). Front, back, middle, right, left, - all in common usage and readily understandable. Forward, aft, athwartships, starboard, port - a bit ambiguous, open to interpretation (how FAR forward? Athwart-what?) or requiring some little ditty to remember (lessee, 'port' has four letters and 'left' has four, so...) You don't have to learn a whole new language to drive a car or learn to swim, so why do it with sailing? Sure, every sport requires that you learn a few new words, so we'd have to keep 'mast', 'rudder', 'keel' and a few others. But otherwise, let's put pointless nautical lingo out to pasture with Latin and use it only when necessary for historical purposes or pirate movies. * Add your comments here: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/blog/2008/05/sailing-language.html CLINICS, COACHING, BOOKS & CDS Host a clinic. Hire a coach for a weekend. Learn the latest in Tactics and Trim. You can spend a lifetime learning to be a better sailor, or you can accelerate the process at North U. Learn more about North U Clinics, On Board Coaching, or their renowned line of books and CDs at http://www.northu.com ROBOTS TO TACKLE THE ATLANTIC CHALLENGE Sir Francis Chichester, Robin Knox-Johnston, Dame Ellen McArthur and other great names from the history of sailing could be joined this year by Pinta the robot. The unmanned boat is undergoing final preparations before setting sail in the hope of becoming the first robot to cross an ocean using the power of wind. By sailing non-stop and unassisted for an estimated three months it will prove the potential for robotic craft to undertake vital research in roles in dangerous and far-off waters. Pinta has been designed by scientists at Aberystwyth University and will join seven other robotic craft in October in a race across the Atlantic. The race is intended to test the endurance and reliability of robots away from battery chargers and the predictable environment of a laboratory. Mark Neal, of Aberystwyth University, said: "This is the first time anybody has attempted to sail across any ocean with an automated boat. The big issue in robotics at the moment is longevity and flexibility in a complicated environment. Something that can survive for two to three months completely unassisted while doing something interesting is a major challenge. If it does get there I will be seriously cheerful. It will open up all the oceans to environmental monitoring by robots." -- Times Online, complete story: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/science/article3904557.ece SAILING SHORTS * Carol Cronin and Kim Couranz won the 2008 Snipe Women's National Championship sailed on Puget Sound and hosted by the Corinthian Yacht Club this past weekend. Going into the eighth and final race, there were five teams separated by only four points. Starting in a 12 knot northerly on a cool and crisp Mother's Day, the top teams were close throughout with the overall winner not being decided until the last leg. Jen Glass and Kati Belden finished one point back to take second, followed by the daughter / mother team of Lindsey Bergan and Carol Buchan in third. -- Results: http://www.cycseattle.org/2008_specific/wsnipena.html * The launch in January this year of the World Yacht Racing Forum has received an extraordinarily positive reaction from almost every sector of the Yacht Racing industry world-wide in a clear demonstration that Yacht Racing deserves its own forum to debate the issues affecting the business of the sport. The Forum is modeled closely on the successful Motorsports Business Forum (motorsportbusinessforum.com), now in its fourth year, and the two events will co-locate and share the Grimaldi Forum facilities in Monaco in December. -- Read on: http://tinyurl.com/56gtoo * (May 13, 2008) Tough night during the solo Artemis Transat for the IMOCA Open 60 fleet, caught under spinnaker by gusts up to 30 knots, while the Class40 leaders were 220 miles back with more moderate offwind conditions. Current leaders heading for the finish line in Boston, MA are Yann Elies' Generali (Open 60) and Giovanni Soldini's Telecom Italia (Class40). -- Race site: http://www.theartemistransat.com * The teams that have qualified to attend the Inter-Collegiate Sailing Association/ APS Team Race National Championship on May 30-June 1 in Newport, RI are: MAISA: Georgetown University, St. Mary's College of Maryland, U.S. Naval Academy; MCSA: Notre Dame University, University of Wisconsin; NEISA: Boston College, Brown University, Harvard University; NWICSA: University of Washington; PCCSC: Stanford University; University of Southern California; SAISA: College of Charleston, University of South Florida; SEISA: University of Texas. -- http://www.collegesailing.org * (May 13, 2008) The ten catamaran teams competing in the six leg 500-mile race from Key Largo, FL to Tybee Island, GA have completed their third leg from Jupiter, FL to Cocoa Beach, FL, with Team Velocity winning, but Team Tybee and Marleys Yellow second and third respective finishes maintains their overall elapsed time positions at the top. -- Event site: http://www.tybee500.com J/105 CLASS ROCKS ON The boat that ignited the bowsprit revolution is setting attendance records across North America. Enjoy one-design at home or on the road at Key West, NOOD, Block Island, San Fran Big Boat, and the 2008 North Americans (SF Bay 8/20-24). New 2009 model J/105s are in production at US Watercraft! http://www.jboats.com 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 Craig Fletcher: (re, the Earthrace story in #2595) For all the people who think the biodiesel race is highlighting some great environmental good, I suggest they research biodiesel and ethanol fuels, and then draw their own conclusions. I will say you will be surprised how environmentally and economically mislead the public has been. * From Scott MacLeod, President, Force10 Marketing, Ltd.: (re, World Match Racing Tour prize money info in #2595) Deducting tax from prize money or any other payment for services for foreigners is very common. In fact, any prize money or payment for services issued in the US would be taxed at about the same rate and should be deducted. The sailor can claim it back on their own personal return. * From Steven B. Levy: (re, Detroit Cup story in #2595) "20 to 30 knot winds with moderate rains. forced the cancellation of further racing." I don't really understand this. On Puget Sound - a notorious "light-wind" venue - no one even thinks about canceling when winds hit 30 knots. Moderate rain, of course, is our middle name. They were racing Ultimate 20s . if you like weather, they ought to be a hoot in 20-30 knots. * From Robert Johnston, New York City: (re, letter in #2595) William Reed is onto something when he notes the technological bent in the Deed of Gift but he overlooks the political subtext of the 1851 London Exhibition. It was as much a celebration of the British and their empire as it was of new technology. The empire, after all, was designed to feed the industrial development of Britain. Its new technologies, while brilliant, could hardly have found the large-scale practical applications they did without it. British shipbuilding was always reliant on overseas sourcing for the construction and maintenance of its great fleets but indeed was perhaps still living in the age of Lord Nelson in its organization and technology. Then as now, sailing was multinational and even in the history of the Cup, the "American" Charlie Barr and the "Englishman" Sir Thomas Lipton, were both imported from Scotland. Bertarelli, like many Swiss entrepreneurs, has understood the organization of technology, people and money better than anyone in the Cup's history and knows as well as anyone that the era of truly "national" teams in the traditional sense is long past, if it ever really existed. * From Rich Roberts: Well said by my pal Chris Ericksen in 'butt #2595. Have faith. The America's Cup is too strong to die, even from the cancers of billionaires' egos and their battalions of lawyers, which will soon run their courses at the expense of the sport. Eventually the AC will come back around to a degree of nationality and rationality -- say, a minimum of half the crew must be from the country the boat represents, and once again we'll all have someone to root for. But first the sport must suffer through the disintegration of credibility currently in process . . . which means, one supposes, multihulls in the America's Cup but not in the Olympics? The sailing gods must be crazy. * From Alfred Poor: (edited to the 250-word limit) I agree with Ken Guyer (in #2594) completely on the principle of keeping things simple, and not making legal interpretations more complicated than they need to be, but he's off course when he insists that the AC Deed of Gift means "not assembling parts from far off lands". If Ken thinks that any country is an economic island - or even was in the days of the original America sloop - then I think he's mistaken. I would challenge anyone to create a competitive America's Cup contender using just the resources from the United States. This means you cannot use rubber from the Philippines, or copper from South America, or gold from South Africa, or electronic components from Asia, or aluminum from Australia. It is unreasonable to expect that a boat will be made solely from raw materials of a single nation. If you accept that you cannot do it without materials from other countries, then were do you draw the line on processing them? Iron ore is okay, but not metallic iron? Or do you allow iron, but not steel? Or do you allow steel, but not processed into bars or sheets? Or can you permit castings? Can these be machined elsewhere? My point is that there is no clear place to draw the line, whether you're building your hull from Canadian cedar or Middle Eastern petrochemicals. The global economy genie got out of the bottle in the days of the clipper ships. He's not going back into the bottle just for a boat race. CURMUDGEON'S OBSERVATION I don't make jokes. I just follow the America's Cup and report the facts. Special thanks to Goetz Custom Boats, North U, and J/Boats. Thanks also to new website advertisers LaserPerformance and Line Honors Performance Sailing Supply. A complete list of preferred suppliers is at http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/ssc/suppliers |
