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SCUTTLEBUTT 1956 -- October 31, 2005
Scuttlebutt is a digest of major yacht racing news, commentary, opinions,
features and dock talk . . . with a North American focus.
GUEST COMMENTARY - Magnus Wheatley
The word 'daft' doesn't come close to justifying the latest submission from
the President of ISAF towards a new Olympic scoring format that is
available to view on the Federation's website. From what I can gather from
this proposal is that the scoring will work thus: Races 1 to 5 will allow
one discard. Races 6-10 will be non-discardable and then the top 10 boats
will carry 'weighted points' into a final race show-down to decide the
medals and give greater opportunity to the person in tenth place the chance
to sneak a medal.
Now excuse me, sailing is hard enough to explain to Joe Public at the best
of times but creating a final race, made for television showcase event
where the leaders of the regatta (who will no doubt have put far more time,
effort, and training into their campaigns) will effectively be at the mercy
of the elements, good fortune, gear-breakage, and corner banging wannabes
that have scraped into the top 10 to decide the ultimate prize in our sport
is just ludicrous. I'm all in favor of a non-discardable final race and
allowing just one discard in the other ten races but 'carrying weighted
points' into a final race, it's opening a can of worms that the public at
large will find incomprehensible and turn off from.
This handicapping system that has been assembled by committee in a
pandering to the TV companies that, even in an ideal world where the wind
blows at 15-20 knots, fair and true all regatta, is still not right.
Handicapping, or to give it the Olympic term 'weighting,' is simply another
distraction that bars understanding and participation in our sport.
Remember the next Games are in that sailing backwater of Qingdao, where if
they even get 11 races in they'll be lucky.
The document titled "Format 2008 Olympic Sailing Competition" can be viewed
at http://www.sailing.org/meetings/2005november/papers/sub_025.pdf
MUSTO WINS SCUTTLEBUTT OFFSHORE CHAMPIONSHIP
The UK's Keith Musto has won the Scuttlebutt Offshore Championship, sailed
at the Bitter End Yacht Club in the British Virgin Islands. The
championship series was raced under bright skies with warm Caribbean trade
winds as a part of the 11th Annual Mount Gay Rum Defiance Day Regatta.
Although Musto was unable to win either of the legs from the BVI's North
Sound to the Baths and back, consistent placings in his BEYC Freedom 30
gave him a four-point edge over the Horizon Yacht Charter's Baveria 36,
co-skippered by Butch Ullmer and Peter Isler. The third spot on the podium
was shared by Rod Johnstone and Lowell North in an unbreakable tie.
Although Robbie Haines took line honors on both legs of this race series,
his Express 37 Cosmic Warlord, only corrected out to fifth place. The
Scuttlebutt Offshore Championship served as a warm-up for the BEYC's Pro-Am
Regatta which starts on Monday. -- www.beyc.com
WILMA
Stagg Yachts together with the Farr 40 and Mumm 30 class associations have
decided to cancel the 2005 Rolex Farr One Design Invitational due to the
conditions in South Florida following Hurricane Wilma. Originally scheduled
for November 3-6 in Miami's South Beach, the regatta was also set to double
as the Mumm 30 North American Championship. That regatta will now take
place during Key West Race Week. "There are too many issues with getting
boats launched, not knowing when power and water will be restored, when
curfews will be lifted, gas stations open and the residents of the area
recovered from the damage incurred to proceed," said Stagg Yachts President
Geoff Stagg. Additional details can be found at the class websites: Farr
40- www.farr40.org; Mumm 30- www.mumm30.org
OCKAM STRENGTHENS TEAM
Ockam Instruments would like to announce and welcome Dan Chesson, the
newest member of the team. Dan has extensive marine electronics background
and will be heading up the Ockam service department and assist the already
strong Ockam customer service and support network. Ockam offers integrated
instrument solutions with proven race-winning performance for all boat
types. Impress the competition and measure your performance gain with a
system utilizing the superior Tryad processor and the impressive Matryx
graphical display with strip-chart capability and hit the shifts like never
before. Ockam has instrument solutions for everyone. Contact sales:
lat@ockam.com or service: dan@ockam.com
NORTHERN CALIFORNIA CONNECTION
Sausalito, CA and Capetown, South Africa, have more in common than
expensive real estate and stunning water views. John Sweeney and Tina
Kleinjen, co-founders of the defunct Sausalito Challenge, are now team
managers and for Team Shosholoza, Africa's first challenge in the 154-year
history of the America's Cup. For Trapani, the African team also hired
sailing ace Dee Smith of Novato as tactician. Under Smith's guidance,
Shosholoza was the surprise story during the races in Trapani, Sicily,
finishing as the most improved of all twelve teams. Salvatore Sarno, the
team's managing director, confirmed after the races that Smith will
continue on with the team as a coach.
Before Smith stepped on board, Team Shosholoza - despite having the only
new yacht in the 12 boat fleet - struggled near the bottom. Under his
tutelage, Team Shosholoza wrapped the 2005 season with two fifth places and
a third, en route to fifth overall in the Act 9 fleet racing. "They are
Sponge Bobs," said Smith. "They are good at their individual job, but
needed help putting it all together. They have been sailing in a vacuum
down there in Capetown." To tap RSA-83's (speed) potential, Smith used the
close competition during the races to conduct speed trials. After the
starts, Smith sailed in a straight line, making few turns. "I've decided
the boat is pretty fast but not that fast. It's not really balanced," he
said. -- Marin Independent Journal
HIGH DRAMA, HIGH DANGER
Crashing and banging your way over 31,000 miles of the planet's cruel seas
is not unalloyed fun, and Neal McDonald is not alone among the skippers of
the meanest machines ever to tackle the daunting and dangerous challenge of
the Volvo race to speak of this year's event in unusually cautious tones.
McDonald is rapidly having to assess exactly what he has bitten off in
taking on the race, which starts from Vigo, in north-west Spain, on 12
November. It is due to end on 17 June in Gothenburg.
For this year's race the decision was taken to have something new,
something more exciting. It was meant to be cheaper, which it has not
turned out to be, and to have a tighter timetable to reduce costs at the
stopover ports. Those costs have gone up again because these spectacular
new boats, the Open 70s, will be eating up miles faster than even the
experts predicted, so they will be in port earlier and for longer. But with
all that speed comes ever-greater danger.
The vulnerability to breakage applies not just to the boat and gear - as it
would with any new piece of kit -but also to the people driving it. The
60s, which were 64 feet long, were crewed by 12 people, and often that was
not enough. The new 70s, which, are less than 10 per cent longer but about
25 per cent more powerful, have an offshore crew of 10. "We went up to Cape
Finisterre to pick up a gale and a downhill ride of about 15 hours, and we
were exhausted," said McDonald. But he insists: "The dangers and pressures
are imposed by us, not by the boat. We can always back off." McDonald is
not a man who likes to do that but, as he says: "At the end of the day you
have in-built survival instincts." -- Stuart Alexander, The Independent
QUOTE / UNQUOTE
Jerry Kirby, a bowman for Volvo 70 Pirates of the Caribbean, "Without
question, this will be the most extreme of any Volvo race. "The boats go 30
knots, no problem. In the Southern Ocean, they'll be going 40. As soon as
Pirates hits 20 knots, all crew on deck will clip on to safety lines. If a
sailor is washed overboard, he'll almost certainly be injured, but he'll
still be attached." -- Tom Meade, The Providence Journal
GRAND PRIX 42
A meeting of the Grand Prix 42, the largest of the three new level classes
proposed and studied by the Offshore Racing Congress, has been recently
held at the Yacht Club Italiano in Genoa. The new Grand Prix Rule has been
officialized and published on the ORC website (www.orc.org) on September
1st 2005. Since then, many interested owners have immediately involved some
of the most important design offices for having preliminary drawings and
construction details of the new boats. One important item discussed has
been the intention to create soon an International Class Association: the
formal constitution is foreseen before the end of October.
Moreover a preliminary event calendar for 2006 began to take shape. One
GP42 boat, designed by Farr Yacht Design, is already under construction at
Latini Marine in Rome and, during the meeting different designers'
renderings and drawings have circulated. Beyond Farr Y.D., the most
actively involved ones are the Spanish Botin & Carkeek, the Italian Felci
Yacht Design, the Germans Judel & Vrolijck and the Americans Nelson &
Marek. It has been mentioned that a meeting has been called by a group of
American interested owners on November 16th in Stamford, Connecticut (USA).
It is definitely their intention to build some GP42s and to coordinate with
ORC a USA events calendar. Soon it will be possible to have more
information about other boats under construction, the final calendar for
2006 and involvement of a company as class sponsor. -- Paolo Massarini, ORC
Grand Prix Level Classes Manager
2006 BREITLING MEDCUP
The TP52 2006 Breitling MEDCUP for plans to open the Circuit with the first event to
be held in Punta Ala, Italy, from May 22-27. The fleet will then move to
Barcelona for the second event in the Circuit, to be held from July 5-9.
The third event will be the Breitling Regatta, which will be held in Puerto
Portals from the July 19-23. The next event will be held just one week
after, which will be the Copa del Rey in Palma de Mallorca from July 29
-August 6. The TP52s will then meet in Athens for the fifth event, from the
August 19-27, with the Circuit drawing to a close in a final event in
Ibiza, which will be from September 18-23.
The number of teams due to participate in the 2006 Circuit will be almost
double that of this year, with 20 boats already confirming their presence.
Among the new teams to take part in the 2006 edition of the Breitling
MEDCUP are the Dutch team Sotto Vocce and Mean Machine, the Germans Pinta,
Norway's Fram, and the English team Stay Calm. Also joining the fleet are
the Americans Rush and Warpath - who will have almost all of the Emirates
Team New Zealand onboard. Among the Spaniards to look out for in next
year's Circuit, will be Inaki Castaner's team Ono, following the purchase
of the Breitling MEDCUP 2005's winning vessel, Pisco Sour with Vasco
Vascotto. -- www.medcup.org
SOUTHERN SPARS AND THE VOLVO OCEAN RACE
Southern Spars extends best wishes to all the teams competing in the Volvo
Ocean Race and particularly to ABN AMRO, Brasil 1 and movistar, which are
carrying our rigs. Racing round the world presents one of the greatest
challenges in sport, taking crews and yachts to their limits. No other
spar-maker can match Southern Spars' round the world record: in 2002, seven
of eight teams chose Southern, including winner, illbruck; in 1998 six of
10, including Merit Cup (2nd) and Swedish Match (3rd); and in 1994, four of
10, including winner Yamaha and Galcia 93 Pescanova (3rd).
www.southernspars.com
NEWS BRIEFS
* Cablevision Systems Corp. and OLN today announced that they had reached
an agreement under which Cablevision will include OLN, which has rights to
the America's Cup Cablevision is one of the nation's leading entertainment
and telecommunications companies, serving 3 million households in the New
York metropolitan area. Cablevision owns Madison Square Garden and its
sports teams, the New York Knicks, Rangers and Liberty. The company also
operates New York's famed Radio City Music Hall, and owns and operates
Clearview Cinemas. --
Yahoo News
* The Volvo Ocean Race 2005-06 will receive the Spanish Royal seal of
approval when His Majesty King Juan Carlos I makes an official visit to the
host port of Sanxenxo on Friday 4th November. His Royal Highness will meet
the crews of the seven boats - a day before they do battle in the in-port
race, which will mark the beginning of the round the world event.
* Champion wakeboarder, Dan Nott achieved a world first by becoming the
fastest wakeboarder to be towed by a Volvo 70 racing yacht. Dan achieved
speeds up to 20 knots as he was towed by ABN Amro One, one of ABN Amro's
two boats entering the Volvo Ocean Race. Towed by a rope led from the top
of the 30 metre mast, Dan reached high speeds just off the coast of
Sanxenxo during the training session.
* It was announced Friday that the fishermen's strike (in Valencia, Spain)
finally came to an end after an agreement was reached between the unions
and the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries. As a result of the
agreement, the fishing fleets of Spain withdrew their blockade of the
country's ports, and maritime traffic resumed its normalcy. However, on
Saturday fishermen in Valencia and Gandia announced that they were going on
strike as they were not in agreement with the deal that had been struck
with Agriculture minister Elena Espinosa by the National Federation of
Fishermen. -- Valencia Life Network
* Giulia Conti (ITA) and Anna Tunnicliffe (USA) were matched in the final
of the ISAF Grade 1 Rolex Osprey Cup in St. Petersburg, Florida, USA, with
Conti defeating Tunnicliffe 3-2. Pre-event favourites Claire Leroy (FRA)
and Malin Millbourn (SWE) were in the Petit-finals, with Leroy defeating
Millbourn 3-2. -- ISAF
* There is a new game on the Scuttlebutt website, which involves cubicles,
a trash can, and wads of paper. We call it "Trashketball."
Link: www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/games/trashketball
LETTERS TO THE CURMUDGEON
(Letters selected for publication must include the writer's name and may be
edited for clarity or space - 250 words max. This is neither a chat room
nor a bulletin board - you only get one letter per subject, so give it your
best shot and don't whine if others disagree. And please save your bashing,
and personal attacks for elsewhere.)
* From Richard Collins: Jon Nash's awesome photos of the Volvo 70 ABNAmro
in today's Butt (1955) is an indicator of real sailing and a reminder of an
AC series of races back a few decades ago in the old 12 meters down in the
Land of Oz. That sort of action with wind, waves and close competition
is/will be sorely missing in today's made for media AC event. These AC
boats will be huddled on their shore cradles in those spectacular Volvo 70
conditions. Too bad. (Photo link:
www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/photos/05/abnamro1027)
* From Mary Gunther: I was so impressed by the story of hurricane victims
in the South. While they have lost their boats, their clubhouses and their
marinas, and I'm sure much more, they have not lost their spirit and they
are dedicated to getting back on the water. The Baltimore City Yacht Assoc.
does not have a clubhouse or even own property which we call home. We race
every Tuesday from April through September and rely on the good will of
local establishments to put up with wet, salty, and the sometimes
disheveled look of our members as we pass through the bar to a reserved
area for post race gatherings. Sailboat racing is not about a place, but
the people and the lifelong friendships we develop along the way. We wish
only the best and hope that everyone will consider donating whatever they
can to the Katrina Sailors Exchange.
* From Nick Jako: (regarding Mike Marzahl's claim in Issue 1955 that Star
sailors are the best all around sailors in the world) And many of today's
(and yesterday's) top Star sailors graduated from the Finn class -
including Freddie (Loof).
* From T. Carder: (edited to our 250 word limit) There is no question that
the organizers of the Lauderdale Boat Show had little regard for the St.
Pete Boat Show when, because of the damage caused by Hurricane Wilma, they
re-scheduled the Lauderdale show a week later at the same time as St. Pete.
How smoothly is the Lauderdale Boat Show going to run this year in any
case, even in its new, postponed dates? Even if the hotels and restaurants
in the area manage to get up and running again with water, power etc, they
may not necessarily be able to accommodate those visitors who had
reservations for the original dates of the show and would now need space
for the new dates. At the time of this writing, power is still out through
much of Palm Beach, Broward, Dade and other Florida counties.
And what about the many mega-yachts that were to be exhibited? Don't most
of those floating displays-of-ostentation have pretty tight
delivery/charter schedules that may not be so easily postponed? If you were
managing one of those huge yachts and had to make a decision, which would
it be- have the thing on display for a week, with a few hundred or thousand
strangers wandering around messing things up, or make thousands and
thousands of dollars in charter fees?
One wonders whether the decision to postpone the Lauderdale show, rather
than cancel it, was perhaps made because of the possibility that exhibitors
might ask show organizers for a refund of their fees...
* From Paul Strzelecki: It never ceases to amaze me how little awareness
there is about declining sailing participation. But it's happening, and
will continue unless we do something about it now.
This is what the International Sailing Summit and its country spin-offs is
all about. I personally have been involved for 5 years and now look forward
to the Amsterdam summit on November 14th where we will hear about some
major initiatives already taking place in Brazil, UK, and the USA, as well
as ISAF's new Connect to Sailing initiative. However, we need more
involvement from industry, and for all those companies attending METS, it
is an ideal opportunity to find out more. Get involved to help reverse the
decline in sailing participation.
CURMUDGEON'S OBSERVATION
If it's zero degrees outside today and it's supposed to be twice as cold
tomorrow, how cold is it going to be?
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