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SCUTTLEBUTT 2169 - August 29, 2006Scuttlebutt is a digest of major yacht racing news, commentary, opinions, features and dock talk . . . with a North American focus.UNWORTHY Frustration was the overriding sentiment at the Olympic test regatta in China as varying winds and race management combined to create racing unworthy of elite level competition. The International Sailing Federation said courses and schedules might have to change to ensure a satisfactory Games regatta in 2008. Saturday saw a big swell and seasickness among the sailors, while in other races the wind speed dropped to below two knots. In yesterday's men's 470 race, a new windward mark was signaled but the new buoy was not laid before the leaders had sailed beyond it. Britain's Nick Rogers and Joe Glanfield lost the series lead as a result. The ISAF will discuss the problems in November. Among their options for Beijing 2008 will be reducing the number of races and altering the number and angle of the legs sailed. -- Tim Jeffery in Qingdao, the Daily Telegraph, http://tinyurl.com/ndyzk OLYMPIC TEST EVENT Qingdao Olympic Sailing Centre -- Paige Railey (USA) continued where she left off yesterday at the Olympic Test Event in China, taking second Monday’s in today’s only Laser Radial race to virtually assure herself of overall victory. Although her closest challenger Jo Aleh (NZL) came in just behind the World number one in third, Railey’s lead is 23 points so all she needs to do is finish the Medal Race to win the Gold. After eight of ten races in the Star class, the USA’s Andy Horton and Brad Nichol (USA) moved to the top of the leader board. They are tied with Iain Percy and Steve Mitchell (GBR), with George Szabo/ Eric Monroe (USA) just two points behind in third. It was a great day for the British sailors in Qingdao -- they hit the lead across five of the fleets. Ben Ainslie (GBR) led the charge at the ISAF Grade 2 Qingdao International Regatta with another two bullets to continue his remarkable comeback to the Finn class. Along with Ainslie, GBR appears at the top of the leaderboard in the Laser, Men’s 470 and 49er fleets, plus Percy and Mitchell’s (GBR) tie with Horton and Nichol (USA) for top spot in the Star. Top three spots in the Yngling and Laser Radial complete the British success story so far. Zach Railey (USA) continues his solid performance in the Finn class, maintaining his fifth spot in the 18-boat class. And Stuart McNay/ Graham Biehl (USA) have advanced to fourth place in the large 42-boat 470 Men's class, while teammates Mikee Anderson-Mitterling/ David Hughes are now in 11th place. In the 37-boat Women's 470 standings Amanda Clark/ Sara Mergenthaler (USA) have slipped out of the top ten -- presently in 12th place. Dalton Bergan/ Zachary Maxam (USA) are North America's top crew in the 49er standings, presently positioned in eighth place, with Canada's Rob Dale/ Hunter Lowden in 13th. -- Complete standings: http://www.2006qdregatta.com/ COMMENTS FROM QINGDAO * From Andy Horton and Brad Nichol, USA, Star: In most places the current goes slack (stops) and then slowly builds from the opposite direction when the tide changes. In Qingdao it behaves very differently, and sometimes differently from day to day. In past days we have observed the current actually clock around from flood to ebb. Needless to say it is difficult to plan your race when you do not know what the water is going to do under you! http://www.hortonnichol2008.com * From Anna Tunnicliffe, USA, Laser Radial: We came to Qingdao to gain experience in the local conditions and we gained more today as Fusan Bay dished up some different variations on light wind sailing. The first race today featured fog and haze, with light winds and a very big swell that meant we were almost hiked out on the tops of waves but sitting inboard at the bottom. The morning forecast was for light winds and we had postponed ashore for an hour before going out for a start at around 2:00 PM. The wind was blowing from a completely new direction and there wasn't much current for once. http://www.annatunnicliffe.com AS SEEN BY BEN AINSLIE (The Daily Sail subscription website spoke to Ben Ainslie about his seven bullets in eight races in Qingdao, despite not having sailed his Finn since last year. Here’s a couple of tiny excerpts.) Apart from one day the Finns have always been out on D course, 5 miles offshore. Here Ainslie says they have always had around 4-8 knots with small shifts, a light but regular wind with none of the massive holes or permanent shifts normally associated with winds of this strength. A bigger issue has been the combination of light wind and the relatively strong tide that has been running. "The current has been strong but manageable," continues Ainslie. "Today we raced on course C and it was a pretty tough race because the breeze was down about 3-4 knots and we had about a knot and a half of tide and there was one point on the second run that we weren’t actually making any headway over the ground for about 10 minutes! That was kind of a tricky race. It is just one of those things - we all knew it was difficult before we came, so you’ve just got to get on with it. In some of the races there’s been a big gap between the fleet because the tide. You have a sort of tidal gate - you either stretch away upwind or downwind or somewhere you end up getting away from the fleet." For Ainslie this is his first time at the 2008 Olympic venue and he says he is impressed. "Everything shoreside is great. The marina is big and everything works. The nice thing is that the locals seem really happy to have us here.” -- http://thedailysail.com WAKE UP CALL The Pre-Pre Olympics in Qingdao are proving to be a real wake up call for many. The facilities would appear to be outstanding in terms of their standard, functionality and state of readiness. The fact that they are completed two years before the start of the Sailing Olympics is without precedent in Olympic sailing history. On the water it is quite a different story, with conditions which would be described in polite circles as 'difficult'. One only has to read report of current that is as strong as the wind, and beats that are less than five minutes long, and the suitability of Qingdao for the Olympic Regatta has to be questioned, and surely will in the coming months. But on the other hand, if the regatta were to end now, the Skandia GBR Team would walk away with seven medals – a jump on the five they won in 2004. However dig down into the results from Qingdao and there are some very good names, and current top performers, buried in the middle of the fleets and the GBR result aside, all have a big self-analysis exercise to undertake when they return home. -- Excerpt from a report by Richard Gladwell, New Zealand editor for the Sail-World website, http://www.sail-world.com CATCH THE NORTH WAVE Congratulations to Tom Coates and crew aboard 'Masquerade' for winning the 2006 J/105 North American Championship! Powered by North Sails' awesome combination of an AP Class Mainsail and our new 3DL "Wave" Jib, Tom and crew led the event from wire to wire. Designed to excel and provide maximum power in light to moderate ocean swell or choppy conditions, the Wave Jib is a perfect complement to your J/105 sail inventory! To find out more, call your local North Sails representative or log on to http://na.northsails.com/One_Design/J105/J105.htm MATCH RACE RANKINGS After four event wins on the run, Areva Challenge helm Sébastien Col (FRA) has overtaken Peter Gilmour (AUS) to take the number one spot in the ISAF World Sailing Rankings for the first time. Claire Leroy (FRA) makes it a French clean sweep of the top spots, as she extends her lead in the Women's Rankings. Open Ranking Leaders: 1. Sébastien Col (FRA), 2. Peter Gilmour (AUS), 3. Paolo Cian (ITA), 4. James Spitthill (AUS), 5. Ian Williams (GBR), 6. Eugeniy Neugodnikov (RUS), 7. Mathieu Richard (FRA), 8. Chris Dickson (NZL), 9. Bjorn Hansen (SWE), 10. Ed Baird (USA). Women’s Leaders: 1. Claire LeRoy (FRA), 2. Klaartje Zuiderbaan (NED), 3. Marie Bjorling (SWE), 4. Nina Braestrup (DEN), 5. Lotte Meldgaared Pedersenden (DEN), 6. Sally Barkow (USA), 7. Linda Rahm (SWE), 8. Katie Spithill (AUS), 9. Jenny Axhede (SWE), 10. Annie-Claire Le Berre (FRA). Complete Rankings: http://www.sailing.org SAILING SHORTS * US Sailing has named the top three Skud-18 teams to the US Disabled Sailing Team (USDST) in the two- person class. The athletes qualified based on their results at the C. Thomas Clagett Jr. Memorial Regatta, held August 17-20 in Newport, R.I. The two-person teams are: Karen Mitchell (Deerfield Beach, Fla.) and Michael Grimm (Miami Beach, Fla.); Mark Lewis (Hingham, Mass.) and Maureen McKinnon-Tucker (Marblehead, Mass.); Scott Whitman (Brick, N.J.) and Julia Dorsett (Boca Raton, Fla.). The Skud-18 is a lead-assisted skiff, similar in hull shape to the 29er with a big, asymmetrical spinnaker and a bulb keel. -- http://www.ussailing.org/olympics/paralympic * Eleven Youth Team Race teams traveled from across the country to compete in the Youth Team Race Championship at the Naval Academy on August 26-27. The competitors raced in Flying Juniors and 420 dinghies on the digital 'N' course - with each match/ race taking about nine minutes to complete. Ted's Team were the clear winners. With a final six record of 14 wins and only one loss, Ted Himler, Cameron Cullman, Evan Aras, Elizabeth Whipple, Taylor Cole and Franny Kupersmith earned the right to represent the United States in the Australia Youth Olympic Festival in January of 2007. http://usna.edu/SailingTeam/ic/new/go.php?ID=8 * North Sails has partnered with expert meteorologist Chris Bedford and his team at Sailing Weather Services to provide free weather forecasts for the Rolex Farr 40 Worlds (Sept 6-9) along with forecasts for the Pre-Worlds on Sept 1&2 in Newport, Rhode Island. To sign up, visit North Sails' online weather center: http://na.northsails.com/ew/EW_main.taf * Color-coded hulls and sails will make for easy identification at the ISAF Team Racing World Championship, to be held at West Kirby Sailing Club on the Wirral, Great Britain from August 20-25, 2007. The event will be sailed between three boat teams in two person Firefly dinghies. Many sailors worldwide think of West Kirby's marine lake as ‘the finest team racing amphitheatre in the world’. It is surrounded by a promenade and sea wall that can accommodate spectators in grandstands and many more standing around the course, all almost able to reach out and touch the sailors. -- http://www.sailing.org/default.asp?ID=j6lFh?j`2 * If you have sustained a sailing related injury this year, Dr. Andrew Nathanson of the Injury Prevention Center at Brown University would like you to participate in a Sailing Injury Survey. Please go on-line and complete an anonymous injury survey. Initial findings will be presented to the Sports Medicine Committee of US Sailing at its Annual Meeting in Newport RI in November. http://tinyurl.com/khexo * Thirty three boats sailed at the Jet 14 Nationals held out of Severn Sailing Association last weekend, where PRO John Potter flew the I flag for every race and called back individual starters even when half the fleet was over. All of the top boats were called back as OCS during multiple races. Brent Barbehenn with his crew Ben Stock won the event with a six point edge over Greg Fisher and his wife Joann. Dirk Schwenk, Sean DeFusco and Dave Michos completed the top five, while JoAnn Fisher won the Jet 14 Women’s Nationals. -- http://www.severnsailing.org/results/index.shtml * Jud Smith threw out his only second place finish and won the Rhodes 19 Class National Championship Regatta with four bullets. Gretchen Curtis finished second in the 37-boat fleet racing at Sandy Bay Yacht Club, Rockport, Massachusetts, while Conway Felton, Bob Jensen and Zane Yoder took third through fifth in the championship. -- http://www.sandybay.org/rhodes/2006Nationals/Results.shtml * The Dragon Gold Cup started Monday in Douarnenez, Brittany, France, and brought together 107 boats from 19 countries with something like 20 Olympic medallists in the fleet. The top ten include boats from Germany, Denmark, France, Finland, the Netherlands, Russia, Great Britain and Sweden. This is obviously one of the world’s most successful one-design classes, and curiously, it’s almost non-existent in North America? -- http://www.dragongoldcup2006.com/ * The Herreshoff Museum has an end-of-season party every year on the last weekend of August. The objects that come out to play are thrilling, and photographer Emily L. Ferguson has provided the Scuttlebutt website with some comments and images: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/photos/06/0828 FROM EIGHT TO 30 KNOTS Hyeres, France -- Day two at the Melges 24 Worlds in Hyeres brought a mix of conditions for the 119 crews with racing starting in 8-10 knots and finishing in 30 knots as the Mistral began to blow. Two more races in the six-race round robin series were completed and in the overall standings Francois Brenac, helming DPR Partner & Partners for Philippe Ligot of France now leads by 7 points. Second to twelfth place are separated by only 10 points so the regatta remains wide open at this stage. Dave Ullman, sailing for California-based Philippe Kahn's Team Pegasus, also scored 1, 2 on Monday which made up for Sunday’s mid-teens results that included a 20% penalty. Ullman is not sailing with his regular crew this week and indeed the team had not sailed together before they got to Hyeres. Ullman is now 13th in the overall standings - just ahead of Brian Porter’s Full Throttle. -- Fiona Brown, full results and photographs are available from www.m24world2006.com NKE AND BENETEAU: INNOVATION, QUALITY AND PERFORMANCE Euro Marine Trading is proud to announce that nke performance instruments have been chosen as the instrumentation package option offered on the new Beneteau 10R one-design class series. nke pioneered BUS technology, and their products have proven to be among the best, relied upon by Vendee Globe and Transat entries. Euro Marine Trading is pleased to strengthen their relationship with Beneteau by offering one of the most innovative, accurate and reliable instrument packages available. For more information on nke instrument packages, Gyropilots or Safety MOB systems, visit us and the new 10R at the Newport and Annapolis boat shows. http://www.euromarinetrading.com LETTERS TO THE CURMUDGEON (editor@sailingscuttlebutt.com) (Letters selected for publication must include the writer's name and may be edited for clarity or space - 250 words max. 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. For those that prefer a Forum, you can post your thought at the Scuttlebutt website: http://sailingscuttlebutt.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi) * From Hugh Elliot: I would like to offer a little history on the subject of 'National' Classes as suggested by Peter O. Allen Sr. A long time ago - not quite in the time of the dinosaurs, but certainly when US Sailing was still known as the United States Yacht Racing Union - the Executive Committee of the One Design Class Council (of which the late Gay Lynn was Chair and I was Vice Chair) spent quite a lot of time and energy considering this issue. Eventually, we came to the conclusion that it would be very hard to come up with objective criteria that would discourage disappointed designers, builders, and their lawyers from taking an excessive number of expensive potshots at USYRU. So we gave up. I suspect that any group, tasked to tackle the job again today, would be very likely to come to the same conclusion. * From John Rumsey: Well, the Volvo race is no longer a race around the world. It is a media circus for money. It is entertainment. It is a career for the sailors, builders and designers. It will be an interesting game to watch and I guess that is what the sponsors want. It is not a race around the world. The big multihulls race around the world. * From Rob Pinkel: In response to Mr. Bourke's letter, I offer one modest suggestion for a change in the rules of the next Volvo Ocean Race: that any boat that suffers a human casualty during the race be summarily disqualified. There is presently a natural tension between the quest for a exciting event and the need for reasonable safety. The sailors are caught in the middle. By acknowledging the possibility of death and instituting a draconian penalty, safety will be transformed from an "issue" to a technology problem. Designers and teams will be further encouraged to integrate safety concerns with other trade-offs early in the design cycle. Sponsors will be seen as pushing the technology of safety, which is close to Volvo's heart. Volvo awards for technical innovation (mechanical engineering, naval architecture, weather routing, safety, etc) would add interest to the contest even if the "winner" is determined with 3 legs still to sail. * From Quentin Mcgown: With reference to Peter Huston's comments about the decline in yacht clubs' influence on the growth of the sport, he has hit on a long developing trend. The aversion to perceived elitism is the real danger - a form of political correctness responsible for such things as the spread of name changes (NAYRU to US Sailing, TYA to TSA, eg.) to the clubs themselves pulling back their outreach to non-members in a "dog in the manger" attitude. It happened at my club in the late '70s and I saw it first hand as a USYRU governor as it became more widespread. Corporate sponsorship has been a factor, also, in the decline of "Corinthianism.” Where are we headed? I wish I had a clue. * From Alun James (re the decline in racing): One-design may be the cause of decline, I know of several instances where owners of smaller boats have pooled resources to get a bigger boat. The other culprit is exactly as you have said – time – we have seen a steady decline in the numbers of yachts entering even the Canterbury Gold Cup series in Auckland and these races only range from 35 to 100 miles. The area that has really blossomed and may be the turning point for yachting in general is short handed. Single handed, double and three-crewed races have really taken off in Auckland with fleets now getting 130 entries. Also short handed divisions in big regattas and the length of the race is not a limiting factor. Every second year we have the 2 handed round north island race which is serious stuff with some rotten water with everything from 30’s to 60’s entering. This is a two week race with staging points. So focus not on what we race or when we race but on how we race. * From George Bailey: One relatively recent UK phenomenon that has only had a marginal impact on sailing in the U.S. is the popularity of sailing (and soft-core racing) glass and wood replicas and restorations of classic sailboats, especially gaff and lugger rigged sailboats. Reading U.K. sailing magazines such as “Classic Boat” reveals that the interest in these boats has really taken off in the last few years. Every new issue seems to contain ads from new builders. I think it is great fun to sail such boats and even rigged my Freedom 21 as a lugger for awhile (stop laughing, please, she was actually faster and pointed higher to weather in a good breeze than under stock main alone). I even raced the lug rig for a season. though I found the 264 sq. ft. loose footed sail I put on her too much for my limited athletic ability in the long run. So, given that it is obvious that a large number of sailors in the U.K. are having lots of fun with classic replicas, why hasn’t this caught on in the U.S.? Could it be that yacht brokers are as bad as the rest of us at putting pointing ability and speed to windward above everything else, as if the only reason anyone bought a sailboat was to do hard-core racing? CURMUDGEON’S OBSERVATION People seem to read the Bible a whole lot more as they get older - like cramming for the finals. Special thanks to North Sails and Euro Marine Trading. |
