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SCUTTLEBUTT 2539 – February 25, 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. BERMUDA FACING CONTROVERSIAL DUTY HIKE Competitive sailing could grind to a halt if Government does not revise its planned duty hike on boats, the head of the Bermuda Sailing Association said last week. BSA president Somers Cooper said the duty increase will halt any new dinghy or keelboat purchases for competition in Bermuda. He is now appealing to Finance Minister Paula Cox to take a second look at her plan to raise duty on boats from April 1. He said the duty hike will also have a detrimental effect on youth sailing, which "has had a meteoric rise in local interest and global success over the past 10 years.' With more than 1,000 enrolled in youth sailing programmes annually, it will affect all youth programmes and runs the risk of putting the sport out of the reach of ordinary Bermudians. He also that said while sailing is thought of as a luxury activity, it is enjoyed by Bermudians from all walks of life and has come closer than any other sport to putting Bermuda on the sporting world map. Mr. Cooper fired off a letter to Ms Cox on Monday, in response to news of the duty hike from 33.5 to 55 per cent, which was recently announced in the Budget. -- Bermuda Sun, read on: http://tinyurl.com/285sp3 AN ‘AED’ FOR EVERYONE Regardless of the type of boat you sail, the sport of sailing has changed a lot during this generation. Nowhere is this most evident that in the support category. There was a time when seeing the sailmaker’s van in the parking lot meant the event was a biggee. Nowadays, support tents and trailers from all facets of equipment providers might be onsite, plus competitors often now bring their own supply trailers (and let’s not even start talking about coach support). Businesses have also emerged to act as a liaison between competitors and the services needed, providing the supplies of the manufacturer along with the skills of local support. One of these such businesses is Sail22, LLC, a company geared toward providing the coordination for everything from boat delivery to rigging, coaching to crew gear, dinner reservations to team chefs, team fitness, photography and event housing. However, it is a new item on their service list that might be setting them apart from the crowd: first aid. Sail22 has teamed up with a company called First Responder Educational Services, and they now have an AED (automatic external defibrillator) among the supplies in their support trailer. -- Scuttleblog, read on: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/blog/2008/02/aed-for-everyone.html THREE MAJOR INDUSTRY MARKETING INITIATIVES Orlando, Fla., Feb. 21, 2008 – At its bi-annual meeting during the Miami International Boat Show last week, Marine Marketers of America announced three major marketing initiatives to benefit the boating industry - a pro bono cause marketing campaign, a marine industry speakers bureau and a marketing awards competition, an industry first. MMA’s first pro bono industry marketing project will be a test program involving boating education programs targeted at women. Co-chairs John Wisse and Jim Rhodes are spearheading the effort which will be tested at the local/ regional level with the potential to grow into a national industry promotion if successful. -- Read on: http://sailingscuttlebutt.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=5833 THE PIRATES LAIR: MOISTURE WICKING HEADQUARTERS! Wikz, Sport Tec, Alo, and the mother of all technical tee's, ProWick & DryShirt. If you're buying technical apparel from any other company… you're paying too much. Let The Pirates Lair supply your event with the highest quality dye-sublimation and screenprinting available. Call 888-724-5286 or log on to http://www.pirateslair.com/sailing to request your free catalog. WHERE ARE THEY NOW? Alameda, CA --The late Steve Fosset's 125-ft catamaran Cheyenne is on the hard at Nelson's Marine to assess damage reportedly caused by an exploded liferaft canister. There's been no word yet as to the extent of the damage. Most recently, she was converted to a power cat and served as the camera platform for filming Roy Disney's Morning Light project in 2007 - chasing the project's namesake Transpac 52 across the Pacific. Prior to that, she set what's now the third fastest time around the globe under sail. She was commissioned by Fosset, and designed by the Southern California firm Morelli and Melvin to compete as PlayStation in Bruno Peyron's The Race at the turn of the millenium. -- Latitude 38, http://tinyurl.com/22534n WHERE THEY ARE NOW If you were wondering what Dennis Conner and Peter Isler were up to, this week they are sailing together on Dennis’ latest Stars and Stripes, formerly known as the Farr 60 Numbers. They are joined by eighteen other boats on the San Diego to Puerto Vallarta race that began last Saturday. Here is their report: (Sunday, Feb 24 - 14:15 PST) After 24 hours of relatively light air upwind and close reaching, three of the four Class 2 boats are within sight of each other - 45 miles off the Mexican coast and 190 miles down the track from the starting line. Unfortunately for our STARS AND STRIPES, both the Santa Cruz 70’s - HOLUA and OEX - have an edge on us in these conditions. HOLUA is better VMG on the wind than OEX and when close reaching, OEX seems to have legs on HOLUA. We are still waiting to find out what conditions will favor us. We awoke to the sun shimmering through the silver clouds and the sounds of mother Pacific grey whales with their calves heading north from Mag Bay. It made all the hard work preparing for the race worthwhile. The expected "dry front" has just come through and we are VMG running in 13 knots of wind and beautiful sunny skies.... 68-degree weather. We'll be abeam of Cedros Island by early Monday morning which is where the first wolf trap will be laid and decisions will have to be made as to when to gybe at the first turn of the race. On corrected time, we are just okay and still in the hunt. Its a great crew, the food is plentiful, and everyone is having a good time. -- Race website: http://www.sdyc.org/pv PROUD MOMENT You know that sailing has hit the big time in the sporting world when one of our high profile athletes is compared to a fisherman. This comes from Eric Sharp of the Detroit Free Press: Greenville, S.C. -- If you say "TO" to a football fan, he'll almost certainly know you're talking about Terrell Owens. To a racing sailor, "DC" means Dennis Conner. And to a bass angler, "KVD" can only be Kevin VanDam, the Kalamazoo Kid from Michigan, who today hopes to win the Bassmaster Classic for a third time and add another half-million dollars to the record $2.6 million he has won in a spectacular career. Terrell Owens must be proud. -- Scuttleblog, http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/blog/2008/02/proud-moment.html WE’RE AT THE END OF OUR ROPE And that’s good news for you, because Hall Spars & Rigging’s famous end-of-spool rope sale starts today. After a busy year we have over 1,000 pieces of pre-cut, high-performance line that we must sell. This is the year ’s best pricing on the good stuff – the only catch is that you must buy the exact length listed on our sale page. We’ll add a shackle or whip the ends, but no more cuts! Click “End of our Rope Sale” and get the bargains before they’re gone. http://www.hallspars.com PROBLEMS AT THE TORNADO WORLDS Of the eleven Olympic events, only the Tornado, Laser Radial, and Star have yet to host their 2008 World Championship. The Tornado class will be next, with racing to begin Monday in Takapuna, New Zealand… or will it? Strong winds prevented the fleet from competing in the practice race on Sunday, but it is the high tides that may prove to be the event’s biggest obstacle for host Takapuna Boating Club. For this series, it was proposed to build a new ramp off the clubhouse which would have permitted all tide and all sea launching. However this was delayed by a group of local residents using an Objection process. Consequently, the new ramp was unable to be built in time for the World Championship, and with a big drop at the end of the current ramp caused by erosion of sand, it is impossible to launch boats. As the high tides will continue for the rest of the week during the middle of the day, it is not known what arrangements will be made by event organisers to facilitate the launching of competitors without sustaining substantial damage. -- Event website: http://www.takapunaworlds.org/index.cfm?eid=989 FOR THE RECORD * Jules Verne Trophy (crewed circumnavigation around the three capes): (February 24, 2008) After capsizing on February 17th at 140 km to the east of the port of Dunedin in New Zealand, Groupama 3 was towed into port last Saturday. The 103-foot maxi trimaran had to be towed turtled, so the team immediately set to work with pumps to facilitate righting the craft. At the time of the capsize, which was caused when the leeward float broke in two, leading to the breakage of the two beams, the team had been at sea for 24 days, and had amassed a day’s lead over the current record set in 2005 by Bruno Peyron. -- http://www.cammas-groupama.com/en * Route de l'Or (crewed route from New York to San Francisco): (Day 39 - February 24, 2008; 22:30 UTC) Lionel Lemonchois and his nine-man crew onboard the 110-foot maxi-catamaran Gitana 13 are just over 1,000 miles from the finish, and currently find themselves off the tip of the Baja California. Sailing upwind angles for the past 24-hours, their average speed is 15.6 kt (13.9 kt VMG) while gaining 374.5 nm down the track. -- http://www.gitana-team.com/en/gitana10/homepage.asp SAILING SHORTS * Terrigal, Australia (February 23, 2008) Racing concluded Saturday at the Laser Masters Worlds, which hosted four age divisions, with nearly each age division broken into Standard or Radial rig, and Overall and Women’s fleets. Among the 335 entrants, the top North American in each fleet were James Liebl (USA), 1st - Apprentice Laser Radial Overall (35-44yrs); Michelle Davis (USA), 5th - Apprentice Laser Radial Women (35-44yrs); Andy Roy (CAN), 4th - Masters Laser (45-54 yrs); Al Clark (CAN), 4th - Masters Laser Radial Overall (45-54 yrs); Doug Peckover (USA), 12th - Grand Masters Laser Radial Overall (55-64 yrs); and Peter Seidenberg (USA), 1st - Great Grand Masters Laser Radial Overall (65+ yrs). - http://aus08.laserinternational.org/resultsMaster.php * Clearwater, FL (February 24, 2008) Beginning last Thursday, the Midwinter’ s East Championship for the Laser, Radial, and 4.7 fleets had four days of sailing planned, but conditions on the final two days precluded any races except one for the 4.7’s on Sunday. Fortunately, decent winds provided for either a six or seven race series for the fleets, with the 51-boat Laser fleet won by Raul Aguayo Roco (Dominican Republic), the 93-boat Radial fleet won by local Paige Railey, and Cameron Hall (St. Petersburg, FL) topping the 23 Laser 4.7’s. -- Complete results: http://www.regattaprocessing.com/CLWYC/LMWE08/index.php * The International Olympic Committee (IOC) have announced that Singapore will host the first Summer Youth Olympic Games in 2010. The result was unveiled by the IOC President, Jacques ROGGE, at the Olympic Museum in Lausanne. Singapore beat Moscow in the final by 53 votes to 44. The Youth Olympic Games aim to bring together talented young athletes – age group 14 to 18 - from around the world. The first Summer Youth Olympic Games will gather approximately 3,200 athletes and 800 officials and feature 100 sailors in four sailing events: one person dinghy men; one person dinghy women; windsurfing men; and windsurfing women. -- http://tinyurl.com/2gohln * The Canadian Yachting Association’s Offshore Committee has been working diligently through the winter months on an initiative to provide Canadian IRC sailors with home-based measurers. The goal of this initiative is to service IRC sailors across Canada with regional measurers. At this time, the CYA has announced a partnership with US Sailing in pursuit of this initiative. The CYA is now endorsing US Sailing’s IRC Measurer’s certification program for Canadians and US Sailing is now accepting Canadians into their certification programs. -- http://www.sailing.ca/feature/2008/02/irc.html * Sydney, Australia - Twenty-nine entrants competed in the 18-foot Skiff JJ Giltinan International Championship, with the crew of Seve Jarvin, Sam Newton and Robert Bell sailing Gotta Love It 7 to victory, with lone North American and past champion Howie Hamlin sailing Wild Oats Chardonnay to 12th position. -- See photos and event information at http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/photos/08/jj TWENTY AND COUNTING What do you get with attending thousands of regattas and having countless supports boats on the water? Twenty years of commitment to the sport. Providing the optimal platform for setting marks, coaching, or just watching the races, RIBCRAFT is the official RIB of US SAILING and the US Sailing Team. http://www.ribcraftusa.com EIGHT BELLS John Kostanecki passed away at the UVA Hospital at 2:45 AM on Wednesday, February 21, 2008, from a heart attack resulting from internal injuries and an infection for which he was hospitalized on Monday morning. John is the son of Andrew Kostanecki, past chairman of the U.S. Olympic Sailing Committee, and current secretary to the U.S. Olympic Committee, who currently resides in Orchid, Florida. John became a paraplegic in 1977 following a disabling automobile accident. However, he led a full life, skiing, sailing and living life to the fullest with his family and friends, blaming no one, showing malice towards none and cheerfully accepting his life in a wheelchair. During the 1970s, John was a top junior sailor in Long Island Sound. In 2000 John placed second in the Paraplegic Sailing Trials, narrowly missing the right to compete in Sydney, Australia, as a representative of the United States. He competed in several wheelchair marathon races, fly fished, camped, and danced. Donations can be sent to Charitable Foundation, Therapeutic Adventures, Inc., (PO Box 4668, Charlottesville, VA 22095), and while a memorial was held last weekend, a memorial celebration of John's life also will be held at a future date in Darien, CT, his hometown. -- http://tinyurl.com/2x2jwg CALENDAR OF MAJOR EVENTS (Sponsored by West Marine) Events listed at http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/calendar 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 the Curmudgeon: To save those ‘buttheads who are desperately tired of the America’s Cup legal maneuvering that has occurred since the closing of the 32nd event last year, Scuttlebutt has tried to avoid some of the stories that we find to be “non-essential.” One such recent story regards the Décision 35 Class catamaran racing on Lake Geneva, hosted in part by Ernesto Bertarelli’s club (Société Nautique Genève). BMW Oracle Racing purportedly has an alliance with one of the boat owners, and has plans to compete in some or all the eight class events. Whatever you might think of Ernesto, it wouldn’t be a big surprise if the guy would like to occasionally retreat to his own pond, and go sailboat racing without all the crapola that has become the Cup following him. The appropriateness of BOR’s entry has been much discussed amongst the class members, and this letter by Adrian Morgan comments on the situation: “I can't be the only one feeling a little sorry for Ernesto. Call me perverse, but why do we fondly think that good 'ol Larry (Ellison) has any purer motives, or that he can be regarded as anything other than another America's Cup predator, with a cleverer legal team? To muscle in to the D35 competition strikes me as being provocative and if I were among those elite Swiss bankers I would vote to exclude a blatantly commercial spoiler entry from a competitor against whom I was fighting a legal battle. It would sour the contest and spoil the fun. And I note that Ernesto was not among those against the Oracle entry. So give the man a break.” CURMUDGEON’S OBSERVATION As I've matured, I've learned that you cannot make someone love you. All you can do is stalk them and hope they panic and give in. Special thanks to The Pirate’s Lair, Hall Spars & Rigging, and Ribcraft RIBs. A complete list of preferred suppliers is at http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/ssc/suppliers |
