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SCUTTLEBUTT 2319 - April 10, 2007Scuttlebutt is a digest of major sailing news, commentary, opinions,features and dock talk . . . with a North American focus. Scuttlebutt is distributed each weekday, with support provided by UBS, main partner of Alinghi, Defender of the 32nd America's Cup (http://www.ubs.com/sailing). A SOBERING THOUGHT It is a sobering thought for the 11 pretenders to Alinghi's America's Cup that even with a string of bad starts from helmsman Ed Baird and even using the slower of the team's two boats, the Swiss defenders still walloped the opposition in the seven-race Act 13, which concluded at Valencia on Saturday. Now Alinghi has two months of splendid isolation to iron out helmsman issues and develop even more speed while the 11 challengers try and eliminate each other through four rounds of selection trials. Ed Baird, given the nod over fellow American Peter Holmberg, admitted to his shortcomings in five starts out of seven. "I didn't start very well this week, but fortunately the finish is where you get your points," he admitted. Perversely, precisely because of Baird's starts, SUI 91's recoveries were aided by clear air. Yet most of the gains came from speed, crafty positioning by skipper Brad Butterworth and polished crew work. -- By Tim Jeffery, The Telegraph, full story: http://tinyurl.com/2w7o8b AN INTIMIDATING DISPLAY (Here's an excerpt from the summary of the Act 13 fleet racing that appears on The Daily Sail subscription website.) In putting on an intimidating display for the challengers, Alinghi could have done no better. After racing several challenger were asked if they thought Alinghi was beatable, but few came up with responses that sounded that convincing. Alinghi unquestionably showed boat speed at least as good as her rivals in Act 13, but her crew also made some outstanding tactical called and won four races despite getting only two reasonable starts. Because they are the defender and their score has no bearing on points they can take forward to the Louis Vuitton Cup, they were perhaps less molested on the race course than they might have been. Butterworth acknowledges that this was the case particularly towards the end of the regata: "No one was that interested in us, so we got to sail in our own lanes. We only tacked on two boats in the whole regatta. It was a great opportunity for us to sail against the other teams but we don't want to get involved with that end of it." In comparison with Alinghi, the three 'big' challengers - BMW Oracle Racing, Luna Rossa and Emirates Team NZ, looked every bit as fast in terms of boat speed, but they consistently seemed to break less gear, make less crew errors and had less glitches in their performance. -- http://www.thedailysail.com BIG BOYS, MAJOR TOYS AT THE "BUCKET" The world's fastest superyachts gather for the St. Barth's Bucket to battle on the water and unwind at cocktail parties onboard the fleet, moored stern-to on the quay. As usual, Doyle-powered boats claimed some silver: Kaori, a 118-foot Paine-designed sloop, took the Grand Dame division, and the 289-foot, Dyna-Rigged Maltese Falcon took the Perini Navi Best Overall award. It just goes to show that, big or small, when you want to go fast, go Doyle: http://www.doylesails.com Curmudgeon's Comments: We have photos of these thoroughbreds from the St Barths Bucket, now on the Scuttlebutt site: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/photos/07/bucket HOW THE CLASS WAS WON (The American team of Sally Barkow, Debbie Capozzi, and Carrie Howe won the Yngling class last week at 38 Trofeo SAR Princesa Sofia Mapfre in Palma de Mallorca, Spain. Here are their tactical notes from the final race.) It was clear that our major opponent was Sarah Ayton and her British crew who were trailing us in second place by nine points (and were the only team that could beat us). Discussing our tactical options with our coaches, it came down to this: if we finished in the top five boats, we would win the series, or if we finished in any place in front of Sarah we would win. As a group we decided to match race Sarah early in the five-minute pre-start sequence. and than work to hold her at the back of the fleet. Fifty seconds after the five minute gun, we were circling with Sarah to windward of the starting line in only four knots of wind. We managed to lure her into a penalty but our relative positions after that gave her more control than she'd had before. Sarah broke away with a minute remaining to the start and we tailed her, trying to push her past the pin end of the start line. With seconds remaining Sarah tacked away (to port) towards the committee boat and we chose to let her go. We both made good starts with our boat in the middle of the line and the Brits at the committee boat. We were controlling the left side - which was favored for wind angle and pressure - and were able to maintain a tight cover, always forcing the Brits to the unfavored right hand side of the course. We laid the mark nicely and rounded in fifth place while the Brits had to make an extra tack to lay it and then had to make a downspeed spinnaker set. We extended on the run and then maintained our cover on the weather leg. On the final run Sarah made up ground on us as we fought to get clear of the German boat but we finished just ahead of her, sixth and seventh respectively, and that was all we needed. -- Team Seven Sailing, Sally Barkow/ Debbie Capozzi/ Carrie Howe DON'T BEAT YOURSELF A race in the hindsight of those who sailed in it is remembered so many different ways. Have you ever talked to someone about a race where they had a disappointing result? Generally you will hear them explain the race away by pointing fingers. They blame the race committee for an un-square line or uneven course, they moan about how the wind shifts were not on their side, they may even point to the actions of another competitor that affected their race, however slight, according to their to complete detriment. On the flip side if you ask someone who just finished a great race they are all smiles. "Our speed was great", or "We were really dialed in" will be their summation. Competitors by nature tend to externalize the negatives and internalize positives. Do you see how these two sailors are in one case ignoring their mistakes while in the other case ignoring that they may have had some good fortune? This is a great challenge that we must overcome to become better sailors. When I was 14 years old I was sailing in a youth regatta in very light winds on Lake Ontario. I didn't have a coach, but my father (a self confessed mediocre club sailor) would take me to the events. I came in from a long day (two races in six hours) with large wind shifts that all seemed to be against me. The first thing I said when I saw him was "That sucked, those guys who won were just lucky." My father, having spent the day ashore waiting for me to come in and not liking my tone retorted, "Well, you all sailed the same course." At the time I hated this comment but now I am thankful for hearing it. It's absolutely true, we started at the same time and made decisions based on what we thought was the best way to get around the course the fastest. Others made better decisions than I did and thus they beat me. What I should have said was, "I made a big mistake, I should have seen that pressure coming from the right side and been there for it." By externalizing the bad result I would have learnt nothing from it and just written it off to bad luck. -- By Dave Wright, a current member of the Canadian Sailing Team, former Intercollegiate National Singlehanded Champion during his career at Kings Point (USMMA), full story: http://tinyurl.com/yt6ttm FINAL RACES ABANDONED Fredrik Loof and Anders Ekstrom (SWE) took the honours at the ISAF Grade C1 Star Western Hemisphere Championship, with the wind deserting Tampa Bay on the final day. Loof collected his fifth Silver Star Championship with a comfortable ten point win. Davis Island Yacht Club (Tampa, Florida) pulled out all of the stops on the water and on shore for the Star Class. By using Format C, which provided for short courses, they took into account almost everything - except that sometimes no matter what you do the wind will not cooperate. The 2007 Star Western Hemisphere Championship ended with former World Champions Loof and Ekstrom claiming the Silver Star with 11 points. Peter Broby and Bill McNiven (BER) were second with 21 points. Iain Murray and Andrew Palfrey (AUS) were third. Rohan Lord and Miles Addy (NZL) were fourth and Andy MacDonald and Mike Wolfs (USA) were fifth. Only four points separated the second place finishers from the fifth place finishers. - Event website: http://diyc.home.att.net/ BACK BY SAILORS REQUEST For racing or a night out with the crew, these canvas shorts are perfect for all activities. This modern, classic Italian design is also great for crew dress uniforms! The Porto Cervo shorts are made from 9 oz. brushed, soft cotton canvas. They have a relaxed fit with plain front, zipper fly, belt loops, two deep side pockets, and two stitched rear pockets with Velcro closures. They're designed with a double-seat for protection and gusseted crotch for full range of motion. The stone colored front and mist gray, blue, or stone back give these shorts a unique look. http://www.camet.com SAILING SHORTS * Olin Stephens, widely regarded as the leading designer of the 20th century, will celebrate his 99th birthday this Friday on April 13. * A number of brothers are involved with the America's Cup. However the most accomplished America's Cup siblings are the McKee brothers from Seattle, Washington, who sail on Luna Rossa. Younger brother Charlie, 45, is one of the team's tacticians, while Jonathan, 48 is on main sheet. At an age when many would have hung up their Olympic sailing boots, the brothers teamed up again in 2000 attracted by the advent of the high performance skiff, the 49er, securing for the US a bronze medal. The America's Cup website has an interesting story of these talented brothers: http://tinyurl.com/34njpa * Keefe Kaplan Marine Inc. (KKMI) has won the American Boat Builders and Repairers Association's (ABBRA) "Boatyard of the Year" award -- saluting the first time any company from Northern California has received the award. Voted on by the Association's 300+ members the recipient must demonstrate excellence in all facets of their organization. The company must be committed to customer service, quality management and promote a positive environment with vendors and employees. * The America's Cup website has published the official pairing for Round Robin One of the Louis Vuitton Cup which is scheduled to begin next Monday, April 16. The Race Committee intends to start no more than two flights of races each day, with the first warning signal scheduled to sound at 14:05. If, due to weather conditions, it is impossible to run all the scheduled Matches on a day, the Regatta Director will respect the original pairing list as much as possible and re-schedule the un-sailed matches on the first available slots available (reserve days and one race days). -- http://www.americascup.com/en/ RONSTAN ORBIT BLOCKS LAUNCH AT STRICTLY SAIL PACIFIC Revolutionary in design and construction, new Orbit Blocks are lighter, stronger and WAAAY cooler than any blocks you have ever seen. Be among the first to see & touch the Orbit blocks next week at Strictly Sail Pacific. Think you can't reinvent the wheel? See for yourself at Ronstan's booth #337. http://www.ronstan.com/orbitblocks * The 10th Annual Strictly Sail Pacific boat show will be held April 18-22, 2007, in Oakland, CA., and Scuttlebutt has $5.00 discount tickets for all the 'buttheads. Look for the Curmudgeon at the show, and the banner ad on the Scuttlebutt website for ticket info, or go straight to the show's e-commerce site to buy your discount tickets: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/jump/strictlysail 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 Rich Roberts (re the decision that the German syndicate can not give the +39 team one of their spars because, "this was a breach of the Protocol that requires all equipment to be designed by the team."): So, the Italians are finished before it starts because the boats must be true to each team's nationality, while nowadays the sailors can be from anywhere. Thus, the America's Cup will be defended in Spain by a so-called Swiss team led by New Zealanders with American helmsmen, and the "American" team . . . never mind, just tell me when it's over. * From Christian Jensen: I was reading the SB below and it triggered a feeling I have had for some time but haven't voiced before. You are reporting on the 38 Trofeo Sar Princesa Sofia and in your eagerness of reporting North American finish positions you completely left out the top finishing positions (unless they happened to be from NA) - e.g. in the Lasers - the top mention was for an American in 8th place - no mention of # 1,2 and 3. Come on. While I understand that you are American and are rooting for American teams - somehow expanded to include Canadian and Mexican teams (maybe to make the mentions more impressive?) it leaves a somewhat bad taste in my mouth to see an 8th place being the top reported finish in a class. Please reconsider your way of reporting scores. There are many countries that are important in sailing and that includes a fair amount outside NA. Curmudgeon's Comment: Your point is well taken. The next major event on the European circuit is the Semaine Olimpique Francais in Hyeres, France in two weeks, and we will attempt to expand our coverage for that regatta. * From Richard Shulman: From the East Coast, I echo the West Coast concerns in Scuttlebutt #2318 regarding US-IRC's claim that almost all big boat events in the U.S. are offering IRC. US-IRC is ignoring large portions of the US and is attempting to promote a false air of inevitability that irks many sailors. Racing here on the East Coast, we have been forced to use IRC for some distance races and at the urging of US-IRC, PHRF has been dropped for inshore races. Pity the poor owner seeking a reasonable alternative for racing on a casual basis. Even worse, pity the poor owner who owns a boat that is uncompetitive under IRC which clearly favors certain design characteristics. Without the alternative of PHRF, cruising is the remaining answer. US-IRC's attempt to project an air of inevitability is a hollow claim when you consider that major East Coast events such as Marion-Bermuda and Newport-Bermuda have offered IRC only as secondary scoring to the main ORR event. Despite all the IRC hype of the last two years there were only 624 IRC certificates in the entire US at the end of 2006. That should be compared to 720+ ORR certificates and 18,000+ PHRF certificates. It is a great shame that US-IRC has spent so much time and effort on promoting their rule and has excluded any discussion of what is best for sailors and boat owners here on the East Coast, the West Coast and all the equally important sailing areas in between. * From Paul Kueffner (edited to our 250-word limit): Recent letters to you about IRC in the U.S. bring up a number of misconceptions that perhaps you can straighten out. If IRC is trying to grow the sport, why are they suggesting (in the area around Long Island Sound anyway) that boats wanting to use spinnakers have to use IRC ratings; otherwise they have to sail under cruising canvas? Or if boats rate under 90 PHRF, they have to get an IRC rating in order to race in certain events? This sounds like reducing the number of participants, not growing them. The other issue is the "momentum" of IRC. The latest flashy brochure I got from them mentioned (quite briefly, in a sidebar) that the number of IRC certificates had dropped by 700 in Spain last year. That's a hefty chunk, about 10%? Other countries, like England and France also dropped in the number of IRC certificates issued in 2006. Maybe a lot of guys racing to Bermuda last year had to get IRC certs (it's nice be able to fly a chute in a 600 mile race if you need to) and that's the momentum they're talking about. If there are only about 7000 IRC certificates issued Worldwide, (of which fewer than 600 were in the U.S. at the end of last August according to the IRC's own figures) and roughly 22,000 PHRF racers in the US alone, it makes you wonder if the current is headed the way they say it is. * From Noah Purves-Smith: (Re the comments about Olympic multihull sailors) There seems to be this distinction that multihull sailing is only enjoyed and supported by a bunch of beer drinking, beach sailors whose main interest is in "having a Hobie day". Respectfully, I think the entire dinghy vs. multihull sailor issue completely misses the point. By the logic presented, I guess we should remove skiffs and keelboats from the Olympics too, because most sailors in those classes got their development in dinghies as well. Wait, how about we narrow down Olympic sailing to one class - the Optimist dinghy. It's probably the only class that can claim to have developed the majority of Olympic talent. On a more serious note, maybe we could view the different classes as representing a diverse spectrum of sailing. Each class requires a unique set of physical, tactical and technical abilities. Plain and simple, different sailors enjoy sailing different types of boats. The skill level and respectability of these classes isn't defined by where the sailors come from. Olympic Tornado sailors boast an impressive range of dinghy, keelboat and ocean racing championships to their credit. The winner of the last two J24 worlds comes to mind as an example. Let's put the "us and them" talk to an end, and just be proud of the great results that have been achieved by US sailors in multihull competition (which, incidentally include medals won by both dinghy cross-over's and by lifelong cat sailors). Can't we all just be sailors? CURMUDGEON'S OBSERVATION Seen on the back of a motor home recently - "I have a strong will - and a weak won't" Special thanks to Doyle Sailmakers, Camet International, and Ronstan. Scuttlebutt is also supported by UBS, main partner of Alinghi, the Defender of the 32nd America's Cup. |
