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SCUTTLEBUTT 1918 - September 7, 2005Scuttlebutt is a digest of major yacht racing news, commentary, opinions, features and dock talk . . . with a North American focus.FUN - WITH A CAPITAL 'F' (The Daily Sail subscription website took a ride on Volvo's new all-carbon fibre catamaran and filed an extensive report. Here are a couple of excerpts.) Aside from the in-port racing during the forthcoming Volvo Ocean Racing, stopovers in several ports will be enlivened by racing between the new Volvo Extreme 40 catamarans. At one point before Volvo's involvement the boat was known as the Tornado 40 and this pretty much sums up the boat's overall concept. 40ft (12.2m) by 23ft (7m) her length to beam ratio is larger than the 2:1 proportions of the 6m Olympic catamaran, while she carries 100sqm of sail area upwind and 153sqm downwind on an all-up weight of 1,250kg. So what's it like to sail? On the day we were on board there was around 12-15 knots of breeze and when (Mitch) Booth got in the groove she was clearly accelerating to 20. With modest freeboard and the boat readily able to lift her weather hull, you do get more of a sensation of speed compared to maxi-catamarans or 60ft trimarans where you are much further off the water. According to Booth to date the top speed of the boat has been 31 knots achieved in 20 knots of breeze and clearly there is more to come. Herbert Dercksen, Booth's Tornado crew and who is running the Volvo Extreme 40 show says the crew have managed to lift the weather hull in just 4 knots of breeze, but this was reaching under genniker. Typically gybing downwind in a race situation the hull is likely to fly in 6 knots of wind. Still, this is Fun - with a capital F. -- www.thedailysail.com MAXIMUS DISMASTED Porto Cervo, Italy -- Heavy showers, thunder and lightning rolled in 15 minutes before the scheduled start of the second race of the Maxi Yacht Rolex Cup series. Many boats in the fleet experienced major damage. But it was Maximus, co-owned by the two New Zealand businessmen Charles St Clair Brown and Bill Buckley who recently took line honours in the 2005 Rolex Fastnet Race and were first on corrected time in the Grand Prix Division of the 2005 Rolex Transatlantic Challenge, who took the worst toll, losing the rig a few hundred metres before the finish line. Nobody on board was injured. At the time Maximus was the leading boat of the fleet and looked set to add another Line Honours to her growing record. Race Committee support boats rendered assistance and the stricken maxi was safely moored back at the marina, while the rig - including sails, boom and vang - were left at sea and will be recovered, although probably in many pieces, as soon as possible. In the Racing division, following Maximus' catastrophic breakdown, it was Skandia who took line honours, followed, over 20 minutes later, by Great Britain's Black Dragon -- which won on corrected time. -- www.yccs.it DREAM TEAM Anyone considering mounting a British America's Cup challenge, and London 2012 chief executive Keith Mills has recently promised to make a £10 million contribution, can now see the tantalizing prospect of three of Britain's finest Olympic medallists working as a unit. That was the outcome of last week's Louis Vuitton Act 6 and 7 regattas in Malmo, Sweden, where Ian Walker was tactician to Iain Percy, the skipper of Italy's +39 team. Percy has already cemented an alliance with Ben Ainslie, who is now with Emirates Team New Zealand. Percy and Walker have been in the vanguard of British Olympic sailing for a decade and garnered a gold and two silver medals. Melded with Ainslie, this combination would be a coalition of all that is cool, competitive and co-operative in British elite sailing, an alignment of big names that would have been impossible in the Lawrie Smith, Harold Cudmore, Chris Law, Eddie Owen, Rodney Pattisson era two or three generations back. Percy has not yet spoken to Mills. "Of course I keep an eye on what's going on and I'm sure I will speak to him sometime," he said. After sailing with Percy last week, Walker links up soon with Ainslie on the TP52 Patches in Sardinia. Where Percy and Ainslie are close friends, having trodden a common path through the Laser and Finn single-hander classes, Walker and Ainslie have had to work harder at their relationship. -- Tim Jeffery, The Telegraph, full story: http://tinyurl.com/7rgog WHERE ARE THEY NOW? Of the 16 men who sailed Black Magic to victory in 1995 (America's Cup), 13 are still involved in the cup. Just the late Sir Peter Blake, Russell Coutts and Richard Dodson, who is a director at North Sails in Auckland, will not be in Valencia in two years' time. Of the 13, five [Brad Butterworth, Warwick Fleury, Dean Phipps, Simon Daubney and Murray Jones] are with defenders Alinghi and therefore haven't relinquished the cup since receiving it on the dock in San Diego. Taylor and Tom Schnackenberg are with Luna Rossa Ross Halcrow, Craig Monk and Robbie Naismith are with BMW Oracle Racing, Jeremy Scantlebury is with Sweden's Victory Challenge and Matthew Mason and Joe Allen are at Emirates Team New Zealand. -- Julie Ash, NZ Herald, http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=4&ObjectID=10343820 IT TAKES VERVE - AND FAST RAGS - TO WIN! When boats are even, the fastest sails win. Take Chicago YC's Verve Cup, where Jack Buoscio, Lou and Martin Sandoval, and Andrew Reynolds's Beneteau 36.7 'Karma', with their boat set up to Doyle's tuning guide, won with a new Doyle Class main, Class AP #1, and Class half-ounce spinnaker. In the Beneteau 40.7 class's N/A Championship, Dr. Steve Mash's 'Hot Lips 4', powered by an all-Doyle Class inventory and Doyle set up, blitzed the fleet with five bullets. If you want to win but lack the verve, call us today at 1-800-94 DOYLE; http://www.doylesails.com JUD SMITH LEADS ETCHELLS WORLDS By finishing 3-2 in the first two races of the Etchells World Championship at the Richmod YC, Jud Smith has taken a two point lead over Canada's Hank Lammens. Samuel Kahn who won the first race finished ninth in the 20-25 knot second race to hold down the third place slot. There are seven races scheduled, with six races constituting a series in the non drop series. As a result, the protests are expected to be robust. Standings after two races: 1 Jud Smith, H Frazer, A Wills (USA) 5 points 2 Hank Lammens, M Lammens, D Sabin (CAN) 7 pts 3 Samuel Kahn, B Lee, J Madngali, A Finglas (USA1278) 10 pts 4 Stuart Childerley, S Russell, R Marino (GBR) 11 pts 5 William Palmer III, T Corkett, Jr., B Cavanaugh (USA) 13 pts 6 Tito Gonzales, B Mauk, B Batzer, D Gonzales (USA) 13 pts 7 Brian Thomas, M Brink, H Schreiner (USA) 18 pts 8 Iain Murray, M Coxon, A Palfrey (AUS) 19 pts 9 Peter Vessella, S Gordon, M Carter (USA) 29 pts 10 Steve Girling, J Kemoe, E Doyle (USA) 33 pts Event website: http://www.sfetchells.org/worlds/index.php SHOWBOAT In Formula One the teams and sponsors have "showcars" -- gleaming replicas of the fully-branded F1 cars -- for display at auto shows, malls, corporate exhibitions, and so on. BMW has brought the concept to the AC. USA-61, one of BMW Oracle Racing's trial horses from the last campaign, has already appeared at the BMW-sponsored Kieler Woche, the huge Paris Boat Show and a number of other high-traffic venues. It is great promotion for the Cup, the team and our team partners. Now BMW and the beautiful Munich airport have teamed up for a three-month promotion -- with 61 towering over MUC's central plaza. We checked it out last evening while passing through en route from CPH back to VLC. Very cool. -- Tom Ehman, BMW Oracle Racing blog, http://bmworacleracing.twoday.net/ LOWERING THE SAILS After just completing a most successful Transpac Yacht Race to Hawaii, and a record number of people with disabilities requesting sailing lessons in the coming months, the San Diego-based Challenged America program had to lower the sails on its fleet of sailboats to restructure the program, so to best meet the financial demands projected for the coming year(s), according to Urban Miyares, Challenged America co-founder. "We just had to stop everything, take a hiatus and step back and see 'where we are', 'where we are going' and identify 'how we are going to pay for it'," said Urban Miyares, disabled Vietnam veteran and director of the program's charity. "We've never been busier with requests by the disabled to go sailing. But with charitable contributions and donations decreasing in the past couple of years, and the escalating operating costs to serve the larger numbers of kids and adults with disabilities wanting to sail at Challenged America, we just need to catch up with current bills, and restructure a more effective fiscal and management strategy to accommodate the tremendous growth in the Challenged America program." For more than 25 years the volunteer-based Challenged America program has been providing free learn-to-sail and advanced sailing opportunities to kids, adults and seniors with disabilities, their loved ones, and professionals in recreational rehabilitation and sports therapy. "We're closing the Challenged America Clubhouse office, moving the program to the charity's main office in San Diego, but keeping all our boats at the dock on Shelter Island," Miyares said. - Port@ChallengedAmerica.org NOT SO GOOD The China Team learned one thing from their efforts in the Louis Vuitton pre-regatta series - they have a long way to go if they are to mount any kind of America's Cup challenge. The 11th-hour challenger, whose syndicate is headed by Beijing businessman Wang Chaoyong, finished last overall on Sunday following an intense two weeks of racing on the Baltic Sea involving 12 cup competitors from nine countries in the latest Louis Vuitton pre-regatta. The China Team had not sailed together since their debut performance at the prior regatta in Valencia in June and it showed. "Our results were not so good and it was tough work," said tactician Philippe Mouniac. "We had no time to practise and we have new guys on the boat. We proved here in Malmo that we have a long way to go." Wang caught the sailing bug a year ago and this past spring formed a partnership with the French team Le Defi, who had challenged for the America's Cup in Auckland in 2003. There are three Chinese sailors on board. They were selected from the country's Olympic team and have gone from dingies to the powerful cup boats in a very short time. -- Excerpts from a story by Laurie Fullerton in the South China Morning Post NEWS BRIEFS * The Ericsson Racing Team will be revealing some big news at a media breakfast on Wednesday September 7, in connection with Ericsson's entry in the Volvo Ocean Race 2005-2006. During the press briefing, one of the world's most prolific American sailors will be announced as a new member of the crew. -- Bang the Corner website, http://www.bangthecorner.com/da/19509 * Dame Ellen McArthur, double Olympic Gold medallist Shirley Robertson and Ginnie Chichester, daughter-in law of Sir Francis, will sail the famous yacht Gipsy Moth IV up the Thames to Greenwich on Wednesday (7 September) to meet another famous lady, Her Royal Highness The Princess Royal, when Sir Francis Chichester's yacht Gipsy Moth IV returns to Greenwich for the first time since she left the capital aboard a lorry last November. Helping to crew the yacht will also be some young people from schools and charities. -- Yachting World, http://tinyurl.com/axrvm * Training has kicked off for new recruits of the Global Challenge 2008/2009. Nearly three quarters of the race berths have been snapped up for the event, despite the race not starting for another three years. Although a long way away it is essential to start getting crew trained up as early as possible as 70% of those who apply are non-sailors and will be put through some of the most punishing conditions on earth. One of the major changes for the Global Challenge 2008/09 has been to raise of the upper age limit from 60 to 65. -- http://www.challengebusiness.com/global * A team from the Royal Thames Yacht Club traveled to Newport RI, on Sept 3-4 to compete against the New York Yacht Club and defend their 2002 win of the Commodore George Nichols Trophy -- a silver bowl that dates to 1802 and has been the prize for a team race regatta between the two clubs for over two decades. This year's 15-race regatta was won by the four-boat NYYC team. -- http://nyyc.org/ * Photos from the America's Cup fleet racing at Act 7 in Sweden are now available on the Scuttlebutt website: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/photos/05/malmo-7/ GET A GRIP ON FALL Just because the summer is ending doesn't mean you have to put away your Sperry Top-Siders®. The brand that you love and trust for summer now keeps you in step with fall with the new Mako Lug Collection, rugged, nautically inspired footwear for land or sea. Their unique lugged siped outsoles provide the surefooted grip you expect from Sperry Top-Sider, with added traction for mud or snow. Available in an Oxford or boot in rich browns, blacks and tans, the Mako Lug Collection is perfect for fall fashions. Suggested retail price is $79.95 to $89.95. http://www.sperrytopsider.com/mens_nautical.asp 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, whining and personal attacks for elsewhere.) * From Lloyd Causey (In response to Michael Koster comments): There are no undamaged, operating yacht clubs on the Gulf Coast to carry out your suggestions. Many are concrete slabs, and all will require 6 months rebuild before anyone can be accommodated. Many yacht club members have been rescuing people in New Orleans in violation of the law. People trying to help are blocked by all the "official" people from governments. However it seems that it's okay for all those cable turkeys with their cameras and crews to invade so that you can have your 24X7 coverage. * From Guy P. Brierre: Every Yacht Club from New Orleans to Mobile Bay has been destroyed. Not damaged, not flooded, not shingles missing - Destroyed! Donate your money, blood or time to the Red Cross or other reputable aid organization. We who are in the middle of it appreciate your help more than you know. * From Eric C. T. E. Larsen: Recently, in a lecture I was giving, an MBA caught my attention because he was wearing a belt that indicated he might be a sailboat racer. I had hoped that he was a fellow addict and the lazy/silly side of me was hoping he would know that key nugget that would make auto-bullets a reality. He shared his surprise that a skipper of the recent Rolex Transatlantic had said that when things went wrong during the race that he had felt like he had been operating as a business executive and managing just as he would of on land. The quote is second hand, so pardon any inaccuracy, but I want to use it to highlight what my observations of effective racing have been over the long term. Much like how the house always wins in the long run in gambling, effective total program leadership and effective leadership on the water takes people to the top and keeps them there. Sailboat racing is not a metaphor for business, nor is business a metaphor for sailboat racing, as beneath the apparent dissimilarities they are the same practice. For the grandmasters of sailboat racing, what are the reasons that some successful business leaders do not perform as well in sailing? * From Laurie Fullerton: I was fortunate enough to have spent the last four days watching fleet racing in Malmo as a member of the media. Off the water there was a great deal of discussion and some anger about the U.S. journalists opinions of the America's Cup which appeared in Scuttlebutt all last week. It appears that Europeans feel a journalists opinion is far too important to fall into the trap of not investigating it first-hand before reporting on it - and this opinion made us all wide open to criticism and a loss of credibility. Being an American anywhere these days is an exercise in the latter but can I suggest you veteran writers get to Act 8 and 9 in Trapani in late September if you can? Your opinions do matter a great deal and the hard-work and dedication of the sailors and the organizers is the real story right now. * From Jay Sharkey: Cheers to Herb McCormick for his thoughts on the travesty that the America's Cup has become. What ever happened to a "Corinthian" event where sailors made the difference, not dollars? Sure technology is expensive, but at what cost? We're losing some of the most legendary sailors of this era to deep pockets and huge egos. It is sad to see talent like the Brit olympians, Coutts, and Conner sitting on the sidelines for what is supposed to be the world's most premiere sailing event. * From Charlie McLaughlin: (regarding Herb McCormick article in 'Butt 1911) Herb's right. Scuttlebutt recently noted that AC budgets would approach, if not exceed, $1.5 Billion US. To put that in perspective, at a cost of 50 cents per pill per day, the AC expenditures would fund the treatment of all of Africa's 38 million AIDS victims with life-saving drugs for 77 days. Not a particularly tough choice in my book! The cynics suggest that those of us who are distressed by these expenditures are arguing that we all give up sailing, don hair shirts, sell the boat, and give everything to charity. Not so. Rather, we are asking, "when is enough, enough?" Inherently generous sailors are right to call this unlimited war of egos unseemly. The AC, with or without professionals, need not be eliminated; it should be a quest to see who the best sailors are, not who has the deepest pockets. And in truth, an enormous pool of the "best" sailors are left ashore because of the AC format, the time requirements, and budgets. Today only professionals with no other obligations need apply. Level racing would answer the question and reign in the budgets. Who seriously can argue that the Cup and the sport today are better off than they were when the Corinthian spirit was more in evidence? The AC expenditures today are an embarrassment to the sport and should be to all of us who participate in it. The Cup process desperately needs revision. Enough is enough. * From Ken Lane: Starting out as a foredeck guy (they weren't called bowmen back then) many years ago, I was talking to a more experienced friend of mine one day. I wanted to learn about being a trimmer as it looked like a much nicer place to be going to Bermuda. My friend cautioned me. "Don't forget, the closer you are to the back of the boat, the closer you are to being off the boat" Words to live by! CURMUDGEON'S OBSERVATION You start with a bag full of luck and an empty bag of experience. The trick is to fill the bag of experience before you empty the bag of luck. |
