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SCUTTLEBUTT 2877 - Wednesday, July 1, 2009Scuttlebutt is published each weekday with the support of its sponsors,providing a digest of major sailing news, commentary, opinions, features and dock talk . . . with a North American focus. Twitter updates: http://twitter.com/scuttbutt Today's sponsors are Aquidneck Custom Composites and MyBoatsGear.com. ELECTRIC WINCHES AND THE IRC RULE For the IRC handicap rule, designer Mark Mills clearly has the hot hand, and the Mills designed King 40 has demonstrated this fact in its first season. At Acura Key West 2009, Daniel Woolery's King 40 Soozal ably won IRC 2, and the crew has frequently credited that win and further success this season to the work that Scott Easom did in preparing the boat. In the July/August issue of Sailing World, a tech review story explores the electric winch system that Easom installed, and how it brilliantly allows the crew to trim the sails while minimizing effort and maximizing proper crew weight placement. Curious about the ramifications of such a system for the future of the IRC rule, Scuttlebutt contacted US-IRC Executive Director Luiz Kahl for some clarification: SBUTT: What is the IRC rule regarding electric winches? LUIZ KAHL: "The IRC rule likes to be inclusive of whatever the developments are in sailing. It all started many years ago when IRC first allowed stored power on the Swans with the view that it wasn't any advantage (slow electrical winches at the time) but permitted the less young and agile to compete while using the standard powered winches installed on their boats. "Over the years, this equipment has developed and IRC has worked to keep up with the technology. Throughout the years, the IRC certificate application has specifically asked questions so as to properly rate the yachts and their equipment. No rule can think of everything so some new developments may take a little time to be addressed but rest assured that they are addressed at the first opportunity available. "In the case of 'power', the declaration requirement is already in the application. Regarding the rule itself, IRC Rule 14.1 states that 'RRS 52 Manual Power shall not apply. This rule may be amended by the notice of race' which means that if an Organizing Authority would sees fit, they can override and enforce RRS52 by stating so in the NOR or the SIs for the event. As a follow up, rule 14.2 states that 'Boats using stored power for the adjustment or operation of running rigging (eg backstays, runners, checkstays, sheets, guys, etc), but excluding the hoisting, reefing or furling of sails, shall declare this to the Rating Authority' which means that every boat should have declared in their application the use of electrical power and their rating reflects that application to the best of our knowledge today." -- Read on: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/news/09/0630a * Coinciding with the 45th anniversary of the Rolex Big Boat Series, the St. Francis Yacht Club's premier regatta will serve as the 2009 Rolex US-IRC National Championship. "As the IRC rule continues its expansion throughout the U.S. it is only appropriate that we rotate the Rolex US-IRC National Championship to different areas of the country so that more competitors can participate," said US-IRC Executive Director Luiz Kahl. The event is scheduled for September 10-13 on San Francisco Bay. -- Full report: http://www.us-irc.org/newsfull.cfm?ID=181 WORLD MATCH RACING TOUR Marstrand, Sweden (June 30, 2009) - Day Two of Match Cup Sweden, stage 5 of the World Match Racing Tour saw more beautiful weather, more spectators and of course more great match racing. Marstrand turned on the weather and entertainment for spectators and sailors alike. With interactive games, boat trips and numerous hospitality stands it was easy to get distracted from the on-water action. But one look out on to Marstrand Fijord and the calibre of world class sailors easily reminded you there is some top class sailing happening. Today saw Peter Gilmour (AUS) YANMAR Racing, Damien Iehl (FRA) French Match Racing Team and Torvar Mirsky (AUS) Mirsky Racing Team finish first, second and third respectively from Group A. They were joined by French Match Racing Team members Mathieu Richard (FRA) Philippe Presti (FRA) and Magnus Holmberg (SWE) of Victory Challenge from Group B. All six now qualify for the quarterfinal round which will start on Friday. The remaining teams from both groups will now go through to the repechage which will be a full round robin where each skipper will race against each other team. The top two skippers from the repechage will then go through to join the other quarter finalists. -- Read on: http://www.worldmatchracingtour.com/da/98703 * Among the teams that must now go to the repechage are Adam Minoprio (NZL) and Ian Williams (GBR), who are currently first and second respectively in the World Match Racing Tour standings. Match results: http://www.worldmatchracingtour.com/mcs09results VISIT AQUIDNECK CUSTOM COMPOSITES' NEW WEBSITE Aquidneck Custom Composites has recently launched their first website and would like to invite the readers of Scuttlebutt to check it out. ACC has been building custom boats for eight years now. Finally it has built a website. In addition to boat building, ACC offers fabrication of boats accessories such as composite ladders, custom doors & hatches, passarelles and appendages. ACC also offers CNC router services to other boat builders and fabricators. Check it all out here: http://www.aquidneckcustom.com U.S. YOUTH SAILING CHAMPIONSHIP Greenwich, CT (June 30, 2009; Day 5) - Trophies for all four classes competing at this year's U.S. Youth Sailing Championship were on the line during Tuesday's final day of racing. The breeze was steady today on Long Island Sound, ranging from 8 to 12 knots. In the Laser class, Zeke Horowitz (Team FOR) captured the Robert L. Johnstone Trophy by surpassing previous leader and ISAF Youth World Championship qualifier Chris Barnard (Newport Harbor YC) on the final day. Horowitz finished his last two races with two 4th places, while Barnard finished 5th and 10th down the stretch. Barnard had a 10 point lead after Sunday and a one point advantage going into today. Ian Heausler (Davis Island YC) made a late push by winning the final race, and closed out the regatta three points back for second place overall. In Laser Radial action, Orange Bowl Champion Christopher Stocke (Sarasota Youth Sailing Program) held off Anne Haeger (Lake Beulah YC) and Nevin Snow (San Diego YC) to take the Robert and Ann Conner Trophy. Stocke was tied with Haeger for the lead going into today, while Snow was two points back. Stocke's 4th and 3rd place finishes beat out Snow's 1st and 4th; and Haeger's 13th and 7th. Stocke won by a six point margin. -- Read on: http://forum.sailingscuttlebutt.com/cgi-bin/gforum.cgi?post=7729 STILL COMPETITIVE AFTER ALL THESE YEARS Tony Parker is not a young man. At 63 years old, Tony was joined by his equally 'experienced' J/24 #54 - which is somewhere on the north side of 30 years - when he faced off against the best in the class earlier this year at the J/24 World Championship in Annapolis, MD. After three days, the Bangor Packet team was leading the 79 boat field, and while slipping to 9th by the end, this amateur skipper received high marks for the effort. Here is a brief interview on how he has approached his program in the recent months to prepare himself for the Worlds. * Can you tell us a bit about your history in the class? TONY PARKER: "I was training with the French America's Cup Team in August 1978 during the first J24 North Americans in Newport, Rhode Island. I saw a mass of identical boats on Narragansett Bay all racing. On one picture perfect day, they were unable to get a race off because the competitors were so aggressive and the rules did not provide for anything other than individual or general recalls (no I flag, no Zulu Flag, no Black Flag). I thought to myself, that sounds like great fun. I bought one the next winter." * How do you think the class compares from then to now? TONY PARKER: "The class has really changed. I sailed the first Worlds with about 620 pounds of crew. We all sailed with four. We launched the spinnaker off the bow. We had 2 genoa halyards and a luff groove. We had a long distance race in the Worlds. The racing was great but I cannot imagine a boat racing in the configuration of that day would be within 15 minutes of the top 2009 J24 at a finish. The one constant has been the quality of racers. We probably had every major sailmaker in the US at that first World Championship. The fleet was deep and it was competitive. The difference is that we have learned so much more on how to make these boats go fast." -- Read on: http://www.onedesign.com/class/j24/j24_whatsnew.html#74 REPLACEMENT SHOW FOR SAN DIEGO When news broke recently that the National Marine Manufacturers Association (NMMA) was closing its San Diego office and canceling its 21-year-old winter boat show at the San Diego Convention Center, local boat dealers and small boating businesses were left high and dry. But this boating-friendly region, where the recreational marine industry contributes more than $200 million annually to the economy, did not have to wait long for a replacement to emerge. Jim Behun, general manager of Sunroad Resort Marina located at the east end of Harbor Island, recently announced that Sunroad is organizing a new in-the-water boat show to be held at the marina's docks, with large exhibit tents in the adjacent parking lot to house marine electronics and accessories. Because the show no longer depends on the convention center's scheduling issues, Sunroad has moved away from the event's previous timing right after New Year's. The 2010 show, called the San Diego Boat Show at Sunroad Marina, will be held between Jan. 28 and 31 on a weekend free of professional football playoffs that impacts attendance. -- Read more: http://tinyurl.com/SD-Boat-Show TOP PERFORMING ANCHORS This online newsletter from MyBoatsGear.com contains a comparison chart of the top anchors on the market: http://myboatsgear.com/newsletter/200788.asp The anchors chosen are the Rocna, Fortress, Delta, Spade and Supreme. Each of these anchors had the highest holding power in a variety of tests performed by various publications and organizations. The chart compares holding power, cost, weight, type etc. RSS feeds are available at http://myboatsgear.com/mbg/index.asp SAILING GOES HOLLYWOOD Here is the recipe: get one movie celebrity, go sailing, and quickly there are paparazzi photos of the event splashed in all forms of non-sailing media. This seems to be a foolproof plan, and was recently demonstrated when Zac Efron went for a sail last week at Marina del Rey in Los Angeles to prepare for an upcoming movie role. While it is unlikely that this occasion made much of a contribution to the 15,200,000 listings that Google has for him, this youthful star of the "High School Musical" franchise gave the sport a bit of a boost with over 50 websites picking up the story. For the astute observer of the photos, it was noticed that Zac's day on the bay was in a Lido 14, and his instructor was none other than Olympic sailing medalist Pease Glaser. -- Scuttleblog, http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/blog/2009/06/zac-efron-sails.html SAILING SHORTS * On June 27-28, Chicago Corinthian Yacht Club (CCYC) in Chicago, IL hosted the first edition of the Windy City Team Race Regatta on Lake Michigan. Local team Fair and Balanced with skippers Craig Thompson, JB Turney and Ned Turney won and qualified for a birth at the U.S. Team Racing Championship for the George R. Hinman Trophy. This was the only qualifier for the U.S. Team Racing Championship, with the balance of entrants now to be selected by resume. -- Full report: http://forum.sailingscuttlebutt.com/cgi-bin/gforum.cgi?post=7734 * The four regattas comprising the Laser World Championships will be coming to Great Britain in 2010. The Scottish Sailing Institute at Largs Sailing Club will welcome some 500 sailors, including aspiring 2012 hopefuls for the Laser Radial Women's World Championships from 7-14 July 2010, with the Laser Radial Men's and Youth Worlds to follow from 18-25 July. Meanwhile, Hayling Island Sailing Club will see budding Olympic Champions contest the Laser (Standard) Senior and Junior World Championships from 27 August-5 September 2010, with the Laser Masters Worlds from 11-19 September welcoming sailors in four age categories from 35 years and upwards. -- http://www.rya.org.uk * One hundred two skippers will leave Marblehead harbor this Sunday for the 360-mile course that will end in Halifax, Nova Scotia. This year makes the 20th anniversary of when the course record was set up Starlight Express, a Santa Cruz 70 that completed the race in 33 hours, 29 minutes and 37 seconds. The race began in 1905 and is regularly held on alternate years from the Newport-Bermuda Race. -- http://www.marbleheadtohalifax.com * Boat Owners Association of The United States (BoatUS) has surveyed its nationwide towboat fleet and reveals its recommendations for boaters on how to stay out of trouble when viewing crowded July 4th Fireworks displays. Across the nation nearly 5,000 boaters are expected to request some type of on-the-water assistance this holiday weekend. Included in this report is a listing of over 20 of the hot spots to go in the U.S., and tips for each spot. -- Full report: http://www.boatus.com/news/PR_Full.asp?ID=418 * VOTE NOW: Hosted by ESPN, the annual ESPY Awards commemorate the past year in sports. Among the 37 categories, 2008 Paralympic sailing gold medalist Maureen McKinnon-Tucker is one of the four nominees in the "Female Athlete with a Disability" category. There's not another sailor in any other category. Finalists are determined by fan voting. There is no easier way to support the sport of sailing than to vote for Maureen. Additional details here: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/blog/2009/06/2009-espys.html FOR THE SERIOUS AMERICA'S CUP FAN America's Cup defender Alinghi will be launching their giant Deed of Gift multihull on Lake Geneva in early July, which up to now has been shrouded in secrecy. However, on July 4th, they are offering 10 people the chance to visit their base in Villeneuve, Switzerland for an exclusive preview of the boat. To have a chance to be one of the 10 guests, send your name, telephone number, email address and mailing address to friends@alinghi.com. Names will go into a hat for a drawing, with the winners to be notified by 12:00 CET, July 2nd. The visit will last approximately one hour and does not include travel and/or accommodations. Also, cameras, mobile phones, recording and other electronic devices will not be permitted. --http://www.alinghi.com/en/news/news/index.php?idIndex=1045&idContent=19671 CALENDAR OF MAJOR EVENTS (Sponsored by West Marine) Is your event listed on the Scuttlebutt Event Calendar? This free, self-serve tool is the easiest way to communicate to both sailors and sailing media. These are some of the events listed on the calendar for this weekend: July 3-4 - 42nd Annual Marina del Rey to San Diego Race - San Diego, CA, USA July 3-4 - Lake Huron International Regatta - Port Huron, MI, USA July 4-11 - J 80 World Championship - Santander, Spain July 5-11 - ORC International Offshore World Championship - Brindisi, BR, Italy July 6-11 - U.S. Junior Women's Doublehanded Championship - Hampton, VA, USA View all the events at http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/calendar LETTERS TO THE CURMUDGEON Please submit your comments to the Scuttlebutt editor (aka, 'The Curmudgeon'). Published letters must include writer's name and be no longer than 250 words (letter might be edited for clarity or simplicity). One letter per subject, and save your bashing and personal attacks for elsewhere. As an alternative, a more open environment for discussion is available on the Scuttlebutt Forum. -- To submit a Letter: editor@sailingscuttlebutt.com -- To post on the Forum: http://sailingscuttlebutt.com/forum * From Francis J. Carter: The Marion to Bermuda Race prize giving, this past Saturday evening, concluded this year's race, in weather similar to the predominant race conditions of heavy squalls and torrential rain. The number of entries was down to 48 yachts with only 28 finishers, and as a veteran of many Newport to Bermuda and Marion to Bermuda yacht races I wondered if we are facing the demise of this race. The Marion race, organized by the Blue Water Sailing Club, the Beverly Yacht Club and the Royal Hamilton Amateur Dinghy Club, was the original Corinthian race for purely cruising classes of yachts and over the years engendered the camaraderie of many friends and family competitors. Approximately eight years ago the organizers of the Newport - Bermuda race, the Royal Bermuda Yacht Club and the Cruising Club of America, decided to include the classes which previously had been the sole domain of the Marion race and since that time the Marion race entries have declined to the current level putting the perpetuation of the Marion race in doubt. The two races should be able to co-exist with each other. It makes such common sense for the organizing committees to meet and divide the races back into the original classes so that the Marion Race committee can move forward with confidence and plan for a 2011 race. Let us hope that the powers that be can take the lead and bring about this change for the benefit of all concerned. CURMUDGEON'S OBSERVATION In the USA, there are more fatal accidents involving cars in July than any other month. Special thanks to Aquidneck Custom Composites and MyBoatsGear.com. Preferred supplier list: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/ssc/suppliers |
