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SCUTTLEBUTT 2436 - September 20, 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 the support of its sponsors. RESPECT FOR YOUR COMPETITORS I'll start by saying that to me this is a prerequisite for taking part in competitive amateur racing. I won't comment on the pro circuit because I have no experience with it, but I would hope that it applies there as well. We go sailing for the fun of it, or at least that should be our goal. Fun to my way of thinking does not include cheating, pushing the rules to the detriment of others, swearing at other boats, bullying or taking unfair advantage of less experienced competitors, etc. I could list more, but you get the point. Start with the idea that without competitors there would be no race at all. Then add the fact that it is logically more enjoyable to race with, against, and amongst friends. I would submit that it is much more satisfying to compete successfully staying within the rules and exhibiting good sportsmanship than to do otherwise. Once again I will quote Paul Elvstrom's famous saying, "If in the process of winning you have lost the respect of your competitors you have won nothing". That ought to be laminated and posted on the bulkhead or centerboard trunk of every racing boat, because all of us, at one time or another, let the heat of battle get the better of us. It has happened to me, I am not proud of it, and I work hard to minimize those temptations. If we do screw up on the course, we should take our penalty. If we make a mistake that is not a racing rules infraction, such as rudeness, an apology is the best policy. There will be another race another day, the results for this one will fade from memory…but often the scars left from poor behavior are not forgotten. -- Don Finkle, http://www.rcryachts.com Curmudgeon’s Comment: Don is one of the good fish in the sea, doing more than his share to promote the sport, in and beyond his home turf of Youngstown, NY (Lake Ontario). If you have anything to add, post your comments here: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=5319 HAVING HEALTH AND HAPPINESS Am I the only guy in the room who thinks, between IRC and PHRF, we live in the golden age of rating rules, and we just don't know what to do about it? You're on your own to review the simple-minded failures of 19th-century rules that measured length only or length-and-sail only. Think what you will of the way that a going concern, the CCA rule, was traded in for the theoretically-better IOR nearly 40 long years ago (I can't imagine that the CCA rule would still be a going concern, even if it did produce Bolero). I had a sit-down with Gavin Brady at the Rolex Big Boat Series last week, and one line of conversation rang bells with the part of me that remembers how the golden-oldie IOR did real harm with its measurement points that encouraged designers to create stupid boats to beat the system. Stupid in the sense of hulls shaped like pumpkin seeds that did not want to go in a straight line. The great metaphor for the whole shebang was the way that sailmakers countered by offering a fractional spinnaker to fly opposite the spinnaker, to balance the forces (supposedly), and they gave it the most honest name in the history of sports promotion. They called it, the Blooper. -- by Kimball Livingston, SAIL WEST, who continues on to discuss event names, changing worlds, Stokely Carmichael, rain forests… Kimball can ramble with the best of them: http://sailmagazine.blogspot.com/2007/09/986.html MARBLEHEAD From the sublime to the ridiculous... or perhaps I mean the other way round. Last week I was waxing lyrical about the charms of Third Beach (Newport, RI) and the pleasures of sailing from an out-of-season tourist beach with a bleak parking lot and a simple boat ramp. No "swanky yacht club" fripperies for me. This past Sunday I went to the other extreme and did sail a regatta out of what must surely qualify as one of the swankiest of America's finest swanky yacht clubs, Eastern Yacht Club in Marblehead, Massachusetts. It sure was different from the bleak parking lot. But, you know, it was still a hell of a lot of fun. Eastern is one of the grand old dames of American yachting. Founded by a group of Boston gentlemen in 1870... three successful defenses of the America's Cup in the 1880's... Burgess, Herreshoff were members... have a trophy from Nelson's flagship... etc. etc. It doesn't come any swankier than this. -- Proper Course blog, read on: http://propercourse.blogspot.com/2007/09/marblehead.html WINNING WITH OCKAM IN SEPTEMBER Ockam Instruments congratulates great September yachting performances. Bob Towse’s Blue Yankee was 1st to finish, 1st overall, and set a new course record in the Vineyard Race. Titan XII placed 3rd at the Rolex Maxi Cup in Puerto Cervo. Alex Jackson’s Amelia won the NYYC Swan 42 National Championship, followed by Gary Jobson, Norwood Davis & Whitey Lipscomb’s Mustang (2nd), Mark Watson’s Tiburon (3rd) & Phil Lotz’s Arethusa (4th). All of these winning yachts rely on Ockam Instruments' superior processing and display technology to provide a useful and accurate competitive advantage. At Ockam, we have race winning solutions for everyone. Contact mailto:sales@ockam.com BIG… REALLY, REALLY BIG Global BSI, which is a Danish firm that specializes in the engineering and manufacture of premium rod rigging systems for large sailing vessels, has announced that it has ordered the world's largest cold-heading press for Superyacht rigging applications. The new press, scheduled to be ready by November, is capable of heading larger than dash eleven hundred (-1100) rod. For those that don’t know what that means, which includes the Curmudgeon, dash eleven hundred rod exceeds three inches in diameter and has a breaking load of 1,100,000 pounds. While they don’t say how heavy it is, you got to think it is pretty heavy. Their website lists that dash 540 (-540), which is two inches in diameter, weighs 10.73 pounds per foot. This is all pretty big stuff, and opens are eyes a bit more to the world of superyachting. Following on the heels of the Global BSI announcment was another by the Yacht Club Costa Smeralda (YCCS) in Porto Cervo, Italy, who have teamed up with Boat International Group and Rolex to organize a new event for sailing superyachts. The Rolex Boat International Superyacht Regatta will see the world’s biggest sailing yachts coming together to compete on the beautiful waters off of Porto Cervo on June 23rd to 26th 2008. The racing format will be pursuit-style using IRC handicaps, with participating yachts having a minimum LOA of approximately 28 metres. (We thinks that the Curmudgeon has space in his calendar for this one.) -- Scuttleblog, http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/blog/2007/09/big-really-really-big.html VIDEO OF THE WEEK With the 2007 ISAF Team Racing World Championship being hosted in Valencia, Spain on September 23-29, this week’s video provides an excellent introduction to this exciting and highly tactical type of sailing. Produced by team race promoter Gavin O'Hare, animations by Bryan McDonald, and interviews with Pete Levesque, Tom Sitzman, Caroline Hall, Joe Morris, and Geoff Becker, this 3:43 minute video will open your eyes a bit wider to the fastest growing segment of sailboat racing. Also, if you have a video you like, please send us your suggestions for next week’s Video of the Week. Click here for this week’s video: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/media/07/0917 * Link for Team Race Worlds: http://www.rcngandia.com/team-racing-world SAILING SHORTS * (September 19, 2007) Jochen Schuemann has been hired to lead the German America’s Cup team for the 33rd event. A former three-time Olympic sailing champion, Schuemann also served as helmsman for two-time America's Cup winner Alinghi. Jason Ker, the chief designer of Team Shosholoza, the South African challenger in the 32nd event, has also joined the German team. Car makers Porsche and Audi are now sponsors of the team, which has bought one of the Alinghi's boats, the SUI-91. -- Full report on Valencia Sailing: http://tinyurl.com/2nykmq * Eleven match-racing teams from throughout the United States will head to Newport, Rhode Island, this week to compete in the U.S. Match Racing Championship for the Prince of Wales Bowl, a US SAILING National Championship hosted by the New York Yacht Club from September 19-23. Leading the field is Dave Perry (Southport, CT), who returns as defending champion, and Brian Angel (Manhattan Beach, CA) returns to the event after winning in 2005 and finishing second in '06. -- Event website: http://www.ussailingorg/championships/adult/usmrc * Clipper Ventures PLC (UK) announced that the VELUX Group (Denmark) has re-signed as title sponsor of the next VELUX 5 OCEANS race, the solo around the world race in 2010-11. VELUX was title sponsor of the last edition, which started and finished in Bilbao, Spain between October 2006 and May 2007. Won by Bernard Stamm, extreme conditions on leg one forced the withdrawal of Alex Thomson ( keel) and Mike Golding (mast). The next edition of the race expects to once again incorporate stopovers in Australasia and the United States, with further details revealed by the end of this year. -- Complete release: http://www.velux5oceans.com/page/NewsDetail/0,,12345~1115671,00.html * With only three events remaining in the World Match Racing Tour season championship, Team Pindar’s Ian Williams (GBR) retains a healthy 32-point margin on the leaderboard, but the race has tightened considerably for 2nd through 4th places, as only five points now separate Mathieu Richard (FRA) Saba Sailing Team, Paolo Cian (ITA) Shosholoza, and Sebastien Col (FRA) Areva Challenge. In October, the tour goes to Hamilton, Bermuda, than to Vitoria, Brazil in November before concluding at the Monsoon Cup in Kuala Terengganu, Malaysia (28 November-2 December). -- http://www.worldmatchracingtour.com * (September 19, 2007) Early leader of the 89 boats competing in the Transat 6.50 (Mini Transat) is Isabelle Joschke, with American Clay Burkhalter having now worked his way up to tenth in the rankings after a day of racing. The 4,200-mile race is held in two legs, with the first 1,100-mile leg to Madera (Portugal), followed by a restart for the 3,100-mile leg to Salvador de Bahia, Brazil. -- Event website: http://www.transat650.org/en -- Additional photos by Thierry Martinez from the start: http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/photos/07/0918/index2.asp * Toronto, ONT (September 19, 2007) Light winds prevented racing on Wednesday at the International C Class Championship, hosted by Royal Canadian Yacht Club. With six races completed from Monday and Tuesday, the pecking order of the four-boat field is becoming well established. Winning each race is Fred Eaton/ Magnus Clarke (CAN) sailing Alpha, with Cogito sailed by Steve Clark/ Duncan MacLean(USA) following in second in all races but the third, when she had to retire after hitting a floating log. Fleet racing continue on Thursday, wherein the top two boats will then match race on Friday through Sunday, with the first boat to win five races declared the winner. -- Daily reports: http://tinyurl.com/2vm3pb -- Photos: http://foilborne.blogspot.com/2007/09/c-wings.html * Correction: In Issue 2434, it was stated that Alpha, the International C Class catamaran sailed by Fred Eaton/ Magnus Clarke (CAN), was assisted by foils. It is not. (See letter below by Christian Fevrier) AN INVESTMENT IN PERFORMANCE TODAY Why are Ullman Sails the best sails on the planet? Simple… Ullman selects the top cloth the sail making industry can provide. For race, cruise, or daysailing, this cloth is coupled with the latest design and construction technology. Result: Performance, Durability, and Service that has been for over 40 years the hallmark of Ullman Sails. If you and your crew are ready for the “Fastest Sails on the Planet”, let Ullman Sails bring our performance to your program. Call your nearest Ullman Sails loft or visit us at http://www.ullmansails.com CALENDAR OF MAJOR EVENTS (Sponsored by West Marine) Here are a few of the events that are coming up: Sept 21-23 - Finn North Americans - San Mateo, CA, USA Sept 21-23 - Audi Melges 24 US National Championship - Detroit, MI, USA Sept 21-23 - Sailing World NOOD (Houston) - La Porte, TX, USA Sept 22-23 - Martin 242 North Americans - Vancouver, BC, Canada View all the events 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 John Jourdane: (on the passing of Burke Sawyer) Growing up in the Southern California sailing community, I always considered Burke Sawyer a sailing "icon." He was not only a great sailor and sailmaker, but also a big part of our sailing history. After a race, Burke would always share a beer and a good story not only with his crew, but also with all the competitors. We will miss him. * From Amy Smith Linton: It's so great to have Scuttlebutt as the source of all news sailing, and what a treat to have the lead story NOT concern the America's Cup (regarding the Lightning class in Scuttlebutt 2435). I didn't think I had much of an opinion about the ongoing brouhaha, but what a relief to hear about something else! Of course, the Lightning is one of my favorite classes, as it combines strong international competition and a decent level of diversity among the sailors along with a sensible approach to innovation. The Lightning class discussed the change (allowing VHF radio use in a limited way) at length before voting, weighing the potential downsides of cost, possible unfair advantage, etc., against compelling safety arguments and the usefulness of such a tool to the Race Committee. Perhaps that's what's so dreary about the ongoing AC controversies. The Louis Vuitton series and race for the Cup made for good spectating, but now the ongoing debates are not actually open to discussion, and instead of attempting to make play more fair -- the way most sailing rules and regulations tend to do -- the changes seem to aim to keep the advantage with the winner. It is the oldest trophy in sport, and perhaps some kind of jingoism just comes as part of the legacy. For me, I will continue to put my heart and energy into one-design classes like the Lightning as they prove that change can promote greater good for everyone. * From Christian Fevrier, Toronto, ONT: In reference to your short information published about the first three races sailed on Monday, I have to remind you that the Fred Eaton's C-Class 'Alpha' yacht has no foils at all. Fred won the three first races and the other races on Tuesday ahead of Cogito to Steve Clarke and Duncan Maclane. The second Fred Eaton's C-Class, launched quite recently, is effectively fitted with T-foils on the daggerboards and the rudders. The yacht finished last on Monday but is improving and had better results on Tuesday against Patient Lady VI. There is certainly some future in the foils in the class, but it will take time. On Tuesday, Alpha and Cogito finished with nearly a full race course distance ahead of the last two yachts. So, we cannot say yet the foils are 'better'. Alpha is an improved version of Cogito. To stimulate the C-Class challenges, Steve Clarke and Duncan MacLane have been generous enough to give for free all their secrets about Cogito to the potential challengers after the Bristol challenges three years ago. * From Doran Cushing, St. Petersburg, FL: (regarding BoatUS report in Issue 2435) "As America enters a new era of increased terrorist threats at home..." Who said that? The war mongers in DC have been trying to terrorize the American population long before 9/11 (of which they had more than ample warning...but did nothing). So now we are all supposed to spy on our friends, anyone on the water, and report "suspicious activity." What a laugh. Around the waterside in Tampa Bay are signs to report anyone "taking photos." DUH! Florida is a tourist economy. We sell "Kodak Moments" as a way of life (and prosperity). I don't need brain police and fear mongers telling me how to live. They screwed up, not us. And they have neither ethical nor realistic solutions beyond praising their god and destroying other countries. * From Rick Rogers: After looking at the start photos for the Mini Transat race, am I the only one wondering why the mini's have life preservers affixed on the transom? Who is going to throw it? * From R. Geoffrey Newbury: Regarding comments on the 'lack' of crash boats at the Etchells New England Championship (in Issues 2434-5), I think that hindsight's tail is wagging that dog. In 31 years I've been sailing in Etchells, there has only been ONE day where 'crash-boats' were needed by an Etchells fleet. A thunderstorm with 60+ plus knots can do that, especially when it hits just as the leaders are rounding the weather mark and no one is prepared for it. On the other hand, at Kingston one year, the RC started a race in about 25 knots and it built to over 35 knots. I was on a boat that flew a spinnaker in that breeze. (Great ride!) No rigs were lost, or even damaged that day. Etchells, like Dragons and many other classes, are well found and strong enough to handle strong conditions. We do not plan on needing crash boats. Admittedly, accidents happen, but it is unreasonable to plan on the fact that those sorts of accidents will happen. I think the regatta planners were perfectly correct to NOT plan on having 'crash boats'. And if you think I am wrong, I refer you to Fundamental Rule 4. * From Jeff Blowers: (owner of Naked Lady, the Olsen 30 from Issue 2435) Regarding the name of the boat, I looked at her after just buying the boat and said, she looks naked without a name…she’s my lady, hmmm, naked lady even sounds good to me, hmmm, maybe I should name her Naked Lady. The tattoo I blame on Carlos & Celeste. Carlos and I started on a tangent about WW2 pin-ups they painted on aircraft as a motif for the boat since we were firm on the Naked Lady. He suggested checking out some art by Alberto Vargas. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_pinup_artists). I did my research and fell in love with the unnamed painting from the archive, which is on my back. Well, I shared my thought that I should really have her tattooed on my back with the crew. The guys all said, go for it dude. Celeste said - do not put a tattoo on your back; have you been drinking too much, hit your head? I took that as a thumbs-up since she didn’t say - I will never talk to you again if you do that. So next thing you know, I ran into a beautiful tattoo artist in Chicago that could do a pinup in fine style…Beautiful, talented, I said I would do anything….she said, four hundred Dollar please – and I coughed it up (for the tattoo J). That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. CURMUDGEON’S OBSERVATION Being young is beautiful, but being old is comfortable. Special thanks to Ockam Instruments and Ullman Sails. |
