|
SCUTTLEBUTT No. 848 - July 2 2001Scuttlebutt is a digest of yacht racing news of major significance; commentary, opinions, features and dock talk . . . with a North American emphasis. Corrections, contributions, press releases, constructive criticism and contrasting viewpoints are always welcome, but save your bashing and personal attacks for elsewhere.
BLOCK ISLAND After analyzing the performance of racers in up to seven races during the five days of racing, The Storm Trysail Club awarded its Everett B. Memorial Trophy to Brad Parker's Farr 33 Sugar, from Annapolis, MD. The most coveted of all awards at Race Week, the trophy goes to the participant who wins his class and in the judgment of the Race Committee and the Commodore has logged the best overall performance. Sugar won in the PHRF-102-114 Class today in the race around the island, and finished the week 15 points ahead of her nearest competition. Her crew included tactician Scott Allan and a regular crew made up of college friends from Hobart William Smith crewing who have been sailing together since graduating in the late 80s. The Isbrandtsen Overall Perpetual Trophy for the second best performance of the week went to Jim Richardson, skipper of the Farr 40 Barking Mad, from Newport, RI. - Keith Taylor Complete results and much more: www.blockislandraceweek.com
VOLVO OCEAN RACE Event website: www.VolvoOceanRace.org
INDUSTRY NEWS * The UK-based performance clothing specialist, Gill, has been signed up by the illbruck Challenge as Technical Clothing Supplier for the America's Cup 2003. Gill is already supplying the illbruck Challenge with all of its technical clothing for the Volvo Ocean Race.
YOU NEVER KNOW?
VOLVO OCEAN RACE - By Bob Fisher Heiner and the Assa Abloy team are two-boat testing off Gothenberg five days a week and wish to optimise the time available to them, but also to compete in the Gotland Runt. 'We need something to stir the adrenaline in the crew,' he commented, 'but before all else our aim is to win the Volvo [Ocean Race].' 'We sailed until four o'clock on Friday afternoon with both boats,' he continued, 'and then they went in for routine maintenance and sail repairs.' It was the end of one routine week for Heiner and his team, and they left the shore crew to a weekend of intensive work while they made their way to Sandhamn and the training boat which had been delivered by a small team earlier. 'We will be back at our training camp, ready to go sailing on Wednesday morning at the latest,' said Heiner, 'and we will only have lost two days of our two-boat program. If we had brought one of the new boats we would have lost a total of 11 or 12 days. It would have been good to sail one of the new boats but there would have been too much downtime.' The equation is simple and no one knows better than Heiner, who joined a less than sparkling team in the last Whitbread Round the World race after the first leg had been raced, the value of training time on the water, especially for evaluating sails. 'We have twelve guys here for the racing, and it's good for them to race,' he added in a final comment, 'and I am glad that they are in the old boat; it makes them hungry to win.' - Bob Fisher
LETTERS TO THE CURMUDGEON * From Grant Wharington: I agree with Morgan Larson's guest editorial on stacking, this is clearly a problem in our sport. In last years Sydney to Hobart race we were second over the line to Nicorette. Following the race another boat lodged a protest against Nicorette for stacking. Because the Volvo60 association had asked the question of the the race committee prior to the race "was stacking allowed", the fleet had the clear understanding that it was not. I decided to stay out of the argument in Hobart. The protest was dismissed due to lack of evidence. However in recent months many photos of Nicorette have appeared in magazines promoting their performance. These photos show Nicorette sailing upwind in Bass Strait with 1 reef in the mainsail and a code 4 or 5 jib up. Also three genoas on the rail, one clearly marked 1H. Hardly a sail you could justify as being the next required for a sail change! This is not intended to sound like sour grapes, but our oceans are wide, and in offshore racing rules can be easily exploited. Crews need to be educated about "Fair sailing" or the rules need to be changed so stacking is allowed. What is the difference between rail stacking and turning your engine on when the wind stops? Nothing. * From Fred Schroth, Executive Secretary, North American Laser Class: The Miami Olympic Classes regattta is the premiere Olympic Classes event in North America. What if we changed that? What if we held our premiere Olympic Classes regatta in June in Newport, RI or Buzzards Bay? Here are some possible results: - Save USSailing's limited funds: The organizers would be able to sleep in their own beds instead of expensive hotels in Miami. - Home field advantage: The Miami event is held during the "off season" for our North American competitors. Most of us in the US sail from May to September. Our guys are rusty and not at the top of their game. - Lower per-event competitor costs: A huge number of the sailors could reach the regatta site by traveling fewer than 1000 miles and with proper scheduling many classes could create feeder events as tune up opportunities before the "big event." - Increase fleet size: As an example, only 300 Laser Class members live within 1000 miles of Miami. Over 1500 Laser Class members live within 500 miles of the central USSailing offices at Newport, Rhode Island. When a major event is scheduled within a one day drive distance, the Weekend Warrior is much more likely to attend. If the object is to hold the best possible event that benefits the most possible members of our organization, why not consider some fundamental changes that would make the desired result possible?
LIFE ON A V.O. 60 "This race reminded me of just how difficult these boats are to sail. With quite a few sails to choose from (eighteen on board for each leg), you spend quite a bit of time doing sail changes. For short course racing, such as we will do a bit of in the VOR, sleep is almost non-existent. We ran a watch system that consisted of 4 hours on, two hours off, and 2 hours on standby. Inevitably, you end up being on watch during standby, helping out with sail changes, so it is more like six on and two off! But this is what it is all about, and every boat will be doing the same." - Keith Kilpatrick
QUOTE / UNQUOTE - Charlie McKee Full Interview: www.sailingworld.com/gps/
WEEKEND WARRIORS
RANKINGS
BT GLOBAL CHALLENGE
MATCH RACING
Final standings:
TOUR DE FRANCE À LA VOILE
Provisional overall results after four races:
OPTI NAs
Leaders after six races: Event site: www.cork.org
TRANSPAC Philippe Kahn's new 75-foot Pegasus got off clear and ahead at the committee boat end of the 300-yard-long line, but at the other end several boats fell into a traffic jam not unlike a city street that suddenly diminishes from three lanes to one. Merlin's Reata, with new owner Al Micallef conspicuous in a white Stetson, tried to poke its star-studded bow between Bob Lane's Medicine Man and the inflatable orange buoy. No way. Members of Medicine Man's crew held Merlin's Reata off with their hands as the latter went dead in the water. The rebuilt Merlin's Reata, until recently known simply as Merlin since 1977 when it set a Transpac record that stood for 20 years, crossed the line again five minutes later and unfurled a red protest flag. - Rich Roberts, www.transpacificyc.org. Class leaders: DIVISION III (started June 30) Cantata (Andrews 53), Brent Vaughan, DIVISION IV (started June 30) Bull (Sydney 40 OD-T), Seth Radow, ALOHA DIVISION A (started June 25) Willow Wind (Cal 40), Wendy Siegal, ALOHA DIVISION B (started June 25) Axapac (Wylie 39), Barry Ruff, CURMUDGEON'S COMMENT: Rich Roberts took an incredible sequence of photos of Medicine Man / Merlin's Reata incident which will be posted on the Transpac website in a couple of hours. Also, Pegasus skipper Philippe Kahn sent an email to Scuttlebutt World Headquarters describing the first five hours of the race from aboard his R/P 75. The full text will be posted on the Team Pegasus website soon (www.pegasus.com). Here's an except: "Its fair to say that we won the start. Not for long! Suddenly it got very light. Although Pegasus and Chance are almost sisterships, because of optimization choices that we both made, both boats perform differently in different wind conditions. Because of their larger mainsail (more power in light air) and smaller keel (with less drag), it became rapidly clear that Chance has an edge over Pegasus in very light conditions. After 30 minutes, the narrow lead that we established at the start evaporated and Chance got ahead of us. The rest of the fleet was behind both of us. After 45 minutes it was Chance, Pegasus followed by Pyewacket, all three on port tack. "On Pegasus we're a bit frustrated: We know that we're fast in heavy air, but we didn't realize that Pegasus would be slower than Chance in very light air. When the breeze started filling we started to gain both height and speed on Chance. It was time to tack as the wind had just clocked right to 280 degrees. It seemed that we could almost lay the Western tip of Catalina. We tacked, both Chance and Pyewacket followed. But now with a freshening breeze Pegasus was sailing higher and faster. Two hours into the race we were back solidly in the lead and rounded Catalina first. We met our goal. But again it's a long race, and anything can happen during the night." - Philippe Kahn
FOR THE RECORD
CATALINA 22 NATIONALS
ATTENTION TO DETAIL Because Transpac is essentially a downwind slide, the Pyewacket crew decided to improve their rating by leaving their big genoas at home. Better rating; much less weight - win / win. And without the big genoas aboard, there was no reason to have genoa tracks or the fairlead adjustment equipment - so all of that hardware is now in the container too. I also noticed a port side winch pad without a winch on it. Down below, Pyewacket has a custom carbon fiber rack that was crafted to store the crew's sunglasses. When I mentioned the 12-slot Kevlar toothbrush holder on Pegasus, Pyewacket sailing master Robbie Haines proudly told me they are only taking one toothbrush - and the handle on that toothbrush has been shortened and drilled with lightening holes. Please don't send me any letters about offshore hygiene - I'm sure Robbie was pulling my leg.
THE CURMUDGEON'S CONUNDRUM |
