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SCUTTLEBUTT 1397 - August 20, 2003Powered by SAIC (www.saic.com), an employee-owned company. Scuttlebutt is adigest of major yacht racing news, commentary, opinions, features and dock talk . . . with a North American focus. Corrections, contributions, press releases, constructive criticism and contrasting viewpoints are always welcome, but save your bashing and personal attacks for elsewhere. VOLVO OCEAN RACE Annapolis based syndicate, Team Kan-do, has announced its entry into the Volvo Ocean Race 2005-2006. George Collins, Chessie Racing's syndicate chairman (Whitbread 1997-98) and retired CEO of T.Rowe Price, has agreed to join his second ocean race campaign as Team Kan-do's chairman. Collins will focus on the overall strategy for the syndicate. Besides Collins, some of the world's leading names in ocean racing will join Team Kan-do' s management team, including Tom Weaver (most recently sailing manager of Mascalzone Latino) and John Jourdane (two times Whitbread veteran). Team Kan-do brings a unique perspective to its Volvo Ocean Race challenge by incorporating a comprehensive shore-side programme for learning and charity fund-raising, targeted at children, teenagers and their families around the globe. Team Kan-do will create a global educational experience as well as a truly unique media opportunity to appeal to the public and extend the boundaries of the race profile. Kan-do is an unusual union between two business friends and successful entrepreneurs, John Alden, an American and Patrick Bischoff, a German, who decided that helping others and succeeding in a podium finish would be the next exciting big goal in their lives. The motivation to perform well in the race and create something that could last long after the final gun, led to the formation of Team Kan-do. When Alden and Bischoff started talking about ideas for the race, they immediately thought of the powerful impact that Chessie Racing had on the Annapolis/ Baltimore region. Team Kan-do will be headquartered in the Annapolis (USA) area and plans to participate in activities that will bring the public out to the Annapolis and Baltimore stopovers, developing and building on the success of Chessie Racing. Team Kan-do has already captured the interest of several experienced sailors with Olympic and other world class sailing experience including Maria Fernanda Sesto (470 Olympic and world championship competitor) and Cian McCarthy, tactician and mini-transat competitor 2003. Trials for sailing team members will start in the late autumn of this year and Team Kan-do says anyone excited by the programme that has reached the pinnacle of amateur racing, or has substantial ocean racing/ one design success, should please contact Patrick Bischoff by email at pbischoff@kan-do.com for information or to apply for a trial. The Volvo Ocean Race will start on November 5, 2005 from the Mediterranean. - Lizzie Green, www.volvooceanrace.org TEAM NEW ZEALAND - Grant Dalton (Excerpt from the Team New Zealand newsletter.) Our lease on the land we occupied on Halsey Street has expired and we have moved our base from the familiar black shed on syndicate row. We can now be found just 150 metres along the road in the building that was the One World base for the Louis Vuitton Cup. Phone numbers remain the same. Roy Mason and his small team have been looking after the move. We now have three America's Cup boats, machinery and equipment housed at the new base. The administration offices have been painted and we're in residence. NZL81 and NZL82 will be moved along the road soon. The team had outgrown the black sheds. With boats, machinery spares etc, the shed was cluttered - and those of you who know me are well aware that I don't like clutter. Our new premises are a big improvement on those we vacated. And, in many ways, the move is symbolic of the start of a new era and a strong challenge for America's Cup 2007. We have been keeping a low profile in the media in recent weeks but that hasn't stopped speculation about who we are, and are not, talking to for places on the design and sailing teams. The speculation does not help negotiations and while we avoid talking specifics, when the speculation is accurate as it sometimes is, it's difficult to keep matters quiet. The sailing world has always been like this. Rumours, some inspired, some not, leaks and plain lies have been around as long as I have. But don't be misled by the lack of fanfare from the trumpets. There's a lot going on. We are putting people in pivotal positions that are absolutely crucial to the team moving forward. We will announce who's who when the contracts have been. - Grant Dalton MORE FUNCTIONAL THAN DUCT TAPE What an awesome idea. Imagine a pair of shorts that keeps you organized with giant cargo pockets to store everything, parachute chords just in case, flashlight holders, and plenty of places to attach those whazamacallits that can open, close, chop and slice & dice everything. While Camet hasn't yet created the Swiss Army Knife of shorts, they have bomb-proofed and engineered their highly popular quick drying Camet Padded Sailing Shorts for their crews to feel cool and comfortable on the weather rail. These are a must have for all regattas. http://www.camet.com GOVERNOR'S CUP After the ties were broken in the round robin of the Balboa Yacht Club's Governor's Cup International Match Racing series, the following teams advanced to the semi finals: - United States Merchant Marine Academy, 8-2 - Annapolis Yacht Club, 8-2 - Cruising Yacht Club of Australia, 7-3 - Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron,7-3 In the "Best of Three" Semi-Final series, the United States Merchant Marine Academy defeated Annapolis Yacht Club and the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia defeated the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron. This set up a classic "Best of Three" Finals between the top U.S. team and top Australian team. Annapolis YC and the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron sailed a similar "Petite Finals" for 3rd and 4th place. In the end, it was the "#3 Team", the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia with Seve Jarvin helming, Robert Bell in the middle and Sam Newton on the bow that upset the team with the best record of the week, the United States Merchant Marine Academy, with Peeter Must helming, Ryan Mulvania in the middle, and Todd Kutkiewicz on the bow. In the "Petite Finals", Annapolis Yacht Club with Jose Fuentes helming, Franklin Christopher in the middle and Brendan Healy on the bow earned 3rd place by defeating the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron with Stuart Pollard helming, Ben Barzach, middle, and Tom Reece on the bow. - Wayne D. Rodgers, www.balboayachtclub.com TEAM RACING The nation's top team racers are getting ready to show off their sailing skills and teamwork at the U.S. Team Racing Championship for US Sailing's Hinman Trophy. The event, hosted by St. Francis Yacht Club in San Francisco, Calif., will take place Friday August 22 through Sunday August 24. This Championship is the most prestigious team-racing regatta in the country; each of the 16 teams were selected based on their sailing resumes with an emphasis on team racing experience. The current world champion team will be competing in this event, as will past Hinman Trophy winners from 1998, '99, '00, and '01. Nearly every team is comprised primarily of Collegiate All-American sailors. Many teams have won important team racing regattas throughout the U.S. and abroad. - www.ussailing.org/hinman CALENDAR OF MAJOR EVENTS Events listed at http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/calendar TEAM ULLMAN SPEED ADVANTAGE! For 30+ years Ullman Sails has progressively grown into one of today's premier sailmakers. With lofts established throughout the world and new lofts being added, Dave Ullman and a loyal team of talented and dedicated followers have put Ullman Sails at the forefront of the sailmaking community. By utilizing the latest in cloth and construction technologies, Ullman Sails has developed the fastest and most durable sails possible. From local club sailing to international competition, give yourself the Team Ullman Speed Advantage. For great service and competitive pricing, call your nearest Ullman Sails loft or visit us at http://www.ullmansails.com NEWS BRIEFS * The International Olympic Committee (IOC) praised the Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games in Athens 2004 for the successful running of the test events held over the past few days. Chairman of the IOC Coordination Commission, Denis Oswald, said, "The IOC is satisfied with the work carried out by the organizers and by city and government authorities with regard to the running of what we call "test events". With one year to go until the Olympic Games are declared open, a total of seven test events, including sailing, are taking place this month. - http://tinyurl.com/kjyf * Three races were sailed on Tuesday in the Netherlands for the J/24 World Championship. The winds ranged from 12-21 knots - shifting over 30 degrees. After four races with one discard the leaders are: 1. Lorenzo Bressani, ITA, 6; 2. Gabriele Benussi, ITA, 6; 3. Andrea Casale, ITA, 13; 4. Mauricio Santa Cruz, BRA, 14; 5. Andy Horton/ Rudi Wolfs, USA, 15 - http://www.j24.nl/worlds/ * Computer graphics companies Virtual Spectator and Animation Research have ended their uneasy pact and are now expected to go head-to-head competing for sports graphics contracts, particularly deals around the next America's Cup. The settlement, details of which are undisclosed, frees both companies to use their graphics software in television and internet products. Virtual Spectator assumes sole rights to the Virtual Spectator brand-name. - NZ Herald, http://tinyurl.com/kk0x * The Jet-14 Nationals was held August 14-16, 2003, at the West River Sailing Club in Galesville, Maryland, with 37 boats competing. The champion, for the second week in a row, was Brent Barbehenn, who won Thistle class prize just the week prior. Top five: Brent Barbehenn (8); Dirk Schwenk (22); Gary Mentesana (26); David Hansen (28); Marion Zaugg (37). Full results: http://www.sailingsource.com/wrsc/ * There's a story on the Oracle BMW website about the newest member of the syndicate's afterguard, John Kostecki. http://tinyurl.com/kk1d * Bill Turpin and crew of his Santa Cruz-based TransPac 52 Alta Vita, which just corrected out first in the TransPac, are offering a crew position on Turpin's boat for the August 29th San Francisco-to-Santa Cruz Windjammer's Race. All you have to do is be the top bidder on the charity auction, the proceeds of which will support Big Brothers and Big Sisters of Santa Cruz. The bidding will be on eBay, so go to eBay and search "Windjammer Race". The bidding starts at $750. - 'Lectronic Latitude, http://tinyurl.com/kk34 BOOMERANG Goetz 80' custom carbon fiber (1996) by Frers, complete with two containers of spare parts, fifty-five sails, two masts, two booms and a record of prestigious accomplishments around the world. Boomerang is in covered storage in Newport, RI, attractively priced, looking for a new home. Contact Bill Sanderson via bs@pal.cnyachts.com LETTERS TO THE CURMUDGEON (editor@sailingscuttlebutt.com) (Letters selected for publication must include the writer's name and may be edited for clarity or space - 250 words max. This is not 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.) * From Richard Clark: "Team New Zealand were let down by their race boat, NZL82" It's easy to blame the boat, it can't answer back. NZ was let down by the whole Team, that's people, real humans. The people who made decisions, the people who knew and said nothing, the people who managed, designed, built, tested and even, dare I say it, those who sailed the boat. That was where NZ was let down. Forget about pointing fingers, there are simply not enough, get on with the business of preparing a real team NZ, of NZ'ers! Search for, interview, hire, train New Zealanders who really want to win the Cup, then tap into the truly awesome spirit that is New Zealand. Screen the movie "Whale Rider" every evening, have Witi Ihimaera write a manifesto, bingo. What a legacy to pass on and inspire the kids of NZ. * From Roger Vaughan (edited to our 250-word limit): The lively discussion Magnus Wheatley started about reporting on yacht racing takes me back to a time when journalists who were also good sailors could arrange berths on race boats and do a proper job of writing about the scene. Guys like Bob Fisher, George Johns, Daniel Forster, Rick Tomlinson, Bruce Knecht, Angus Phillips to name just a few of the stalwarts. I did a couple books and a bunch of magazine pieces that way from Ted Turner's One-Tonner, Tenacious; Jim Kilroy's Kialoa; and the Russian Whitbread entry Fazisi. And when the Liberty Cup (match racing) was being held in Manhattan, one of the stipulations was that each boat carry a journalist. Good idea. For years that sort of on-the-spot reportage was a solid tradition that produced good material. The problem is, if the good sailors/ journalists are off the boats for gran prix events, then how do we get the job done? I submit we do it the old fashioned way. Work harder. Get to know crewmembers before the start. Establish relationships with them. Find out about them. Be there when the boats come in. Grab your guys and debrief them. Ask good questions and listen. Get the details about what happened when the number 3 heads'l blew apart. But tactics and breakdowns and horrible conditions set the scene. The real story is always about the people: who they are, how they react and interact. The nature of the people involved sells every endeavour, sailing included. * From Victoria Scott (Re Magnus Wheatley's 'hacks' on glamour boats): Reading out of date reports and position up-dates whilst gazing at a picture that really could be any big boat completing any big race is not generating enthusiasm for the sport amongst those who participate, let alone those who don't. Wheatley is right in saying that the events, the boats, life onboard a 60ft racer tearing downwind etc do need to be conveyed in their full colour. If the colourful life on board was blasted regularly onto your computer, newspaper, even television, sailing, and the way it is perceived, might well be a different ball game altogether. Equally, this is a sport and in that tradition, may the best team win. If 'hacks' can get a crewing position on boats in their own right as a good sailor, then fantastic! Filling racing machines with sailors who may not quite make the grade (did someone say freebie?) but who sure write a good piece, will achieve nothing other than shun the quality of the team. Everyone has to work at racing their boat 110% - if one of those sailors happens to be a journalist who can make that boat come alive in print, on paper, on screen - then that's double brownie points and an opportunity definitely not to be missed by owners, organisers and, most importantly, the hacks. * From Tom Donlan: Bravo to David Gill for pointing out the chain of causation from professionalism to sponsorship to media coverage. None of us race to get our names in the papers and magazines or to see our boats on TV. A few of us race for money, and there would be more money for them if there were more public interest in big-league sailing and more eyeballs viewing the ads on their boats. The rest of us needn't care very much. * From Geoff Wilson, Sydney, Australia: It's a pity that the Fastnet Race (and all the Cowes races) doesn't get the media coverage that is given to the Sydney - Hobart race. Thanks to plenty of TV, radio and press coverage from start to finish, we in Australia are well informed on all aspects of our big race. Perhaps the Northern Hemisphere public needs to put some pressure on their media people or perhaps there is insufficient interest up there for any and all major sporting events! * From Ben Fuller: In the safety boat discussion, a distinction needs to be made between jet drives for outboards and jet skis. The latter are fast, have limited capacity, highly maneuverable at high speed, hard to handle at low. For the former the lower unit of an outboard is replace by a jet pump, at the cost of some speed compared to a conventional prop. Advantage is superior low speed handling and the ability to mount this on a RIB or other boat that can carry extra people. A jet drive RIB would be the ideal crash / coach boat. * From Greg Tice As a potential final thread, I offer that while minimizing injury after a collision by covering props or switching to jets is important, preventing the collisions is a better solution. I do not know if there is an official policy, but I do see a lot of coaches solo on the water. This makes for a less effective coach and a less attentive boat operator. A second person on the boat as a "spotter" or the operator (at least at regattas) would make for a much safer situation. As the gun advocates might say "propellers don't cause injuries, people do". Curmudgeon's Comment: On this note we declare this thread "officially dead." * From Frank Betz: And the beat goes on! I was among all the other committed racing sailors in America who sat incredulously in stunned silence as Liberty surrendered the America's Cup to Australia at about 3:00 AM EST twenty years ago, when Dennis Conner broke what all of us viewed as the primary fundamental we've all known forever about staying between your opponent and the finish line. Although we had been acquainted for years before he became a sailmaker, I just didn't have the heart to bring up the matter with Dennis' wizened tactician Tom Whidden for many months after the fact, by when I hoped that the wounds had stopped hemorrhaging. To this day I've never seen his simple explanation reported publicly... and it always struck me as a kind of rather stoic (but totally rational) "Never complain, never explain" acceptance of a traumatic reversal. Tom's answer as to why they broke their leading cover was because of their absolute certainty that Austrailia was so significantly faster upwind that they would have overtaken, sailed through, and beaten Liberty to the finish on the same tack. So Liberty had no choice but to split tacks. Anybody left out there that wants to argue with that decision? I sure don't. And, whaddya know, there really was life after the Cup was lost, and the sun has, indeed, continued to rise daily. CURMUDGEON'S OBSERVATIONS Wouldn't it be nice if whenever we messed up our life we could simply press 'Ctrl Alt Delete' and start all over? |
