June 2003

 

NSRW

North Sails Race Weekend was held in the LBC this past weekend. There was breeze, and no breeze. Winners, and losers. Good times, and bad times. Sounds like a regatta. Here are the results.

6/30/03

Ramped

This comes from occasional SA contributor, Thornton.

We are at the Youth Champs. This proves that sailing really is fun.... ok it's not sailing, but its a good use of the boat ramp.
Youth Champs

06/23/2003

 

Dr. Laura?

Hard to believe, but apparently Dr. Laura Schlessinger has become a fellow yacht racer. She is a full on newbie to sailing and now owns 5 boats already in just 6 months, a Harbor 20, J-80, J-109 and 2 powerboats...Grady Whites. She is sailing 3-5 days a week with Ken Kieding in Santa Barbara as her paid coach, and she recently finished second in a women's regatta. Some are saying that she could be the next money player in the sport. Hope she's more fun on the boat than she is on the radio.

6/20/03

 

Hey, I thought It Was Summer!

Here's beer can racing Halifax style, a leisurely blast around the buoys in June with fifty degree air, forty degree water and thirty knots of breeze. Probably about as far from "Dago" as you can get. Actually, its about 3,500 miles away!

Cheers!

Richard in Halifax, Canada

06/18/2003

 

Got a Match?

This is what the BluSail 24 (Sport) match race version looks like - an almost identical concept to that offered by the Tom 28. James Spithill, Paolo Cian, Andy Green and a whole bunch of others are having at it at the the ISAF Grade 2 2003 BluRimini Match Race in Italy.In a surprise for the final, it will be Jablonski-Williams and
the petit final will be Cian-Spithill. Go to www.blurimini.com for the latest.

06/05/2003

 

Your Ed gets off his Ass

Yes it's true; instead of just writing (or more accurately, complaining) about our sport, I actually went sailing yesterday. And not just on any boat, I went out on an International 14!

First I must say that these boats are amazing - a huge, sophisticated rig on a light modern skiff - the first time I have ever sailed on such a thing and I was in awe.

I went out with Brad Ruetenik here in Dago. Brad is quite active in the fleet, and has been pestering me to go out with him for months. Being the semi-retired slacker that I am, I always blew him off, but then I reckoned I'd better see what I was missing.

Plenty. Even tough it was a lighter than usual day here (imagine that), it was simply incredible how fast it got going in the puffs, which couldn't have been any more than 7 knots. Now being a total hack in a boat like this, and realizing (with a bolt of cold reality) that I hadn't been in a trapeze for something like 30 years, I provided for Brad a superb demonstration of bumbling and stumbling, but that's what happens when you're old, fat and much slower than you thought you were! I did somehow manage to not kill Brad or myself, even when he was nice (dumb) enough to let me steer.

Even though we didn't get to sail in the boat's proper wind, I can see why the folks who sail these things are so enthusiastic. And to think all those years I spent sailing IOR and PHRF boats, I could have been doing this! Who knew?

6/8/03

 

Sounds Familiar

We all know about the One World / Sean Reeves AC design shenanigans. Turns out that F-1 auto racing isn't immune either. According to one of my all-time favorite magazines, Autoweek, the German magazine Auto Motor Und Sport reports that an unnamed Ferrari employee has been trying to sell design information about last year's F2002 chassis to several competitors. The magazine reports the engineer, who also recently worked for other F1 teams, has confidential material about the car on his computer. it is thought that at least one U.K team rejected his approaches.

So who are the bigger cheats, teams in F-1 or the AC? I think F-1 wins this one, hands down. Comments?