paul henderson on the olympics

[Editor]

Paul Henderson was asked by the ISAF to give his thoughts on their Olympic decisions. We got 'em...

Olympic Events: (On request of the President) CONFIDENTIAL

Assumptions:

Sailing will continue with 10 Events and 380 athletes for 2016.

Olympic Sailing should err on side of “Talent over Technology”.

Encourage inclusivity not exclusivity.

The vote on the Events takes place in November 2011.

The Equipment (Classes) are picked in 2012.

Format, Fleet or Match, to be done 3 years before but should be done also in 2012 with exceptions.

Experience with 2012 Women’s Match Racing will put this in place. Match is exclusive. Fleet inclusive.

(Council made error by deciding Women’s Match Racing in 2007 as that is Format.

Women's’ Keelboat is the Event.)

Solid Classes:

Men’s Singlehanded: Laser Standard

2) Women’s Singlehanded: Laser Radial

3) Men’s Keelboat:

4) Women’s Keelboat:

5) Open Doublehander: Skiff: 49er (no reason to change)

6) Men’s Heavyweight Singlehander: Olympics must not become a Junior small peoples event.

The Finn has served sailing well and should be retained until something better comes along.

Comments: There should be Keelboats because of facilities required for the Paralympics.

Also it is where the best names in Sailing show up which is what the media likes.

The media likes personalities more than they like equipment.

Tough Decisions:

History:

It has been done before that an event is held out of the Games for a period and then brought back. It has usually been done to change equipment as was done with the FD and Tornado.

Windsurfing was originally brought in to show the cutting edge of our sport as distinct from the traditional aspects as shown above. Windsurfing 40 years ago was the new “Extreme Sailing”.

For the next decade every other car going down the highway had one on their roof.

Now it is in strong decline and should be dropped for 2016. 40 years was a good run.

Skiing is a good example as they have replaced events with Snow Boarding disciplines. Speed skating has also met the challenge with Short Track.

Kite Boarding is the new “Extreme Sailing”

Must make the decision to drop the 470 and Windsurfing Men and Women.

Bring Cats Back: (Kinetics are minimized)

It was right to drop the Tornado as it had become very expensive and exclusive succumbing to technology.

7) Men’s Cat: (model to be a modern Hobie 16 with their same “Laser” mentality)

8) Women’s Cat:

Kite Boarding: “Extreme Sailing”

Take a leap of faith and put Kite Boarding in for 2016 as we did with the 49er and Windsurfing so many years ago. Format does not need to be decided till 2013. ISAF will have two year to massage the format to have a sensible equipment and competition.

9) Men’s Kite Boarding

10) Women’s Kite Boarding

“Fools go in where Angels fear to tread”

Respectfully submitted,

Paul Henderson

 

[Turvey]

Paul has always been one quirky guy. Chalk it up to too much time messing with the plumbing.

 

[spectator]

I think it was a good assessment/opinion and fairly spot on although I think one Cat event is enough.

 

[Rebootfkz]

If he likes to be on the cutting edge of sailing, ditch the lasers an replace by foiling one person boat. As i understand weight is les critical when foiling. To keep the talant over tech use the laser format al the same hull sails, foils etc. But keep the costs low. Laser is an expensive boat too race. Kite boarding the new sailing what a laugh kite boarding is the new trick surfing doing jumps etc. It's a watersport but doesn't include the sailing aspect of tactics. Just like there is/was a much bigger group surfers looking for speed surfing ore doing flips and tricks than there where compeditive (sailing) surfers.

So keep a nice fast technical 2 person keel boat with the focus on tactics and atletichs, Ad a foilling design based on the laser formula (pref for 200+ pound) so i can race a foiler ;-)

Yours FKZ

 

[greeners]

Paul Henderson - what a cock

 

[Steveromagnino]

The number of people racing kiteboards is FAR less than the number of windsurf racers, and kite board racing vs. the aerial jumping and B&F kiting is not dissimilar to the massive disconnect between the longboards used in racing olympics by say 2000/2004 vs. the shortboards, slalom and formula boards raced by racers and even further to the average guys blasting around B&F (back and forth).

While course racing on a kite is growing it is still in the early days without a clear format; it is like snowboarding in the late 80s with regards to racing in some respects.

Windsurfing stuck with longboards because you can ride them in displacement mode, and right now there's been a bit of growth in windsurfing since the late 90s when it was really struggling.

Given that kiting is even more wind dependent than windsurfing, i struggle to see how you can kite in 3-6 knots which is why we see longboard/hybrid POS RSXs and not lightweight formula boards in the olympics. Will they bring out longboards and even bigger kites?

I am unsure what events snowboarding replaced in the winter olympics that were previously ski events....AFAIK virtually none were downhill ski events (a fair comparison between snowboarding and sking); maybe a few events were eliminated like ballet but those were already suspect and in some cases only test events and had little to do with snowboarding down a hill. I stand prepared to be corrected, but suspect the reasoning behind this is totally flawed, especially given that ski racing has not died as a result of snowboard racing, any more than windsurfing is dying as a result of kiting. And certainly not for the tiny proportion of any of these 4 sports that actually races. In fact as a former snowboard racer, it is fair to say snowboarding racing around gates is the most likely to be dropped in future due to lack of participation =- so much for 'cutting edge extreme'

I agree with most of the rest, although a foiler might be good depending on wind minimums. Keelboat should be a single sportboat class broken down by gender that is fast, affordable fun, and men and women should race the same boat, this would certainly help management of costs for the class. It also helps a lot for logistics - requirements to be would be 4 person, trailerable, can be towed by a 4 cylinder car, 2 fit into a container, high performance for advanced sailors, best in class, affordable, existing class rewarding effort and tactics (i.e. not some non hiking old man's boat).

 

[morrisre]

Paul seems to be fitting the arguments to his desired selection. Very little consistentcy in some of the arguments to keep things in and then to include the kite board.

 

[Bill E Goat]

"The Finn has served sailing well and should be retained until something better comes along. "

I wonder if he has a slight bias - something better ? How about losing 100 lbs to start with

How many sports boast that something designed 60 years ago is still the best there is ?

You don't see the Tour De France in Penny Farthings

 

[macca]

I have always loved that Paul claims there is minimal kinetics in Cat racing, I use his statement everytime someone accuses us of pumping, which we do a lot of and its very effective.

So, It just points out to me that he is really out of touch with whats really going on out there.

 

[IshmaelHatesThatDamnWhale]

In my opinion, Women AND Men's keelboat: Shaw 650. Use the fiberglass production boats as a one design for the Olympics. Just by looking at the specs and photos, it's obviously very powered up. Since the general public doesn't know much about sailing, I think our equipment should be used to help show it off. People like race cars almost as much as the racing itself, so why not get people interested in racing sailboats by making them sound cool and modern with "light weight composite construction, massive sail area, carbon fiber mast and bowsprit, etc." Often times, when people think sailing is a sport only for the rich, it's because they don't understand boats in general. I bet if they saw a Star plodding along and found out it costs $40k (guessing on price here), they would probably be shocked. If they saw a Shaw 650 blasting downwind with a masthead kite and found out it's $40k, they might not be as surprised since it's been described to them as a hi-tech, modern race boat versus an ancient design that was originally made of plywood. People can handle the idea of racing vehicles being expensive.

I'm of the younger generation of sailors, where fast is fun. Yes, I respect grace, grunt, and talent required to sail a Star at top levels, but a powerful sportboat is so much more interesting, and that's what the public needs to see sailing as! The micro tuning isn't there, but the physical effort of hiking hard and trimming well still is, along with the mental game of good driving and tactics. Imagine the photo from the front page with the Star about to round down in big breeze. Then imagine a powered up sport boat with the crew hiking off the back corner trying to keep the bow up and working in sync to surf at max potential. Other than the carnage factor of the Star, which would you rather watch? If we want sailing to take off, we need to get people to understand it can be fast and exciting!

 

[dogwatch]

How many sports boast that something designed 60 years ago is still the best there is ?

Not certain the shottput has changed too much. Javelin, discus.....

 

[dogwatch]

Windsurfing 40 years ago was the new "Extreme Sailing".

For the next decade every other car going down the highway had one on their roof.

Now it is in strong decline and should be dropped for 2016. 40 years was a good run.

It's nowhere near 40 years. Introduced at the 1984 games.

Several hundred sailboards raced near my club one weekend this summer, my club has restarted running course racing for boards and if anything I'd say windsurfing is enjoying a bit of a revival right now.

Never did like it, did he? "Air-rowing", apparently.

 

[johnnysaint]

Windsurfing 40 years ago was the new "Extreme Sailing".

For the next decade every other car going down the highway had one on their roof.

Now it is in strong decline and should be dropped for 2016. 40 years was a good run.

It's nowhere near 40 years. Introduced at the 1984 games.

Several hundred sailboards raced near my club one weekend this summer, my club has restarted running course racing for boards and if anything I'd say windsurfing is enjoying a bit of a revival right now.

Never did like it, did he? "Air-rowing", apparently.

First one I saw was in 1972 - in Spain. Pretty extreme.

 

[cpq3]

Windsurfing 40 years ago was the new "Extreme Sailing".

For the next decade every other car going down the highway had one on their roof.

Now it is in strong decline and should be dropped for 2016. 40 years was a good run.

It's nowhere near 40 years. Introduced at the 1984 games.

Several hundred sailboards raced near my club one weekend this summer, my club has restarted running course racing for boards and if anything I'd say windsurfing is enjoying a bit of a revival right now.

Never did like it, did he? "Air-rowing", apparently.

First one I saw was in 1972 - in Spain. Pretty extreme.

FIrst time I played with one would have been 1986 but Australia is a bit behind, the board was at least 10ft, i think.

 

[morrisre]

How many sports boast that something designed 60 years ago is still the best there is ?

Not certain the shottput has changed too much. Javelin, discus.....

Changed the last time to make it rubbish in flight as people where throwing them out of the stadium.

 

[dogwatch]

First one I saw was in 1972 - in Spain.

Not quite clear but Henderson seems to be saying boards have been in the Olympics for 40 years. "A 40 year run". This is not true. 1st time was the Windglider in 1984. I remember the Windglider well as putting it back on the roof-rack was exercise in itself. A hefty beast.

 

[Jambalaya]

Henderson always has an opinion and that's a good thing, overll his proposal is workable.

Personally I'd say kiteboarding should be a multi-discipline event, tricks, head to head knockout racing etc ...

I don't buy the heavyweight/no junior argument in favour of the Finn, to expand sailing in Asia and for women you need boats to favour "smaller" competitors.

 

[morrisre]

Workable except that it doesn't meet a good few of the IOCs objectives and has no real consistent justification?

 

[PeterHuston]

I put this in the Fallen Star thread yesterday, has some application to this issue as well.

............................................................................................................................................................

As usual, Steve Clark nails the situation right on the head.

The Olympics are nothing now but a once every four years sports reality TV show.

The sad part is that there is the vestige of Olympic idealism left within the younger people, at least the very young. Probably by the time you get to an actual competitive world level, everyone pretty much realizes what the Olympics are for those that win - a stepping stone to a bigger payday.

So, the likes of US Sailing Olympic Sailing Committee Chair Dean Brenner cloak themselves in the mantra of winning medals for the good of the country, and younger people drink the koolaid and go raise hundreds of thousands of dollars in donated money to sail in wonderful places all over the world. All for the sake of, at least in the US, of not being on NBC TV when their 15 minutes appears. What is lost in the US system is that we are only concerned with winning medals, and we are now focusing all of our resources at the Olympic level on a very small group of people. We are even running the Women's match racing Trials in Weymouth, UK. We have so lost our soul of Olympic ideology that we think it simply does not matter that we try to educate and otherwise promote our homegrown sailors in the US in the only real trials we are having, all for the sake of 12 women racing at the Olympic venue, rather than in the US. Medals of the moment are the only thing that matters to Dean Brenner - the implications of letting a local club host those trials and all that resultant benefit be damned.

Those who support prospective Olympians might be better off helping that sailor try to get on American Idol. If we are going to create reality TV stars, we might has well focus on bigger potential paydays.

People piss and moan about this or that boat being in or out of the Olympics as if the boats matter to TV ratings - they don't. We have a non-functional scoring system - why on earth reward inconsistency in racing with a drop race? A medal race that isn't really a medal race. And we have a week of sailing on exactly the same course every day. Other than the tens, or maybe 100's, of people who are emotionally, and maybe financially, invested in a particular sailor, who the hell cares about a week's worth of racing on the silly Olympic course? What is exciting about that?

One thing that ISAF does not ever really talk about is format. The first thing that we need to do to get coverage on TV is change the format. Women's match racing might get some coverage - might. But why not downwind starts? Why not make one race of the series a pure downwind sprint? Why not a marathon race? And if we are going to have a medal race, have a goddamn winner take all medal race. I had a conversation about this very fact with Gary Jobson on Monday. After every Olympics he writes his report for NBC on what would make a better Olympic sailing telecast, and every year, ISAF ignores those suggestions.

As for the Star - I don't know if it should be in or out of the Olympics. But I am almost 100% certain that it will find its way back in. The answer is not about the boat or the class, it is about the people who will be pulling the levers to make it all happen behind the scenes. The change of the ISAF Bylaws last week now make it easier than ever for the Executive to do whatever they want. I also expect that the 470 will survive in one form or another. Go look at the structure of the executive and count the votes - and then figure out who is the real power behind the throne.

Ultimately, we don't have an Olympic sailing problem within the sport. We have a leadership problem. The Olympics used to create leaders of men and women within the sport. Now, it is just about the money, and the prospective Olympians are just unpaid actors in TV show.

Aren't we better than this?