USSAILING Champions of Champions regatta
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Thistle3985
Member
Congrats to Skip Dieball. An outstanding performance!!
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razor
Member
Gouvernail
Lottsa people don’t know I’m famous
By the looks of the way he was suddenly in a big hurry, Rabb musta run outta cigs.
It is with the greatest pleasure that we can announce that all 60 competitors, having completed an indoctriniation into Lightning sailing, with cold weather, a frenetic schedule and a final 3 NM race, have now qualified to be inducted into
THE ORDER OF THE FLASH
CONGRATULATIONS TO ONE AND ALL.
FROM PAUL WHITE, 72, Y-FLYER CLASS, TO EMILY DICKSON, 14, DAY SAILER CLASS, WELCOME!!!
And a special thanks to two great boats designers, Sandy Douglass & Olin Stephens.
We hope you had fun watching your accolytes honor your memory so well!
THE ORDER OF THE FLASH
CONGRATULATIONS TO ONE AND ALL.
FROM PAUL WHITE, 72, Y-FLYER CLASS, TO EMILY DICKSON, 14, DAY SAILER CLASS, WELCOME!!!
And a special thanks to two great boats designers, Sandy Douglass & Olin Stephens.
We hope you had fun watching your accolytes honor your memory so well!
my nuts
Super Anarchist
Hey, we have to have some secret weapons in reserve. Want a deal on a wooden Etchells built Lightning?
For all the rest of you, don't worry about who built the Lightning you want to buy.
JUST BUY IT!!!!!!!!!!!
my nuts
Super Anarchist
if I weren't still finishing up some structural work on my Lippincott, then I probably still wouldn't consider it. but I do know a guy who is looking for one.
The Ed seems to think the fleet is "drug addled". Chris's unlit cigs are the closest thing I saw to a "drug". Hot coffee, chocolate & cider were more the rule. And no Clean, there was not even one incident of drunkeness, even among the adults, let alone the kids.
What a pleasure it was to have all those youngsters among the old salts. Placing age before beauty, the fleet ranged from Paul White age 72 to Emily Dickson age 14.
I guess the Ed is just jealous.
Winever
Super Anarchist
This was an amazing event to be in! Carlyle Sailing Association put on a world class event. The PRO did great work, the line was difficult due to the shifting N-NW winds, but they got out there early, took the best shot at squaring and started races, instead endless delays. The first days line was 465 feet, less than 1.5 lengths per boat. Boat handling skills at their most critical to start. Second and third day the line got slightly longer. First two starts were general recalls, very aggressive fleet, imagine that. The PRO moved the pin to bias the line and spread'em out, it worked, good call. The CSA race committee team was excellent, on station at marks with quick changes as needed. The transfer boats got better and better, as did the competitors. Few breakdowns, with very quick repairs. Launch and retreival each day was fairly quick and efficeint, the daily shore teams from CSA brought the trailers in order, provided the lifting straps and then covered the boats each night. On the final day I went back to the boat after folding the spinnaker and had to search for the correct boat as the shore team already had the Rolex sticker and bow numbers removed. To say CSA was organized is a gross understatement, they were fantastic. Much of that is due to the CSA race chair (didn't get the name) and Event Chair Matt Burridge. Burridge was phenominal, he oversaw the ground work, the meetings, did the boat workshop on Wednesday along with Dan Moriarty and then was the on the water Maytag repair man. He had all the repair parts for two different mfg boats in his backpack leaping from chase boat to Lightning, fixed'em and disappeared faster than Spiderman. North Sails cut a deal on providing brand new jibs, mains and kites for every boat, gotten for much less but retail would have been around $63, 000. More than half of the sails were already presold with the owners receiving a 30% discount. I thought the sails still looked very good after 17 races, not completely new but..... North owner also provided his personal Lightning for the event among the 6-8 boats brought in from surrounding states. Obviously their was a lot of salemanship being provided of rthis event to happen. I suspect Matt Burridge and USS rep Drew Daughtery hand a big hand in that. Drew did say some of the competitors wanted to be coaxed to attend. Have to remember the help is all volunteer for this event, Daughtery too. My opinion is that without an organization with USS's prestige (agree or not) that Paul Cayard and some others wouldn't have been responding to a plea to attend from Carlyle Sailing Association. Like it or not, it takes an organization like US Sailing for events like this to happen. One eye opener for me was how different each boat was rigged, yeah the Allens differed from the Nickels, but even the same mfg boats had different controls in different places. Jib halyards moved from the mast to the centerboard trunk, wire with swaged balls and hooks to some with turning blocks and cam cleats. Mains came thru the deck near the mast with the swaged ball or sometimes turning blocks and cams. Spin halyards fixed on the mast or on the deck, some times lead back to the helm position on the port side, some on the starbaord, one under my ass on the trunk. Vangs, cloth, wire, topper, cunningham moved all over boat to boat, traveler & bridle sometimes switched position, same with twings. Each boat became a fast lesson in "where the hell is the ....." The top boats traded on the water skipping the chase boats and used the extra time for quick spin sets to eliminate fouls, find controls and pack as they wanted. We had a couple of close crosses, corinthian spirit everytime, we were given a cross and gave'em back, everyone did too unless it was tactical. 17 races and not one competitor to competitor protest, it all got handled on the water. One written request for redress over a broken boat issue that affected Stu Robertson. I never heard what the issue was for Olaine Paine and his redress. The Opti sailor helmed very well (why won't he, he sailed in fleets of 200+ boats) and had some quality experienced crew. Olaine had his high school coach onboard, Steve Hunt, a former Jack Brown Trophy winner. BTW, Hunt won the Martin 242 class and then went on to sail in a different boat to winner his C of C. Also for those that aren't Lightning sailors, Skip Dieball usually crews middle position for Tom Starck, who just finished second at the Worlds. And oh, BTW, their bow, Mrs. Starck is Jody Swanson, two time Rolex Yachts Woman of the Year. Also, Greg Fisher certainly deserves his good guy reputation, always helpful with answers. Skip Dieball was right there too. While we wish we could have done better we understand and accept the difficulty of competing in an unknown quantity. We were happy to be there and next year it's in Ideal 18's, a keelboat. Gotta go, gotta start practicing, I want another shot at this! Cheers, Winever.
Hobie Anarchy
Super Anarchist
THOR
Super Anarchist
what irks me is that you can blow at US sailing for all the right reasons all day long,
but this thing was 90 % worked by local sailors and what I hear they did a great job
( as usual I might add)
and if their club ( CSA does have a huge Junior program ) is strict about drugs
than all power to them. If the wording came from US SAiling, so be it ...
there were kids or Juniors involved and drugs have no place. Period
Congrats CSA for a job well done !
Thor
BYC Race Chair
This raises an interesting question, did any of the boats seem ergonomically superior to the rest in terms of ease of use and simplicity combined? The data shows one boat had a disproportionate number of top 5 finishes. Can you guess which one?
Did any boat(s) seem significantly faster? Did you have a favorite?
The data is misleading in that some boats deserve "mental breakdown points" for operator errors. These are very hard to quantify. The old adage still applies,"It's not the boat, it's the driver".
Also, did you enjoy having the kids mixed in for an "adult" event. I thought it was cool. Christopher Williford really brought down the house with his answer to the question, "How many boats did you beat to get here?"
His reply,"A couple of hundred". Those grizled veterans really loved that! Really nice bunch of kids.
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Winever
Super Anarchist
Crash, if I had to guess I'm thinking boat #6 had the best record. Why? It's owned by Dan and Tobi Moriarty, and is the World Champ boat. Do I get a prize? Then again we never sailed it in the rotation, missed it by one boat. Big deal, no disrespect but really wouldn't have made a difference to us. We did have a favorite boat, it was one we sailed well, better start, inside the fleet, seemed to have boat speed. But honest to god the speed really came from talent to get off the line, go to weather, round clean up wind, and down, then hike and go fast. Short course, great stuff, the talent ruled. There really are lots of sailors across the country that could be here, and compete if they win, and apply. Again, no disrespect, but when the boat is something less than an icon, like Lightning, or Scots, or Thistles or Sunfish, then the sailmaker competition might be reduced (NTTIAWWT), and the boat may become more visible, if that makes sense. Why not sail Geary 18's, or Comets, or Daysailers, or Mercury's or Buccaneers or San Juans. But then again, if that was the case we would have missed all the Great folks in the Lightning CLass. And the "future" talent( I won't say kids) was great to see and race with, we can always say we beat'em once. And I don't buy the mental breakdown thing, it's an excuse in my mind. We all had the same drill, where the f**k is the halyard, vang, topper etc. this time. The good boats finished first, figured it out, set their chutes and repacked before the next start. It was fair and even. The critical term is operator error. Again, had a BIG time, want to do it again. If your fleet can put 22 boats on the line you should consider hosting. Ensigns, Rhodes 19, San Juan 21, Ultimate 20, Viper 640, Melges 20 or 24, J22's, whatever, go for it. Cheers, Winever.
Bow number 6 did have a great record, but number 10 won more races and number 14 only won 1 race, but finished in the top 5 eight times!!! (A word of warning, if you show up at the Red Flannels, you'll be faced with all those boats with their rightful owners at the helm (plus Todd Wake, Debbie Probst, Pat Considine etc. etc. Be prepared to get you ass kicked!)
As to having the kids, I think it went great. They seemed to have zero complaints (unlike the Ed & Clean). The tradeoff was for CSA to accept the additional burden of hosting minors, said minors (and more importantly their parents) had to agree that the kids would comply with the law of the land regarding drugs and alcohol for 96 hours, something the larger society expects them to do 24/7/365. A trivial concession. In return they got to race with adults and be treated like adults. Seems a generous deal on CSA's part to me.
Hell, Optimom might even consider that Christoper is going to age out of Optis soon, so maybe she & Dad ought to buy a Lightning with her being forward crew, Dad doing middle and Christopher on the helm.
As to having other classes take a turn, GO FOR IT!!! It's a lot of work and someone else ought to take their turn so we can go race.
