I don't think anybody would argue against Portsmouth racing being the best (and in most cases the ONLY) way to "grow cat racing in your area". It is the policy that has been in effect in many parts of the country for years. It was about 10 years ago that, at my suggestion, our Hobie fleet in Miami was converted into an open organization named CABB (Catamaran Association of Biscayne Bay) so we could include ALL types of catamarans. All of our racing has been on Portsmouth ever since, and the club has been gradually growing again as a result.

OCRA, which has larger numbers of boats, expanded and improved upon this by dividing into high and low Portsmouth divisions. CRAM had probably been doing that long before. So all this is nothing new. Except for Hobie fleets that still have strong one-design classes and are still adhering to the NAHCA policies, most people agree that Portsmouth racing is very important to the success of regattas.

It also is nothing new for various classes of similar speeds to be started together -- including one-design classes starting with Portsmouth classes.

Here is the difference in Mark's concept:
Normally the one-design classes are racing for trophies within their one-design classes and the Portsmouth fleets are racing for trophies within their Portsmouth divisions, even if they all start together. You are aware of what boats you are racing against right from the outset.

Mark's stance is that he wants to see the BIG regattas, like Spring Fever and Tradewinds, to use the same scoring format as Catfight, which scores and trophies one-design fleets but also scores and trophies everybody for overall Portsmouth trophies. He says this makes it possible for people to decide whether they want to race the other boats in their one-design fleet or race for the Portsmouth trophies. THAT is where the problem comes in, because how does anybody in the race know whom them are racing against? If you think you are in a one-design fleet, you have no way of knowing whether the other boats in your one-design fleet have decided to race against you or race for the Portsmouth trophies. And the Portsmouth sailors also have no way of knowing whether some of the boats from one-design fleets are racing them or racing the others in their particular one-design fleet. And people's motivations may change in mid-stream in the regatta -- "Oh, I'm not doing well in my one-design fleet, so I think I will start trying for a Portsmouth trophy instead." How do you plan your tactics when you don't know who your competitors are?

When Mark first started his campaign to get other major regattas to adopt the Catfight formula, I talked to the Catfight organizer, and he said he does not recommend that format for other major regattas. He also said it is very labor intensive for the race committee and requires a lot of people, because of the need to take times on every boat in the regatta rather than just the open class boats.

This is not as simple as Mark makes it sound. I, for one, want to know who my competitors are.

Maybe if the regatta is done entirely on Portsmouth and so you base your strategy on going as fast as you can around the course and ignore tactics within your one-design fleet -- i.e., just sail your own race -- and then, after the fact, break out the results within the one-design fleets and award trophies for those fleets -- MAYBE the one-design results would be the same as if they were racing each other instead of on Portsmouth. I don't know, but it just seems to me that all it measures is the relative speeds of the boats around the course rather than their racing skills and tactical abilities (so the one-design trophies would be relatively meaningless).

But maybe those things are not important any more.