Tim,

You're exactly right. We are certainly asking for the F18 fleet to extend some niceness to us. They are certainly not obligated to do it.

However, I hope that they will enjoy the competition of an additional few boats on the start and at the marks.

Outside of at the start, I'm not sure that the issues that arise would be any different than having multiple fleets/starts on the same course. On the J/24 at Chicago NOOD, we were leading the race and regatta....we rounded the top mark with a back marker from the Melges fleet....they were inside us, took forever to get the chute up, then went reaching into oblivion. With the sym chute, we wanted to drop dead down....competitor rounded well behind us and went straight to the finish. Doh. Just changes the game I guess.

In any event, I hope the F18s will let us play with them at the smaller regattas. It's hard for me to get excited about handicap racing or racing against one or two other boats....but that's just me.

Jeff.