http://isafconference.wordpress.com/2010/11/12/multihulls-mixed-sailing-and-more/

The vote is in.

Thanks Dub!

I need to start looking for a small girlfriend

Don't get her too small, Rolf. Macca and I enjoyed continuing the debate in Athens over a pint or five, but I still think the proof is in the pudding; IF (and it is a big IF) an F16-type boat is selected as equipment, it is worth noting that in all F16 events in the US, F18-sized teams have performed very well. All of the F16 platforms I have lain hands on needed much more that the Macca-predicted 120kgs to land the podium.

And I can't stress enough - the Evaluation will be detailed and open; I'm sure there will be 16, 18 and 20-foot designs in the running. The outcome is not at all assured to be one over the other.

John, I am a featherweight at 100kgs and dont have much bodyfat to loose.

This will be the second multihull evaluation event in 10 years. Hopefully the Tornado will come out on top at its third evaluation event.

NO... I will not let this characterization of the past stand.






Fact... Before the Tornado was eliminated, the Tornado Class and the rest of the mulithull community played games with each other at cross purposes with ISAF. The T class was represented by ONE volunteer while manufacturer reps/ other multihull class reps pushed a different agenda at ISAF meetings. Our discipline was always outnumbered by many more ADULTS who focused and represented their discipline and managed their niche pretty well.

So, the Olympic Multihull representation fell on one ONE GUY who battled both the other multihull voices AND the other Olympic class interests. Even worse, He battled T class Olympic sailors who pushed and pushed the rules to the brink, not once but TWICE for two Olympic cycles. The end result was a dramatic demonstration that Olympic Multihull sailing was not about athlete performance when the Silver medalists show up with a BRAND NEW Sail design ... forcing the ISAF to blubber lamely about one design sailing and the athletes who compete at the games.

As they say... MISTAKES WERE MADE!

naïveté ... NOT A CHANCE... even I KNEW how much trouble multihull sailing was in BEFORE the ISAF descion.

Don't confuse typical mulithull sailor apathy or our chippy FU attitiude with naivete!
The messages were delivered and they were ignored by the T class Sailors... by the multihull Class reps... and certainly by the multihull rank and file.

naïveté... NO!... Apathy? Absolutely! Righteous Indignation... Typical self serving BS.

Bullish Behavior.... Yeah well when you have ONE GUY on his personal dime trying to literally manage cats/children on his side... it's possible to characterize his efforts as bullish... IF WE HAD BEEN ADULTS AND PLAYED BALL WITH A VARIETY OF VOICES AT THE MEETINGS AND AT THE TABLES... we would not have been characterized as BULLISH.... (I absolutely agree with your point that for three years we have had multiple representatives at the meetings and at the tables... Sadly, this is about 12 years too late!)

After this FUBAR... the world scape goated Mike... Oh he sued.. oh he screwed up, oh he was an AHole..... Much easier then taking responsibility.

I view his efforts as desperately trying to represent our interests BY HIMSELF and the back biting among the MULTIHULL advocates and bad behaviiour was a huge factor leading to the ISAF descion of... WHO NEEDS THESE GUYS. Your milage may vary of course... But this is a closer description and interpretation of the past.

Now the present and future....
Your point... EVERY CLASS has their own agenda to remain or become Olympic.... Understandable... and always true.

Your point... the committees... also have their own agenda... Understandable and always true.

Each MNA has an agenda... the Brits need multihulls in the games to keep their funding stream alive... The USA has strength in some disciplines and not others... blah blah blah.



This is where we disagree.... I ASSERT that from the IOC to the ISAF to the MNA's to the Rank and File.... There was widespread agreement that Multihull's MUST be represented at the games...
THEN the AMERICA's Cup happened.... THEN the NEXT CUP happened...

Yes we need to be there...We need a diverse representation. Yes the schmmoozing is important. but... do you REALLY THINK that this level of politics will be dis-positive.... Not me!

So... Politics and compromises must be made.... I get that and agree. BUT... you can't compromise on the principles.. It's the Olympics... so the game is about the pinnacle of the sport... Until somebody can tell me why the world at large would view a BRAND NEW MIXED event ... with has no history as the pinnacle of anything... AT any level of competition... I dissent.

Compromise involves everyone giving up something for the good of the whole... Logrolling is fine so long as you maintain the integrity of your principals. IMO, the politics swamped the big picture.

Since the Board on Saturday is NOT bound to honor these rec's... This could all be irrelevant... the committee output was irrelevant to the final decision the last time.

So... two more hurdles... the spring ISAF vote... You sound like you don't expect any surprises at this level (unlike the last time).

The IOC... will they keep Sailing???... given the proposed changes ISAF has put forth.

From my point of view... The Problems for the IOC:
Still a Keel boat in the games... = big cost.
unbalanced events: men's heavy weight single hander... women's heavy weight keel boat.

Novel creation of MIXED events. (requires some splainin..)

on the plus side..
Add two additional visually exciting events. W skiffs and Mixed Multihulls.

Is this enough??

Respectfully
Mark

Good job.

ISAF: "This is a provisional list of event and subject to final confirmation in the ISAF mid year meeting next May"

Provisional is such a powerful word.

Provisional is also a HOPEFUL word... One last chance to get it right.

What do you think... they run this by the IOC and get a thumbs down... (Roman... not Greek symbol ... meaning off with their heads)

What then?

WTG John! Better to have your foot in the door than not at all!

Great job John (et al)...

Now to keep the irons hot through to the spring meeting!

Mark, I appreciate your enthusiasm (and truly wish more people had it), but I don't see ANYTHING in that last rant that could POSSIBLY move us forward. True, we don't want to repeat the mistakes of the past, but we also don't need to dwell and can't turn back the clock. We need to move forward in the current environment and change it over time.

IMHO, ISAF will never let keelboats go, and will continue to leverage Paralympic sailing if need be. They are on record for this.

Mike

yes, well done to all the multihull reps at the meeting.

The final list of events is a mess.

Imagine you are a member of the IOC. You love sport, but you are not that familiar with sailing... ISAF flop this list on the desk in front of you and you get someone that is more familiar with the sport to explain it to you...you are gonna have some questions...
Men and women each have a board, a skiff and a single-hander - fine. Why do men need an extra single-hander?
Why don't men sail in keel boats?
Why do only mixed teams sail dinghies and multihulls
We have 3 single hander classes and only one keelboat - do 3 times as many people sail singlehanders?
We have 2 sailboard classes and only one dinghy class - do 2 times as many people sail boards as sail dinghies?


OK some of the answers to these questions could make sense, but my point is that it seems to be a mish-mass list with no real pattern or system, it therefore leaves itself open to questions

I can't see ISAF having the bottle to submit it after the May meeting. Its all still up in the air in my mind.

I’m so happy to see a cat back in there (thanks to all who made that happen) but I agree with your sentiment.
The problem is that the process takes place in a piecemeal fashion. The entire slate needs to be voted on to ensure that there is proper balance. To my mind the end result is just so simple when you take all the class preferences out of the equation.

Single Handed Dinghy (classic) Women & Men
Double Handed Dinghy (modern) Women & Men
Boards (modern) Women & Men
Multihull (modern) Women & Men
Keel Boat (classic) Women & Men

This whole "Olympic Sailing" situation has become a load of crap. I think we all agree on that. It has more to do about PC, personal platform prejudice and gender equity than sailing.

Do the other Olympic disiplines have the same issues that we "yachters" have?

I used to root for the "home team" regardless of what the selected classes were. Being a two hull guy, I was especially energized when the "T" made the cut for '76.

That was 35 years ago. We are into a new generation both in society and the olympics where it is all about media, $$$$, and PC.

We had 5 classes and they changed slightly from year to year...5.5 to Dragon to Soling, FD to 470, Star to Tempest to Star, Finn to Finn to Finn, etc. TORNADO!!!!

It all went down hill from there...I can accept a few women's classes, they deseve it for sure. Throw in a sailboard or two, I'm OK with that.

Now they are trying to fit all the special interests into 10 disiplines. Even that makes sense if you have to limit it at some number.

One would think that you would just pick a variety of classes that are popular in a lot of places and if someone wants to be an "Olympian", they would migrate to one of those classes.

I know this is simplistic thinking and on this forum we all want a cat (note: not just a multihull).

So now we might have to settle for a "mixed" team? Why us rather than the 49er? And whose bright idea is it to have both the Finn and Laser? It's the Olympics for crissakes, man up.. Paul Elvstrom did.

I would almost rather have the multihull be an Aqua Cat. Wouldn't our Rock Stars still decide the issue of who is the best Catsailor?

You guys are fighting the good fight. Keep it up JW, et al. Mark is way over abused by short thinking posters. He may say things that sound like ranting, but there is a lot of wisdom in his posts...as there was with Wouter until y'all ran him off. Or did Rick cut him off because he went over the posting limit?

I am happy to see the multihull back in the mix. It is not final so I will not hold my breath until it is. I do not understand the remaining list though. Some I agree with and others I do not. I wonder how the IOC is going to view this list. Still think there is much politics at play here. I was not there so that is just a supposition.

The following is not an official report from the ISAF Multihull Commission, but an unofficial account including a number of personal opinions on the subject of multihulls and the process of getting them back into the 2016 Olympic Games from one of the "insiders".


As everyone will be aware, the ISAF Council voted 19 - 16 to support the recommendations of the Events Committee for a slate of 10 events for the 2016 Olympic Games, including a mixed multihull. This slate is a recommendation only with the aim to provide direction and allow people to plan further ahead than in previous Olympic cycles. The final decision on events will be made at the May 2011 Mid-year meeting to be held at St Petersburg in Russia. Unfortunately a 19 - 16 vote is not an overwhelming vote of support and it would only require a re-think by 2 Council members to overturn this decision in May, so there is still a lot of work to do between now and May.

So to recap the events that lead to this decision:

Following the vote to drop the multihull in 2007 ISAF decided that a piecemeal approach to event/class selection for the Olympic Games was not in the best interests of the sport and formed the Olympic Commission to provide an overall strategy not just for event selection, but also for World Cup and World Championship events. This Commission generated a lot of interest and with their report submitted last May, people began dissecting their report in great detail. While everyone felt that it was an excellent piece of work, each particular group found one or another piece that disadvantaged their particular self interest. For the multihull community the recommendation for the re-introduction of a multihull was most welcome, however, one other aspect of the report was the aim to achieve gender equity with equal medals available to men and women. To achieve this, there either needed to be a men's and women's multihull, no multihull, or a mixed multihull with a male/female on each team. With the Commission recommending a single mixed multihull, to achieve gender balance across the ten events there then needed to be another mixed event and the mixed 470 was proposed, effectively pairing it with the multihull.

The Commission also proposed a slate of six core events of men's and women's board/kite, single hander and skiff. Given that everyone was of the opinion that the multihull "must be returned to the Olympics", one has to ask why the multihull was not part of this set of core events, and this remains an unresolved issue.

At the Multihull Commission meeting, the overwhelming view was that we should pursue a separate men's and women's event, but that a mixed multihull was an acceptable though less preferred alternative.

As part of the Olympic Commission report, they also offered up a voting procedure which was followed by the Events Committee who voted in the slate of six core events, and then proceeded to a vote to narrow the remaining six recommended events for the four remaining slots. The encouraging support of 84% of voting members put the multihull in front of the Finn, Star, 470, Women's keelboat and a 2nd women's single hander. At this vote the last two remaining boats were the Finn vs Star with the Finn coming out comfortably in front and the Star being eliminated.

This recommendation then went to the Council which voted 19 - 16 to support the recommendations. This vote is non-binding and the final decision is to be made at the mid-year meeting in May in St Petersburg, Russia. Given that the vote was close, one can expect a significant amount of lobbying in the ensuing months from those who feel that the recommendations do not meet the needs of the sailing community or that their particular interests are not well represented.

So for multihullers the issues/messages out of the meeting are:

• The issue of mixed gender is still undecided. While no-one has put forward any concrete reasons against mixed gender, it is still an issue with unknown consequences. In sailing outside of the Olympics, mixed sailing by choice is extremely common, but enforced mixed gender is not. And the reverse can be said for men's and women's sailing - it is one of the few places where sailing split by gender is enforced and is not almost unheard of in club sailing.

• With mixed gender brings up the issue of "who would be driving". The general consensus was that for a 470, probably the female would drive and the male would be crew, simply based on weight considerations. In the multihull it would be dependant on what boat was chosen. If a smaller boat was chosen then either could be helm/crew whereas if a bigger boat were chosen it would probably be a women helming due to the high loads on the mainsheet.

• With the mixed gender being somewhat divisive, the previous submissions about a 5/5 split of boats has again begun to gain favour in some quarters. This proposal, originally from the US, called for a men's and women's board, single hander, double hander, multihull and keelboat. This has significant advantages with pairings at each level of the sport. However, once you then start looking at specifics, this would mean the removal of either the 470 men and women or the 49er and the women's skiff, as well as pitting the Laser against the Finn. It would also mean changing a lot of classes all in one shot, and changing classes causes major upheavals for sailors, MNAs, etc. In the past, it has been typical to change only one or two classes per cycle.

• The May meeting could see the issue of events again opened up for debate. So for multihullers, the outcomes could be that we end up with a men's and women's multihull, a mixed multihull, or heaven forbid, no multihull.

So while the vote at the Events Committee in Athens is very positive for multihullers, the job is not done yet with 16 Council members effectively saying that they are not happy with the current slate, and we will all have to reconvene again in six months time in St Petersburg to ensure we end up with at least one multihull sailing in the waters off Copacabana beach in 2016.

And finally, a big thank you to all those who attended the meeting and help promote the message of mulithulls.

Members at the Multihull Commission meeting:
Carolijn Brouwer
David Brookes
John Williams

Other multihuller supporters at the meetings
Darren Bundock
Nahid Gaebler
Olivier Bovyn
Roland Gaebler
Edwin Lodder
Trigonis Konstantinos
Rob White
Mark Pryke
Hugh Styles
Gunnar Larsen
Andrew McPherson
Yves Loday
Arnaud Gautier
Richard Slater

ISAF Staff Member:
Simon Forbes


And to the offsite crew of Nick Dewhurst, Will Sunnocks and Simon Morgan for all their support and with special congratulations to Simon who also managed to have a son during the meeting.

Regards,

Paul Pascoe

I'm still here !

I'm just more taken up by other pursuits in life.
I'm spreading my wisedom elsewhere !

I do check back regulary though.

Kind regards,

Wouter

Nothing could run that dude off! haha

John Gender balance! Is that what you really think will apease to the viewers, if that were true then we would have a mixed super bowl wouldnt we, I say to you John getting a multihull in using a mixed event will not be enought to lift viewer interest to a level where the olympic sailing can survive, I say better we have NO mixed multihull event because that will not be enough to save olympic sailing anyhow...Do the general non sailing spectators really care about Gender Balance, definately not! They will tune in to watch the best of the best sail in the fastest and most spectacular cat on the market, that is definately not a 16 footer and isnt a hubby and wifey team, your proposal to support an mixed event is unaceptable, to the future of olympic cat sailing, as you will be condemming it, by its failure to really deliver what the non sailer wants to see..We need to go all the way, or not at all, I thank you for your support I just wish I could steer you in the right direction. Remember in order to make the olympic sailing survive it has to really appeal to the houshold viewer or its over, and in your previous post you already admitted that a male will need to hold the main sheet on the bigger platform, in that case then it isnt fair to choose a larger platform as the women wont get to sheet the main and compete as equal, thats not gender equal now is it? So make the event on a smaller cat 14 to 16 foot! wake up to yourself please, that is not what is needed to lift viewer numbers and you know it! The general viewer must and want to watch 20 foot cats that wont be over weighted in light conditions. Just how exiting will a 2 up 16footer with your argued heavy weights on it perform in 5 knots of breeze, like a piece of boring ****! Yet a 20 foot cat can still lift a hull and power up under spinaker, I really dont think that the ISAF have considered that! Light winds versed spectator interest in a small 16 footer verses a 20 footer, Can you garuntee 15 to 20 knots at the next venue John? Can olympic sailing take the chance? I ask you in all fairness Please do not condem olympic cat sailing to a mixed event in a 16 foot cat in very light breezes its not worth the risk, is it? Just my thoughts and i am always open to other opinions and ideas, and now is the time to put them forward..

Personally I'm more of the side "why not" then "why" in this respect and agree with John here. Lets make mixed multi sailing the most exiting sailing event in the Olympics ! It's gotta beat heavy men dinghy sailing with ease as a spectator sport !

I say this is an opportunity that we must leverage with all our might. Perferable to a final result where both men and women have a multi event. I feel that alot of other posters are just vinegar pissers because their preferred setup is not high on the equipment listing. Tough luck guys, you should have worked harder on the design or on building a viable class.

Personally, I feel nothing fundamentally wrong with mixed teams, hell, I would even liked to see that ! Seriously. I think it can introduce a new dimension to sports in general. Don't we have mixed doubles in tennis for example ? Also, it increases the pool of potential sailors by theoretically 2 ! Not in the beginning of course but after a several years of good promo ? Aren't we complianing about the decline of sailing ? Well, opening up the sport to the other half of the populus can't really be a bad thing, can it ?

Of course then we get the usual BS about a 16 footer being a toy compared to the manly man 20 footers, bla, bla, bla. How a 16 footer will sink with two heavy weights on it, but the Olympics aren't really about beer belly overweights are they ? They are about trimmed-down athletic young people right ? How many 90kg version will there be of those ? Or are we putting Mike Tyson kind of persons on sail craft now ? Of course, we also get the "slow as hell" argument when for example the F16's are ONLY 15% slower around the course then the overhyped Nacra carbon 20. Yep, you got that right, a full 15% (5 min per race)! Never mind that (even) the 16's beat the 49-er skiff (another overhyped class) by a 20% margin already. My point being here that pretty much any catamaran design (including the H16's) will beat ALL OTHER SAILING OLYMPIC CLASSES hands down anyway. In fact, the F16's beat ALL OTHER types of sailboats (incl. moth foilers, 14 and 16 foot skiffs, with 18's being equal at best) around the course, save a handful of larger cats (M20, Tornado (only 10% faster), Nacra 20C, plus a few one-offs or prototypes). And that most definately includes light winds. How can that ever be bad ? You yourself, celebrated the Nacra 17 (gets beaten by F16) as a good option a short while ago ? I'm sure you also know the meaning of the expression "Double standard".


No I say that some of us here are focussing to much on the negative and don't see the opportunities that John tries to explain to us.

Start out mixed and make that work then work to get a second (mens) multi included while keeping the current choice as the womens multi. Like a two-stage rocket. Seems like the best approach given the situation to me. The 5/5 directly would be better but that is simply not in the cards at this time.

So we've got to use what we've got and get some results first.

Regards,

Wouter