Apologies up front if any of this sounds inflammatory, or if I wander off topic.



It's only an excuse if you are the type of person who looks for excuses. If you're the type that says "I won, I'm the better sailor" and "I lost, the ratings suck", you'll always find an excuse. No excuses under one-design? Gimme a break. Sailor X won because he bought new sails. Sailor Y won because he has lower/higher crew weight.

I'm finding myself in a real slump in my racing lately, but the last thing I'm blaming is other people's ratings.

I have always believed, and I think this is the angle Mark is working - that for any of this to matter you have to add new sailors to the sport. Moving sailors from one class to another is just a shell game.

When you're dealing with low numbers and you're trying to build a Fleet, picking and choosing the boats will limit turnout, and some form of handicapping is absolutely the way to go. Having to buy an expensive boat to play is not going to happen when you're new to the sport. When numbers begin to increase, and people start to upgrade from the starter boat that got them in, they start to pick the boats that interest them and groups start to form, and now that they're hooked, spending some money is ok. We've seen this big-time in our club. When we get newbies (I mean new to cat sailing or sailing itself), it's usually "I've got an old FastCat 17.5, can I race with you guys?" Telling them no, you must buy the one-design we're all sailing to play would only reinforce the exclusionary reputation sailing has. For awhile we've had a rag-tag Fleet. I guess we still do. But now our numbers are growing. And what do you know, the people that have been sailing their mixed bag are starting to upgrade, and they're picking boats based on the others that are around, and some groups are forming. First it was the NACRA 5.8s, then NACRA 6.0s. Hobie-20s and Inter-20s, A-Cats, and Taipans. And people are having fun racing against their counterparts as well as within the whole context of Portsmouth. The increase in numbers of sailors in our Fleet is helping out other regattas in the area, as people are starting to venture out. It's a slow process, but I believe it is happening.

Don't get me wrong - I believe One Design and Formula is a great thing. And it will be great to see it thrive again with strong cat classes.

We're at a time with our sport (and I mean catsailing in general, not just racing, even though I know that definition is not universal), where we need to bring fresh blood in. I believe we need to concentrate on that. Once the numbers come up, and a critical mass is there, the one design and formula scenes will have a better chance to develop and exist and keep support. I believe the open Portsmouth racing is the best way to just get people out. If the racing in the area is handicap, and people feel that racing in handicap is so bad they'd rather sit on the beach and stew about it, well, go ahead and sit. You're not helping grow the scene and I'd rather have somebody who doesn't know port from starboard but is enthusiastic to race with.

Variations on the scoring theme as far as trophies in sub-classes are simply a tweak, and honestly I'm not sure if will change the draw to an event that much. I don't think I'll say "it's not worth going to that race because there's only trophies for open spin and non-spin" - I'm more interested in whether the whole thing looks like fun. If you're going to base your attendance on what trophies you can take home, then see my previous comment about who I'd rather see on the water.

What will bring new people to the sport is relentless bringing of the word to the unconverted. In our area, I believe a crappy job is done in this area. I think one of the key reasons our Fleet has grown has been due to our getting the word out to non-catsailors and non-racing catsailors. We've backed off a little because we're at the limits of our land space, but you can never back off - old members leave or become inactive for whatever reason, and you drive yourself crazy trying to figure out a way to make them come back, or you can go out and find new blood. New blood is the best option every time. An example of us not getting the word out - in Galesville, where we race on every Tuesday night from early May through October when we switch to Sundays, I just got contacted by an active keelboater from the Wednesday night series, saying after all the years he's raced in Galesville he had no idea that there was a cat club. He was surprised to find out we've been there for 12 years. And we're sponsored by the same bar. We're not getting the word out. Great events like the C-100 happen and nobody outside the cat-sailors even know it happened. We're not getting the word out.

If this all sounds like work, well it is. But the benefits include having the critical mass of sailors to support just about any kind of racing to fill all niches. Forming the niches before the critical mass has been achieved is a recipe for failure in my book.

Of course, that's just my opinion, I could be wrong.

Okay, I have been watching the banter, and I have to chime in now. We have a fleet of about 25 boats here in Columbia S Carolina. They are as follows
Supercat 20 4
I 20 2
NACRA 6.0 1
NACRA 5.2 2
G Cat 5.7 2
G Cat 5.0 4 active
G Cat 21 1
H 18 2
H 17 1
H 17 sport 1
H 16 5 (3 new sailors)
Mystere 6.0 1
H18modified 1
Trac 16 2
H 20 1


Okay, do we race one design. No. Do we race portsmouth, sometimes. Do we just go out and have fun and see who gets back first? Oh yes. No excuses heard, no bitching, just I can sail my boat(no matter what it is) better than you.

Now when we have a regatta, we split the fleet into high and low portsmouth groups. If ther e are 5, they have thier own class.
This is what works for us. Most people (IMHO) buy boats because something becomes available that they like. Most people when they are new to cats dont set out and say I have to have this type of boat to race against these guys. Once people begin racing and enjoy it, then they specialize. At least that is what is happening here. It may not apply anywhere else, but you asked what will support our fleet.

David Mosley
www.seacats.org

That's what I'm talking about. You certainly said it more concisely! I believe that's happening in our club for sure.

Hi Mark, not sure if it's of interest, but at our club we have an SI that says that any class that has an average of 5 boats out per race in the previous year (we hand-wave that calculation rather than actually compute it) in the cat handicap fleet - ISAF www.schrs.com - can have their own start and seperately scored results. The Dart18s were the last fleet to achieve this, but without exception, everybody in the Dart fleet decided that they'd still like to see their results against the other boats and so we just score their results seperately (+ additional glassware) as well as include them in the handicap results, and they start with the handicap fleet. The F18s will achieve this 'status' next year and I suspect the same thing will happen. In this way the club's policy adapts to whatever folk decide to sail. Racing spinny boats against non-spinny boats sounds like madness, but at the end of the day we're (that's our club, not all clubs in general) out there to have a good time in club racing; most of us treat it as practice for 'real' events so big starts are good and winning is secondary. The bar banter is always good after the race too; especially when a Dart18 is the first to reach the windward mark after a decent start in a force 6... Our policy is similar for regattas; invite everybody; see who turns up; take times for everybody (it's not that much extra work**) and score overall and seperate class/rating-splits as appropriate with additional prizes for the separately scored divisions. If we had say 10-20 of one class turn up we would probably just ask them if they wanted a separate start... We would not get away with forcing any particular formula or class and I don't think we'd like to do it anyway; let folk sail whatever they like and try and accommodate everybody as necessary. Our cat fleet is growing steadily; but at the expense of the monhull fleet is has to be said...

www.mumblesyachtclub.co.uk

**By using something like Prolog - www.software4clubs.com - you press a button every time somebody cross the line and enter their sail number - the data ends up as a text file on the PC which can then be sucked into the scoring software. Presumably if two boats finish very close together you press the button twice and fill in the sailno later, so you still only need to record sail nos manually... The Round Isle of Wight race was done like this recently - www.fastscatrace.com.

See also:-

www.precisiontiming.com/3frame_alge.htm
www.autohoot.com/AutoHoot.htm
www.soton.ac.uk/~jets/raceday

Hi Colin
Sounds like the best way to run events .
Accomodate the sailors preferences .
just lunchtime here ,
Here in MI there is CRAM which holds races around the state ,-Great Lakes area . It is set up with fleet captains for each class and oriented on good class racing which has made it successfull for mor than 30 years as the Catamaran Racing Association of Michigan .
The CF 4 regatta is next weekend with more than 100 cats expected ,-The great folks in CRAM deserve credit for this ,--certainly not a handicap rating system base on average time, -its not what attracts people to racing .
Like the ISAF rating which the F-18 class authors used as a basis to write specifications for the class rules . One good thing leads to another and another -

Would like to see it similarly adopted here or at least tested and tried at some events ,-few would know the difference I,d bet .
It would eliminate numerous problems and be much more benificial ,-thanks again for sailwave scoring system .
Carl

Keith,
No apology needed. That remark was from a previous discussion Mark and I had and I don't expect you to know where I was coming from with that. I agree anyone can make excuses if they are looking to do it.

I also agree with you on the having fun aspect of your comments. I have always said that it is the people who keep this sport going not the boat being sailed or how they are being scored.

Fun is by far the most important reason I sail/race. Can you imagine going through all the trouble if it we not? Can you imagin packing the gear, boat, clothes, driving hours, un packing, rigging, sailing for two days, re-packing, de-rigging the boat, securing it, driving home, spending lots of money..etc etc..if the other sailors were all jerks? or if the event its self was no fun at all?

I know I would not be able to do it on a regular basis.

Tracie

Hi Carl,



It would be interesting to score a seasons results on USSA PN, RYA PN, ISAF and Texel to see if much changed. My guess is that they are all 'good enough' and that on average not much place changing would happen; skillful crews winning out over a period of time in all but exceptional circumstances. Why do we have all these systems; I dunno; perhaps I've got it all wrong... At least your PN scheme is easy for clubs to operate; i.e. just email the results to Darline; our (UK RYA) PN scheme is a nightmare - "simple" example - when it comes to making returns... One thing many clubs do is use a high point logarithmic system (e.g. Rinderle or Austrian) which takes the number of competitors in a race into account; i.e. getting a second in a 3 boat race is not as good points-wise as getting a 2nd in a 10 boat race.

We did have a 'situation' with our club racing once; in the last race of a series, an Inter20 would win if a particular Dart didn't come first (or something like that); so the Inter just sailed the Dart down the pan... Not particularly sporting (or is that just me?); but they took so much stick for it that I doubt it would happen again...

Regards,
Colin
www.sailwave.com

The root of the problem is lack of sailors. You can see this in the scarcity of young sailors at our events. WRCRA, Seacats and others who have responded have evolved a flexible system to accomodate the scoring issue and may have found a way to bring new people into the sport. I totally agree with Keith that we don't locally advertise ourselves and our local races enough. I am copying below something I picked up from the NAHCA web site on one way a fleet in Seattle boosted their membership. I don't know if its out of date, but the ideas certainly aren't. Many areas also don't have the benefit of a good local dealer, but that just means the club has to work harder to get into contact with new and potential sailors. Its a bit of work, but anything worthwile is and if we aren't willing to step up and do some work to grow our sport, then we are just passing the time in futile complaining. As one business advisor once told me, "a complaint without a solution is just bitching". My apologise for the length, the following is thanks to NAHCA:
Fleet Building 101
Last year Fleet 95 (Seattle) came up with a crazy idea that was so crazy, it has become infectious. We want to share the concept with you in the hopes it will help you.

Like many fleets around the country, Fleet 95 is/was situated in the middle of a major metropolitan area with a dying fleet. We didn't even need to use our toes to count active members!! This, with over 3 million people less than an hour away!!

So last year we decided to teach a seminar on how to sail Hobies. On the surface, it seemed like a pretty mundane idea. But we were so blown away by the response, that we haven't stopped running!!

We call the seminar 'Hobie 101'. Fitting, since we use the Hobie University booklet produced by NAHCA! We run the seminar on a Saturday in May one week after Opening Day -- the official opening of the yachting season in Seattle. (We figure Opening Day reminds everyone about that mossy hunk of fiberglass buried in the weeds out back.)

Our advertising/marketing is almost exclusively through the local dealer -- Dan Carpenter and Kevin Cunningham at Hobie Cats Northwest. They get a booth at the Seattle Boat Show every January. So we get the word out there and through their shop during the springtime. That's it. No direct mail. No phone calls. Just the Hobie dealer.

The seminar goes from 9 to 5. We have a chalk talk in the morning. Around 11 a.m. we head out to the floating dock to a fully rigged Hobie 16. There we demonstrate tacking and gibing, talk about safety and clothing and boat tuning and stuff like that. Then we send them off to Laura Sullivan and Jerry Valeske's motorhome for lunch. They grab their box lunch, sit down with someone they don't know (we hope and encourage them to), and make friends.

After lunch, they start rigging their boats. Fleet volunteers walk around and help them rig and tune their boats, answer questions, and help them launch. We hit the water around 2 p.m. for two hours of Rick White-style drills. Or at least we try to get it as synchronized as Rick's seminars. But it always fails miserably. Instead, the boats are being sailed off in a myriad of directions. So we abandon the 'drills' idea and power around in the fleet Avon with a megaphone shouting instructions and encouragement to each boat -- giving them personalized instruction.

After a couple of hours, we send them back to the beach. They break their boats down and head back into the classroom. There, Laura greets them with a cool beverage of their choice while Jerry is playing back the video. We analyze the video, talk about the day, and send them on their way!

Last year we figured we might get 5-10 people of which maybe 1-2 would show interest in joining the fleet and our racing activities. We were inundated with 20 people in about 10 boats! It was so successful, the attendees were literally begging for another class!! We weren't prepared for that, but shrugged our shoulders and said "Sure!" Hence, Hobie 102 was born.

Hobie 101 deals almost strictly with boat tuning and handling. Hobie 102 deals with racing -- how starts are run, what the courses are, how to round marks, stuff like that. At Hobie 101 we encourage regatta participation. In Hobie 102 we expect regatta particpation!!

This year we had 38 registered for Hobie 101 of which about 27 showed up with 16 boats! Both years we have had someone travel over 5 hours to attend our seminar!!! 5 hours!

Many of these people don't even own a boat, and are coming to check out Hobies because they are thinking of buying either a Hobie or some other dinghy. Two guys last year didn't even know what a Hobie Cat was, but came anyway and spent the day with us because they was so intrigued with what we were doing. This year we had some fleet members rig their boats and take the people without boats out for rides so they could check it out for themselves.

The best part is this: last year, of the 10 boats that showed up, at least 5 are racing on a regular or semi-regular basis!!! For those of you doing the math, that's a 50% retention rate! Of the 16 that showed up this year, we expect 7-9 new boats out on our race course! That is about a dozen new boats in the past two years!! What would your regatta look like with 12 more boats registered?!!!

The fleet 'regulars' (you know, the ones we can count on our fingers!) were mostly tied up with other obligations the day of our event. The week prior to the event we were so overwhelmed with late registrations that we panicked and put out an APB to our division members asking for volunteers. This is really the clincher…..Just about the entire graduating class from last year showed up to help out with the newbies this year!!!! Can you believe that!

Last year we went on a pretty heavy follow-up campaign. We do all the registration via email, so we have their addresses for follow-up. We create a distribution list and politely hammer them with emails after the seminar about upcoming events, tuning tips, etc. This year we are delegating that responsibility by decentralizing it amongst our active fleet members and last year's class. We are using a 'buddy up' system to help bring these new ones to our regattas, answer their questions, drink their beer, and generally have a Hobie time!!! It helps the guys just one year into this feel like they are contributing something too!

We charge $10 to cover the cost of lunch and to put a value on the seminar so the attendees will place a value on it. We put the seminar on at Sail Sandpoint -- a recently converted Navy base now home to a sailing school. But the location is immaterial. This could be done on any beach with a white board!! We had a couple of passer-bys ask for our fleet contact information when they saw our boats.

Another cool thing is that all this new blood has stirred up some of the old blood. There is excitement in the air!! Things are happening!! The fleet is alive!!

There is a cool breeze blowing in Seattle! Come join the fun! We'll share our ideas with you and help you to have the same kind of success we've enjoyed.

Hi Colin

Down the pan ,--out past the layline ,-Its not just you ,thats usually something reserved for matchracing or collegiate team racing or large class racing at top levels ,-not for local club rated racing ---You generally don,t see it on cats because speed is more the objective . Cats are also very vunerable tacking and in roundings ,the speeds change from 20 plus to 2 sometimes in seas which causes more potential fouling situations and potential boat damage ,-most learn quickly this does not win races or regattas and usually involves the disgruntled back of the pack type cat sailor.
-- ,just realized I tryed something similar once racing way back when on very large competitive fleets of H-18s .
It came down to the last race and they had to have a first to win the regatta so we sat on them off the start and tacked on em each time up the first beat ,after 6 or 8 tacks we both rounded the first A mark close to last in class. Remember I handed the tiller to the crew {age 12 } and said that should do it, you sail the rest. --
The other team was so good they sailed through the entire fleet in the 3 around course and just missed winning by a boat length ,-oddly enough to my crews parents , I ,ve never cheered so hard for another boat to keep going before .
Good lesson for me ,I,ve never done it again or would ,better just to race and loosely cover if you have to in class . In rated racing on a faster design thats really a harsh tactic, if I were the Dart I,ve give them more than stick .
If your racing in a rated class with larger faster boats the larger lighter beamier one always has the advantage in tactical situations ,{maybe why so many of those types like rated races} -its not really {fair } or sporting in rating class type racing .

Seems like the ISAF Rating for cats and Texel are very similar producing similar numbers , think ISAF uses a few more factors in ratings calc that vary of waterline length ,
board measurement ,and spin area measurement where Texel does not and uses a standard 4 pt for all spin in size category and a 3 pt -for non board types. It then uses a slicker abbreviated simpler math formula of rated Length ,Sailarea,and R-weight.
TR number = 100 / (0.99 * RL^0.3 * RSA^0.4 / RW^0.3),
The ISAF site has a really good example rating diagram and sample calc .http://www.schrs.com/schrsdiagrams.asp?id=boat

Sailwave is an invaluable tool for any that would like to compare rating systems,we should be comparing them and hopefully someday combine the best attributes of each into one universal rating system .
I gave it a try in outline,under TIP rating on the F-20 forum here , TIP for Texel ISAF &Portmouth combined ,but honestly it will take better minds than mine to work out all the variables correctly .

The Texel or ISAF Rating systems seem to be accurate within 2or3% -and doubt the differences in P-rating when converted and compared would be much different . What your left perfecting is that last few percent by adding a windspeed and other added calc based on design effects.
Adapting the ISAF rating for cats that sailwave scoring is of course set up for also for some events here would be a first good step.

All the best
Carl

Hi Tracie

"you wrote"
As far fleet policies. I'm not sure I follow you there. Why would a club limit themselves by stating a scoring preference? I'd rather see what we get then sort it out at the Skipper's meeting.

Well that's pretty tricky of you!

You state your policy so that people know what to expect after they do all of the work (see your comments) to get to your event. Why would they want to be surprised or disappointed?

Would you write a teaser for your regatta like this or even attend a regatta that stated?
"Great fun, We expect on average 3 boats in the XXX class based on the last two years of attendace for great one design racing."

While you and Mary are personaly content with that turnout, I don't think you would find too many others (including me) who would make the trek and spend the time and money to go to your regatta.

This well meaning flim flam of listing the one design classes which COULD happen ... has not been growing cat racing for years and your regatta in the spring is an example of how attendance can continue to decline.

Perhaps if you at least adopted CBYRA's policy for one design racing (see above) EG... 7 class boats preregistered and paid by Tuesday with refunds offered if you are switched to a handicap class you might get more attendace at your annual regatta. People would know what to expect and might actually choose to go racing if its against 10 to 20 other boats.. all be it not the same kind and reverse your regattas decline. At the momement the poll is running better then 60% to 40% in favor of running an event like the OCRA/Catfight style.

I am not sure how any one could argue against the notion that potential racers should have a pretty good and realistic idea of what they can expect in terms of class structure and turnout. This is key to building interest in your regatta and racing in general. That's why people like to see the "who's coming lists" and regattas go to all of the effort to build and update them.

Spring Fever lists the attendee's but not the classes and has seen attendace drop while Catfight lists the racers and the portsmouth class class they will race in. HMMM I am sure there are other reasons but I would not discount the truth in advertising theme here.

Clarity seems to be important.

PS.. had you not scheduled your Rookie race day on the same weekend as the 97th running of the Cambridge regatta we might have seen each other sooner.

Take Care
Mark

Mark. is the glass half full? Or half empty?

I would personally view the statement as a challenge. If they said we expect 3 boats in xxx class, and that was my class, I would try to find that 5th boat along with myself and come anyway.
Why do find portsmouth racing so distasteful? Its racing, you are on your boat, you are probably having fun(thats what its all about isnt it), and you are in the company of people who like to do the same as you. Why would you be turned off from any regatta? I have a few that didnt exactly trat cat sailors nice, but otherwise regatta are alot of fun.

David Mosley
www.seacats.org

I don't mean any disrespect to the thoughtful responses here, but in my area (and many others) this whole discussion is irrelevant.

Very few people have any exposure to sailing. The sailboats, including cats, that are around appear to be permanently docked on trailers in storage yards. Ski boats, fishing boats, PWC--they outnumber sailboats on most of our local lakes at least 100:1. There are no sailboat dealers or suppliers within at least 80 miles.

I suspect other folks live in similar demographics. I would race at a local venue with any format. In fact, I've been considering asking the local yacht club if I could race in their PHRF fleet (only boat near same speed is a Hobie 33) as they're just about the only sailors around.

Bottom line is that sailing is just not very popular in the most areas of the US. Why? Probably lots of reasons. So promoting sailing in general is a much larger issue than portsmouth vs formula vs one design. 20 years ago Hobie was doing something right--when bystanders see my Taipan they say, "Nice Hobie." Marketing, in some form or another, is absent now. For example, Lara Croft is seen on a jet ski, not a catamaran, in the latest Tomb Raider. We all know the thrill of cat sailing stacks up to powerboating, but requires a lot more brain cells.

Sailing is viewed in the US as inaccessible, eccentric, expensive, difficult, dull, slow, etc. Cat sailing is anything but dull and slow. It is far less expensive than powerboating. It has all the exhilerating characteristics that could appeal to the 20-somethings buying PWC by the pairs. It's all a matter of exposure and marketing.

Does Hobie or Performance do any large scale marketing? Is expanding the base of sailors in the US part of their business plan?

I have yet to do this but I hope to someday soon...go to your local bicycle and kayak shops (most kayak shops around here cater to climbers, hikers, and campers too) and post some fliers with action shots of catsailing and advertise a free 'get to know' sailing seminar (like someone posted above). If you get any resistance from the shop owners, explain to them how they can benefit by carrying a few profitable items (some they already do) like life vests, gloves, shoes, hiking harnesses and bring the stuff with you to show them. Only take 10 or so people because these guys will not have boats and your club will have to supply them boats and skippers. Have plenty of pictures and / or videos (see the performance cat promotional video - about 30 minutes of hull flying fun, or excerpts from Rick's stuff) and have a video and chalkboard learning session (borred from the above post) at someone's house on a Friday evening and follow up the next day on the water (and pray the wind shows up too). You might have a contingency for Sunday if it doesn't look very windy for Saturday.

THESE are the people with the money, the drive, and the physical ability to bring this sport back again. They're just off doing other, just as expensive, things. Chances are they just haven't considered that catamaran sailing can be more challenging, a little safer, and a heck of a lot of fun - they've probably never even HEARD of it.

If anyone wants any help designing some marketing materials for such a project, I'll be glad to help for free.

Mark,

You hit a sore spot with me and I'm sorry if this sounds mean-spirited but...

I strongly disagree with you on why our spring regatta has had poor attendance. It is not because it is poorly organized event as someone has mentioned previously, and I happen to take offensive to that as I put a tremendous amount of time, effort and heart into that event and every other event I plan through the year.
Poor attendance at the event is not because of how the event is scored. Do you speak regularly with the sailors in our Division? Do you know what they want? I can guarantee you it is not a different scoring system. It is too move the event off the oceanfront.
Quote and analyze all the polls taken off CatSailor if you like, but I hate to break this to you Mark, even though I like CatSailor Magazine very much and this internet site, it is not a complete and true representation of all the Cat sailors out there. I can name many cat sailors and racers that have no idea this place even exists.

It is very easy to sit back and cast criticism on how others run their events or how they should score them and why you are not going to go to their event because you don’t like this, or you don’t that. But think about this. There are dozens of very dedicated people out there who spend enormous amounts of time and effort and heart into planning these events. Sometimes, they are practically the only one doing anything, but they keep plugging away doing the best they can with what they’ve got.

If people like you keep choosing to sit back and tell others how they should run their events and then maybe you might drag your boat out and come race, you are going to find yourself in the same position you are right now. Sitting at your computer still bitching about how these events are run and how you think it should be done.

Or worse yet, the people who do plan and run these events will get tired of it and stop doing it. Then you won’t event have an event to throw opinions on.

By the way the Raven Rookie race is for rookies - people who have never raced before. Surely you are not saying you felt the need to race in it?

Tracie

Great idea Jake.

I live in NY, close to Oyster Bay and race against PHRF (Performance Handicap Racing Formula) monohulls. Does anyone have PHRF not Portsmouth ratings for a Prindle 19 ?

Here's an example...

Looks great Jake!

Feel free to post any comments or suggestions (like adding the word 'free' in there somewhere ). I will gladly customize this (or anything like it) for anyone who wants one.