I'm a little confused. How many regattas are planned? what boats will be able to participate?

I believe one regatta is planned:

USSA Alter Cup: November 15th- 18th at Pensacola Bay Yacht Club

The regatta will be open, and sailed in F16s under F16 class rules (including valid measurement)

The F16 Nationals remain the same:

F16 Nationals: November 10th-11th at St. Andrews Bay Yacht Club

Both events will be great, and I hope I can sail in one of them!

Good deal! I've planned to sail Nationals all along.

PBYC = Pensacola Beach Yacht Club. I hear we're sailing on the Bay rather than the Sound.

Actually, November 9th-11th at St. Andrews Bay Yacht Club.

Is that competition on the 9th or just set up and registration?

F16 Nationals Nov 9 -11, 2012. Re, "I hope I can sail ONE of them" Sailors please chime in -- will anyone out there be able and likely to sail in both events (both are F16 Open events), or will you be required to chose just one? If you have to chose just one, which one will you attend? We need some serious feedback and we need it quick. 2012 F16 Nationals was planned when there were no major conflicts, now the host club has to seriously evaluate whether there will likely be enough of a turn out that the club is not in danger of taking a financial hit. Please help us figure out whether, as the 2012 F16 Nationals host site, we are likely to have a reasonable turnout. Given what we knew about the location of the fleet and the other regularly scheduled events during that time frame, we thought we would get at least 25 boats to the regatta. Now we are very concerned. Both events are Open F16 events in the Florida panhandle, just a few days apart. Alter cup is 4 days and $400 entry fee. F16 Nationals planned for 3 days and $150 entry fee.

I'm in for nationals. Alter Cup probably not.

Tentative plan via Paul Ulibarri, PRO for F16 Nationals was to stage optional practice race on Thurs, Nov. 8, then race days Fri - Sun (Nov 9 -11). Monday Nov 12 is Veterans Day.

I plan to do both.

Nationals

Thanks, John! If we can get enough boats, we will make the F16 Nationals a BIG PARTY for sure!

Apologies for having the dates of F16 nationals wrong, I used what was on the St. Andrews Bay Yacht Club website.

I'm hoping to sail in one of the events, probably not both. The reason for that is I don't own an F16, and would likely need to be asked to sail by someone who does, or charter a boat for the regatta. Also, as a grad student my sailing funds are limited and are primarily being allocated towards the F18 worlds.

I still maintain that both events will be excellent!

Nationals is my first preference. I may consider doing AC as well, or make my boat available to someone else from CRAW.

I'm sorry about the highjack Mark. I had the two threads mixed up and posting my message in the wrong thread.

Readers Digest version:

The general idea on having the events be separate, but close (and using the same equipment) would be that we would not impact the F16 Nationals, but would have boats in the same general vicinity available to charter (privately owned or from the manufacturers who plan to be in the area already for the Nationals), so we can accomodate teams that want to sail the Alter Cup but do not have an F16 of their own. At this time, there is still a very strong opinion within the committee that the Alter Cup needs to remain a unique (separate) event.

None of our decisions have been easy, given the new world we are living in. Manufacturers want way more than even the previous $7,000 to provide 10 boats under the old format. No one has come up with a megabucks sponsor to make that happen, and we needed to make quick decisions, or have no event.

There were plenty of other complications, but this is the gist of this decision.

Hope this helps.

Mike

Mike, I'm not intentionally throwing a monkey in the wrench, but I have to point out that the "new world" is the result of the US Sailing National Championships sponsorship package - it is not of the manufacturer's making. As long as we were able to recognize the boat builders as major sponsors, the charter fees were manageable. When we lost against the push to call them "paid suppliers," and saw them treated as such, we lost their tolerance for lower fees.

It bothers me a lot, considering the 25+ years of support, that manufacturers seem to now be "blamed" for the current format.

Well, it's pretty important. Where does the blame lie?

I don't think there is any, Pete. The sponsorship package evolved, and the "old" event format became incompatible. They were two, different missions.