The first day of racing is complete and results are posted
Hobie 16 Results

The Pan Am games will be in Toronto and 7 slots are for Cats... Canada gets a slot so 6 from North and South America are contested. The US has to finish in the top three this week.

Thanks Mark.

Why does the US need to finish top 3 to qualify if there are 7 spots? I forget how the Pan Am system works.

Any info on the conditions down there this week? I hear they had some great breeze.

Up here in Newport, 70+ J24 Worlds happening. Winds were mid-teens yesterday, with a large ocean swell coming across the course. Tom Korz is crewing on one (Bow 03), which got into a P/S incident on the starboard tack lay line (freight train of boats) at the weather mark in race 2 yesterday. Rigs collided, Tom's boat (S) lost the forestay and had to retire. The P boat retired due to the foul, and Tom's boat got redress. Local rigging shop got their forestay repaired and they were reinstalling it by the end of the party last night. These boats have rules for their rules, so the boat needs to be reinspected by the technical measurer before sailing today.

J24 Results link: http://www.yachtscoring.com/event_results_cumulative.cfm?eID=982

Mike

mike... its just a practical matter... they award 3 spots in the North Americans... and three spots in the South Americans ... of course the continentals are open to all international competitors.... and so a US team could go down to the south American's and qualify the US. Looks like Guatemala, Puerta Rico, US and Canada are at Lewes... so...it should work out.

Contrast this with the US going for the N17 slot... A lot of countries are going for the handfull of remaining slots..... No Slot... no US team in the Olympics. (much less a medal)

Gotcha, thanks.

Mike

Any updates from DE? Results look like two races Tues and one on Wed? Any work for the jury?

Newport's been all hands on deck. Lots of protests until well after midnight Tues, and very late again on Wed, and that's with arbitration. Holding the schedule of two races per day. Waves have been tough, wind in the mid-upper teens. Forecast today isn't pleasant (rain and heavy wind).

Mike

We had 3 races Monday (big wind, waves) and 2 races Tuesday (light, lumpy). No races yesterday - too windy. Only 3 boats left the beach, 1 flipped in the surf, the two others were out to play and flipped at least 3 times each.

Only work for the jury was a Request for redress re: the finish line ball in race 3 not conforming to the SI description. 3 boats were granted redress.

Day 3 Press Release

Lewes, DE (September 24, 2014): Racing was postponed today due to high winds and rough surf before all of the sailors except one team had left the beach. The race committee was on the water and beginning to set a course in the lee of the breakwater near the Cape May Lewes Ferry terminal. Winds were already near 18 knots and gusting to the high 20’s and were forecasted to go to above 30 later in the day. Multi-national champion Greg Thomas and John Williams (California) were the first to try to launch through the surf and promptly capsized just off the beach. Racing was then postponed for the day when it was clear that most of the fleet would not be able to reach the racing area. Two other hearty teams rigged up to test their skills against the elements with onboard video cameras that are part of a video production directed by Gary Jobson Sailing. Mark Modderman and Tommy Butler (New Jersey) and Regatta Chairman Rich McVeigh and Sue Korzeniewski managed to get in a short sail with some blazing speed an only a few capsizes that will be sure to provide some exciting sailing video. Gary Jobson was the featured speaker at the Mid-week dinner and entertained the competitors with stories from the last Americas Cup in San Francisco.

Racing continues tomorrow thru Friday and the forecast appears to be better for the sailors tomorrow.

How'd it go in DE today?

We moved up into the bay due to the horrible forecast making ocean racing on Rhode Island Sound less than desirable. We never saw heavy rain or wind, and with the northerly wind, the waves were minimal. The current helped tremendously, keeping the start line clear except for a single OCS under Papa. Two more good races in the bank. Reasonably quiet night in the room, but they're still going. Sadly, the scoring program hasn't been cooperating with ZFPs.

Mike

what software are you guys using? It seems to be a trend lately in general (uncooperative scoring software)

All of the online registration services have a scoring module...
The appeal is that as long as everyone has registered through the service... no need to import information though some sort of transfer file. Also... so long as you have internet access or cell phone coverage on the water... you can enter the finish positions from a cell phone from the finish boat.

Of course they can't match the international vetting given Sailwave after every quad when it comes to doing what the jury wants. or what the club has in mind according to the rulebook.... ...

Typo's are typos and whether you create them on your cell phone or your laptop... they still require proof reading. Its much easier to have your proofreader read off the RC reconciled score-sheet with a large screen in front of you then anything on a cell phone.

Best solution is to have everyone register online... even on site late registration... It's very quick to download the registration file and suck the data into Sailwave.. print the scratch sheet for the PRO and save the file... Then take a photo of the reconciled score-sheet... send it to the club and then print it. (assuming you have people who can do this....)
a scorekeeper and a helper can then plug along and get cross checked results published before the sailors get to the beach

No phone coverage... then you need a boat to transfer the paperwork to shore.

Sailwave is still the gold standard. especially for large events.

We've been having some weird stuff happening with Sailwave lately...inconsistent output and results. Scores not tallied right and output order jumbled. I'm sure it's probably some setting somewhere or user error but there are just so many options in it that if you don't use it frequently, it's easy to get lost and spend more time scoring a weekend regatta than doing it on a napkin.

blame it on the shockwave virus, Jake...

They have been using yacht scoring.com at Sail Newport for a few years. They had to call the programmer to fix the problem. Never a good thing during a major regatta.

I agree that online registration is the way to go, but I haven't seen any of the systems work well for scoring. My preference is to import the registration data into a real scoring program, takes away all of the guesswork.

The best solution would be for one of these online systems to partner with the best scoring program and run that as a blended solution.

Mike

How'd it go on the last two days in DE?

I left Newport Thursday night (a day later than planned), and the redress stuff had quieted down, but there were still plenty of protests. I watched more blatant fouls than I ever care to see again (squeezing up and wrapping yourself around the weather mark rather than ducking, gybing and losing to the starboard parade). Your penalty for that is supposed to be RET, not turns (or SCP in this regatta). Looks like Friday was much calmer for the jury...

Anyway, up in Marblehead now for the Hinman (US Team Racing Champs). Very light and flat (huge change from Newport). They're using brand new boats (the 24 here are the only ones on the planet), and they are able to sail in almost no wind. Team racing is just too cool, we really should try it on cats.

Mike

Mike are you on RC or umpiring?

They've been holding a 2v2 F18 team race in the Netherlands for a few years now. We had some preliminary discussions to do something on the River out of the MIT pavilion. Biggest problem is getting the boats there.

Team racing is awesome- if anyone ever wants to give it a go I run a weekly series out of MIT every Thursday evening from June-September. The level of racing is pretty darn good, lots of all americans hanging around the area.

We're also planning to bring back the Charles River Open next year in early-mid june.

I've done both, this weekend I'm RC. Umpiring is great. Best way to truly learn the rules, and gives you a whole new perspective on how boats can be handled, and how quickly rule scenarios develop and change on the water.

I know about the 2v2 on cats in Europe (it's been discussed on this forum). We need to do it here in the US.

Mike

Thursday, the nor'easter just squatted on us. Lots of sideways rain.
Friday was beautiful - we started under sunny skies and 15-18 kts, which slowly backed down to 7-8 kts by the time the fourth race started. Boats were off the water by 3 PM. 3 protests.

Jason Hess / Irene Abascal won, with Mark & Grace Modderman in 2nd.

Full results - http://www.regattanetwork.com/clubmgmt/applet_regatta_results.php?regatta_id=7949&show_crew=1