First day of racing for the 2015 Nacra 17 Worlds is Sunday July 5th. This is a huge event for the US teams for a couple of reasons.

1. The US still needs to gain a country berth for Rio

-Ideally, we would gain one of the three berths available in Aarhus. If not, lets hope Canada, Aruba, and Puerto Rico all qualify!


2. The results of these worlds have major implications on the US selection process for Rio.

- The selection events for the US team are the 2016 Miami World Cup and 2016 Worlds in Clearwater.

- Entries for Miami will likely be limited, and the results of the 2015 Worlds determine who gets spots at Miami. No Miami, no Olympics.

From the selection document:

"2. For the 2016 ISAF Sailing World Cup Miami, if limited entries are
enforced, MNAs will be awarded a certain number of spots according
to a system described in the Notice of Race. US Sailing will award
entries to its athletes using the following criteria:

The first two entries in each class will be awarded to the two highest
finishing athletes or teams at the 2015 class world championships.

If a third entry is available in a class, it will be awarded to the highest
finishing athletes or teams at the 2016 MLK Weekend Regattas at
Coconut Grove Sailing Center (470, 49er, 49er FX, Nacra 17, RS:X) and
Lauderdale Yacht Club (Finn, Laser, Laser Radial) January 16-18, 2016.

If a fourth entry is available in a class, it will be awarded to the third
highest finishing athletes or teams at the 2015 class world
championships...."

US entries:
Mark Mendelblatt United States USA027 Carolina Mendelblatt
Sarah Newberry United States USA278 Matthew Whitehead
Michael Easton United States USA 234 Katie Pettibone
Steph Hudson United States USA123 Evan Aras
John Casey United States USA204 Kristen Lane

First day of racing cancelled due to no wind.

Postponement this morning because of too much wind, but it sounds like they are racing now.

Results will be here: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/438966762/Nacra17%20-%20Results.htm

It is interesting to see the number of teams that decided to stay on the beach. It's a gamble to burn your throws early. Mike and Katie are posting very consistent numbers.

I think the results are a bit misleading currently. There are two fleets- yellow and blue. Yellow fleet have finished two races (Easton is yellow), now blue is on the water (Newberry) but have only finished one race, and have a DNC for race two. It would be nice if they didn't use DNC for that purpose!

Gotcha, thanks for the clarification.

Results are up for today: two races each fleet (they may do a third, not sure): https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/438966762/Nacra17%20-%20Results.htm

As a reminder, the countries that are qualified: 1 FRA , 2 ARG , 3 AUS ,4 ITA, 5 NZL, 6 SUI, 7 GBR, 8 DEN, 9 AUT, 10 NED

Three spots available at 2015 worlds:
1. ARU
2. GER
3. ESP
4. GRE
5. USA (Newberry)
6. PUR (Figueroa)
7. URU
8. RUS
9. CAN (Ramsay)
10. NOR

Bad day for JC :-(

That's not fast (or cheap)...

-Captain Obvious

That's weird, a broken N17 mast...

Well, technically speaking...it could be fast depending on how anxious the rib driver is. But that does indeed have a very high suck factor.

Oh come on Mark you can do better than that? Oh sh1t Karl said that, damn marriage has made you soft, are you getting fat too?

eat what you want... sail bigger boats.

Has anyone done the statistics on which team breaks more masts (per regatta, hour of sailing, etc.)? Just from reading here, JC seems to have gone through quite a few. Could technique play a role? I've heard that reasoning used for masts breaking on other designs.

Mike

Results for the first 2.5 races from today are up. ARU and GER are going to be extremely difficult to catch, so it's really a race against Iker (and the rest of the teams on the fence) for the final spot. Talk about a daunting task!

Mike

do you get redress for an equipment failure (like the broken mast)?

I've only seen that card successfully played when the equipment was provided. That's not the case here and yikes what a can of worms if you're allowed redress for equipment issues.

Imagine the situation where you're having a bad race so you break your stick because you have another and redress gives you a better score.

Redress is never given for equipment failure in BYOB events, RRS does not allow for that (think: whose fault is it).

While redress is allowed for damage caused by other boats in BYOB events, I've seen that disallowed at a Worlds. IJ basically decided that the damage wasn't enough to make the boat unraceable.

Redress can be given for equipment failures in a BYOB event, but you have to prove that you didn't cause it (no fault of your own clause). I've seen this disallowed as well.

Mike

nope... no redress for breaking your mast.

Now ISAF can notice that mast breakage and they have decided that this should not be part of the competition and request the class under take a fix. That is how the Torando class moved to carbon sticks from alu extrusions. Marstrom designed and built the stick to be close to the alu extrusion. (bullet proof stick)

Is that an option here... oh wait. ISAF already had a hand in designing these masts to fix the nacra ones that broke all of the time..

no worries... they will get it right on the third try!

Update after 5 races:

As a reminder, the countries that are qualified: 1 FRA , 2 ARG , 3 AUS ,4 ITA, 5 NZL, 6 SUI, 7 GBR, 8 DEN, 9 AUT, 10 NED

Three spots available at 2015 worlds:
1. GER (7th)
2. ARU (11th)
3. ESP (20th)
5. PUR (Figueroa, 23rd)
6. GRE (24th)
7. USA (Newberry, 25th)
8. CAN (Ramsay, 29)
9. RUS (30)
10. URU (32)

As far as the masts, I think a lot of it comes down to skill level and time in the boat. You just don't see breakages from the top teams. If you look at the top of the fleet it is the same teams, no matter the wind and sea state.

Note: edited my post because previous comment came across poorly and I certainly mean to disrespect to anyone who broke a mast

decode please.