**** response about adding a shitload of weight makes life equal. A severly light team is at an equal or more disadvantage as a heavy team, the optimum weight on a tall team will still win given equal boat and sailing skills. (If nobody makes any mistakes) If your interested in adding weight, make the minimum 500 lbs and everybody is the same. No one I have spoken to is in favor of the complex formulas or huge minimums. Just the 6 or so regular posters here.
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<br>Grass roots growth and participation is whats needed. The initial enthusiasm that some of the people in my area had for this idea is dissappearing quickly with the current threads.
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<br>Good luck,
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<br>Matt
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<br>
<br><br><br>

Hi Matt
<br>
<br>-We have been handed a difficult set of existing conditions with boat weights all over the scale and a desire for equalizing crew weight in the formula.
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<br> Please reveiw the basic rules outline {WEIGHT TO SAIL AREA FORMULA } , AND SEE HOW IT APPLIES TO YOUR SPECIFIC BOAT AND CREW WEIGHT .
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<br> If you do not like some aspect please state specifically what that is , and if possible propose a better rule solution .
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<br> Thanks Matt -
<br> Carl Roberts<br><br>

Hi Matt
<br>
<br>I agree I am tired... but this is one of those opportunites to change cat racing for the better.
<br>
<br>Your observatoin that most of the cat racers are NOT racing with Spinaker is very true
<br>
<br>Not Stated is another observation. There is certainly not a huge tidal change of our existing cat racers moving to spin boat.
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<br> In your area, the N6.0's apparently do not want to go buoy racing with spinakers. The class seems content to go sloop rig. ( I know several have chutes for distance racing)
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<br>What formulation of a NAf20 class would convince 75% of your 6.0 fleet to race chutes around triangles?
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<br>The 6.0 class is probably the BEST target for formula 20 to go after for grandfathering boats in.
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<br>The NA F20 class is by definition a spin class. One of the goals in getting it formulated is to optimize competition and NOT fracture into lots of competing one designs.
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<br>I don't think that growth is going to come about by
<br>1) getting new sailors into 20 foot racing boats. OR
<br>2) Hobie 16 couple teams moving up to 20 foot spin boats.
<br>We have not seen a huge movement in the last couple of years.
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<br>What do you see and hear that I am missing here?
<br>
<br>My working model for growth
<br>I think that a formula class for racers could attract the monohull racer now on a Melges or J boat. IF they saw tight balls to the wall racing. The cost of a cat campaign would be 1/2 that of a Melge's with a lot less hassle.
<br>Will this hypothesis turn out... I don't know. but it seems more likely than Wally and Tyler Myers H16 National champs racing a 20 footer chute boat next year. (Tyler is 12ish... sorry Tyler)
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<br>No matter my understanding of the market
<br>How do you see ANY f20 class improving grass roots participation.
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<br>BTW, The recent discussion on the open civil forum generated lots of ideas about improving grass roots participation. No one came up with a f20 class as a solution for the grass roots problem.
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<br>Take Care
<br>Mark
<br><br><br>

Hi Matt
<br>
<br>In reading your post again... do you believe that if the dominant class in an area is for an example a N6.0NA then most sailors should try to fit onto the boat?
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<br>Where do you land on the Formula philosophy statement of trying to segregate the spin racers into three non competing catagories.
<br>F16's... 330 and below Plus single handers
<br>F18's 280 to 350
<br>F20's 325 to 400+
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<br>Three of the participants so far, Myself, Steve and Mike see this division as a growth strategy for the future.
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<br>Do you think your fleet members would have strong feelings one way or the other. ( I know change is always tough but In a perfect world....)
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<br>Thanks again for your input.
<br>Mark
<br><br><br>

Hi Mark - I think the basic separation by weight you mentioned is exactly the approach we need to take. It's simple, fits a wide range of weights, and is easy to implement. When you add in the ability to buy boats/sails from many mfg's/lofts, I think that this is the winning combination.
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<br>Sail fast and have fun,
<br>Alan Thompson
<br>I20 - San Diego<br><br>

Hi Alan
<br>
<br>Thanks were up to 4 now n the US... (wouter won't count here)
<br>I am just trying to get an idea if the stated philosophy can develop a strong consensus.
<br>In California, It seems that you have 5 or so Foxes, 10 or so I20's . Do you still have active N6.0 sailors or H20 sailors who would love to move up to spin racing. What is your best guess at how they would buy into this philosophy.
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<br>Best guess on your H20 fleet... Itching to move up to a spin boat or quite happy with the racing that they have..
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<br>If they do move to a spin boat... Do you think f18's or f20's would have an appeal.
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<br>Obviously this kind of survey is based on gut instinct but we could waste a lot of time trying to get people to focus on the debate and then not get any useful information.
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<br>Thanks for your input
<br>Mark
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<br>
<br>Make sure they understand that the assumption is that the NAf18 class actually flies and speaks to that portion of the market.
<br>
<br><br><br>

Nicely said Matt.
<br>
<br>The proposed formula of weight to sail area system is much less complicated than the existing Portsmouth rating system and creates a fair system for a large group of people.
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<br>The enthusiasm for the class has also dwindled in my area when faced with the idea of setting a high minimum crew weight.
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<br>Hope we can work it out...
<br>Marc
<br><br><br>

Marc,
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<br>My take is that the F20 class will not draw too many H20 sailors. It will draw a few but many are male/female teams that probably won't jump onto an F20 and don't have the interest. I see a few of the larger weight teams being interested but not sure how many. I think that mostly it will draw from old 6.0 sailors and 5.8 sailors that might have hung it up or got frustrated at the low minimum weights. I think most of the H20 teams will be interested in the Tiger.
<br>
<br>Mike Hill
<br>H20 #791
<br><br><br>

Forum Posters,
<br>
<br>My comments on grass roots growth stem from my opinion that massive growth in any class will only come from the bottom of new people , begginers etc moving up. People new to sailing will not drop the cash on a high performance boat to see if they like it. And if they did they probably would not like it because they would be so far over their head. There is significantly more prejidous to cats in the monohull world than there is between the various brands of cats. A few monohull sailors will jump on the bandwagon if the class becomes strong, but they will never be the catalyst to jump start the thing. To have a class begin now, you have no choice but to draw some sailors from existing groups.
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<br>My frustrastion comes from the amount of time spent in discussions on how engineer utopia. Not on how to creat an organization but how to divide the sailors.
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<br>Most serious racers are interested in having the largest start possible. H20 sailors for example dont race the boat because they have some deep seated lust for Hobie products, they race it because of the size of the participation, large starts many places around the country, a decent organization, making for good racing. Many Hobie people would be attracted to a nationaly active Formula class, but not if it has restrictively huge minimum weights, as there are a lot of couples.
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<br>I am a firm beliver in letting the boat determine the sailor. In the H20 class the top is not loaded with the lightest crews. I have never seen, or heard of anyone who moved up in to a larger active class because they blamed their lack of competitivness on weight, do any better. The truely skilled racers can make any boat go. In this area, the ones who moved up to the active classes are still in the middle to the back of the fleet, the ones who bought "faster" open fleet boats, are often still being passed by the boat they left. The old guys blaming their new larger middles most often fall into this too. The new young guys are not just lighter, they are truely faster. This disgruntled fring of "blame it on my weight sailors" will always remain unhappy, and creating a fleet for them is a waist of time. If your going to add weight, add all the way up to some amount over the heaviest crew, make it truely equal and eliminate the arguments (not going to happen)
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<br>Enough of my weight sop box.
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<br>I do agree that weight has a place. Dead weight for crew adjustment is not it. The formula class idea allows a much larger latitude for this. It is not one design, and the 20 foot class in scope is 1) currently over powered for the 8.5 beam, 2) has hull paramaeters that are not fully dictated by the finness ratio.
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<br>My proposal
<br>
<br>1) Boat lenght 20' (simple)
<br>2) Beam 8.5' (would like to see wider but not trailerable and keeps system simple)
<br>3) Boat weight 320 or reasonable classs goal weight. - The manufactureres do not currently control their process to maintain weight. It is not worth the cost when 90% of your sales are to rec sailors, thats why they will not divulge the boat weights. They can and will build boats to spec if their are sales. Lowering the class weight gradually will only make the procrastinators not join the organization, they will always be waiting for it to drop that next bit before they buy that boat or change sails. In the short term to account for the current heavy boats, allow some sail area modifier to be grandfathered in.
<br>4) Crew weight - None, or some minimum for safety to right the boat. - Do not try and force divide the class especially by weight. The formula idea allows heavier crews to choose hull designs with more boyancy, lighter crews to have bendier rigs etc, all to fit your size. Unless your corrections can take into account drags, sea states, gusts,etc, your waisting your time trying to place rules against it. A light crew is disadvantaged up wind on an overpowered boat, especially as the wind speed increases. They then have an advantage down wind. If on the AVERAGE (fat guys do not just look at the results on a light race day), this is not equal, then place some sail area modifier to the sytem (Hey, sounds like the european system spin adjustment. hmmmm)
<br>5) Sails and rig - I do not have exact numbers but the concept would be
<br>
<br>Max mast height
<br>Max Main and jib combination
<br>Max spin - Area adjustments to the spin size would be simplest to control for corrections in old boat design weight, or crew weight. Weight seems to have the biggest effect in downwind performance, so some lift factor in area could be applied to help offset the difference.
<br>6) construction materials, foils etc open.
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<br>Se the boat and move on to discussions on what the class can do to attract the participation. Hobie gets slammed a lot but the class does o good job of having events, not just races. Simple formula, then move on with selling the class, and not by 5 million correction factors to apease the disgruntled minority, it just includes more people in the argument.
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<br>I probably forgot several items, but its a start.
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<br>Matt
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