We were having lunch at the Hunters Bay Sailing Club and with the loan of two Laser Radials our Christmas party of assorted journalists and photographers took it in turns to go sailing. Now the inner areas of the Harbour, beyond the Harbour Bridge, are known to be frequented by sharks, and of some of the nastiest varieties such as the Bull and the Great White. Of course, the locals don't give this a second thought and they go sailing, swimming, waterskiing virtually every day of the year. But we tourists tend to be a little more paranoid about these things, and it certainly brought added incentive to keep the boat upright and avoid the roll-in to windward down the run.
Sailing a Laser again was a pleasant surprise. My dalliance with the class in the early 90s was not the happiest of affairs. Having been what I thought was a pretty good hiker in my teens, I think the intervening years of trapeze crewing on Fireballs and 470s made me a bit soft. When I got into the Laser in 1993, what I considered to be full hiking was Ben Ainslie or Hugh Styles' definition of having a breather. So I retreated to the comfort of trapeze boats once more and haven't returned since.
But what a transformation these new control lines have brought to the Laser. Finger-tip control of vang and Cunningham - it's well worth the extortionate amount it costs to convert to upgrade to the new set-up. Perhaps this is what accounts for the big rise in numbers in the Laser Radial class in this country. The 15:1 vang control and other high-powered controls makes it much easier to pull the sail into the shape you want, and must have made it easier for smaller sailors to handle the boat in strong winds.
One of the UK's top Laser Radial sailors is Jon Emmett, who is also the UK Laser Association's training officer. He says numbers are getting so big at open meetings now, with entries frequently breaking into three figures, that the class has been discussing the prospect of whether to split the fleet into two. Race management is becoming difficult for some clubs and at start time, general recalls are becoming more commonplace as the fleet gets bigger.
At some of the class's inland venues, the start line virtually stretches across the whole lake as the race committee attempts to accommodate 120 boats on the line. Of course as Jon points out, it's a nice problem to have, but it's a problem nevertheless. One solution was to separate the women, many of whom are campaigning seriously for the Olympics, into their own division, but it seems more likely - and more sensible - that sailors will be seeded on merit into Alpha and Beta fleets, regardless of gender.
SWOT analysis
On the international Olympic circuit, Jon acknowledges the American teenager Paige Railey as the dominant force in the new women's class. Although she missed winning the recent Rolex Miami Olympic Classes Regatta at the beginning of the year due to some OCSs, Railey dominated the Worlds and most other ‘majors' during 2005. Jon puts it very simply: "Paige works very hard, probably harder than anyone else. For example, the Paige that went to Korea for the ISAF Youth Worlds to the Paige that went to Brazil for the Worlds a few months later was very different. She put on about 6kg in extra weight for the expected strong winds in Brazil. And she is very consistent. She never won a race in Brazil but she still won with a race to spare."
Jon says it is this consistency that the top British women lack right now, but if you could take the best qualities of each of them you'd probably have a serious contender to Railey's dominance. Lizzie Vickers suffered badly in the light winds of the qualifying phase of the Worlds in Brazil, and almost missed the cut for the Gold fleet. In fact some of the hot favourites including Sari Multala didn't even make the cut, which must have been galling for Multala, as the Finn won race after race in the Silver fleet once the wind picked up for the finals.
The increase in breeze also suited Vickers, who throughout the Gold fleet finals stormed up the rankings to finish top Brit in 10th place, just a place ahead of Laura Baldwin. Charlotte Dobson, on the other hand, fared very well in the early stages and Jon says that in non-hiking conditions she is the match of anybody, but that she has yet to find race-winning pace in the stronger conditions.
Jon describes Laura Baldwin as probably the hardest working member of the squad, but her current challenge is that of adding too many letters to her scoreline - either OCSs for overeager starting or penalties for over-zealous kinetics that catch the eye of the on-the-water umpires. So Jon believes that while a number of the top UK girls have world-beating abilities in some areas, each of them has areas of weakness that must be addressed if they are to become a serious contender for a medal in Qingdao 2008.
One of the benefits about the simplicity of the Laser Radial is the way it has attracted some of the old Europe campaigners back into the fold, names like Penny Mountford and Nicky Muller. Jon believes the ability to fly around the world with just your wetsuit and tiller extension to a regatta where you charter a brand new boat from an identical fleet is a huge attraction to many sailors, who were doubtless put off by the technical complexity and expense of Europe sailing. If after its first four years as an Olympic class it can be shown that women's singlehanded sailing has increased significantly, then ISAF can give themselves a pat on the back for having voted in the Radial. And at the same time it should ask itself if similar decisions could be made in some of the other categories, and particularly - you know what I'm going to say next - particularly in the case of the women's keelboat class.
Training Day
If you're a regular reader of Roll Tacks you'll know that my disdain for the Yngling is matched by my passion for class training, and the RS800 and Musto Skiff are two classes that are really developing some good initiatives. The RS800s are experimenting with some two-day events this season, where the Saturday will be a coaching and training day, involving video cameras and onshore debriefing sessions, and the Sunday will be devoted to short-course racing. RS800 National Champion Steve Irish will be running three of the four scheduled weekends and another top
· 29th April - Training day - Stokes Bay, 30th April - Informal racing - Stokes Bay
· 20th May - Training day - Draycote SC, 21st May - Informal racing - Draycote SC
· 10th June - Training day - Oxford SC, 11th June - One day open meeting - Oxford SC
· 12th August - Training day - Weston SC, 13th August - One day open meeting - Weston SC
For more information contact Spod Olive: alan.olive@rya.org.uk or telephone 07867 780214.
Six of the best
The Musto Skiff class is carrying out an even more ambitious plan to hold simultaneous training sessions at six different locations over the weekend of 8/9 April. Chairman of the class association Paul Clarke says there are so many newcomers getting into the Musto Skiff that they wanted to make sure everyone had a chance to learn from the top sailors in the class, regardless of where they might be in the country. "Class training by the class for the class is a key part of the Musto Skiff success" says Paul. "With so many newcomers entering the class the length and breadth of the country we wanted to kick off early with training at six locations throughout the UK."
One of the great assets of the Musto Skiff class is the high calibre of sailors currently competing in the fleet and also their willingness to share knowledge and experience with others. The list of trainers for this weekend is pretty impressive and includes: Richard Stenhouse winner of the Musto Skiff Gold Cup and former Olympic Finn Representative; Ian Trotter current UK & European Champion and former International 14 POW winner; and Ian Renilson, former Contender World Champion.
The locations are as follows:
- Dalgety Bay - Trainer: Ian Renilson
- Derwent Water - Trainer: Ian Trotter
- Rutland Water - Trainers: Richard and Kit Stenhouse
- Thorpe Bay - Trainer: Danny Clark and Paul Clark
- Whitstable - Trainers: Rick Perkins & Simon Reynolds
- Venue TBA - Trainer: Jamie Stevenson
If you want to grow numbers and enthusiasm in your class, particularly if it is a technically challenging one such as the RS800 or the Musto Skiff, these two classes are showing the right way to go about it. Getting to grips with high performance boats is not easy, but getting a helping hand from the experts will speed up your learning curve immeasurably and make the learning process that much more rewarding.
