Rules rumpus

I see poor old Alan Mackie has been taking a hammering in the Letters page, for his response to my Rolltacks column back in the summer, when I questioned the appropriateness of the racing rules for asymmetric boats. In the July 18 issue, Alan recounts a near miss when he was sailing downwind in his RS700, narrowly avoiding an RS200 coming upwind with rights.

Alan proposes a reversal of the windward-boat-gives-way rule, following on from a similar discussion I had with an Aussie skiff sailor, Tony Hannan. Alan's letter has prompted a good deal of sensible comment, some reasonable criticism, along with a hint of anti-skiff sentiment.

There hasn't been much support for a proposal of the rule reversal, a point on which I have to agree with John Meachen, whose letter of 29 August said: "The proposed solution of a rules change may well work if the race course is only used by skiff sailors conversant with the amended rules. Even if the proposed change were adopted by all classes, most stretches of water open to sailing would still be used by cruising boats and potterers."

The windward boat rule works very well for the vast majority of sailing, so it would be unfair and retrograde to change the rule across the board. But there's little doubt it would serve the skiff racing fraternity better than the current rule. The question is, whether it would just complicate matters to have one rule for one event, another rule for a different regatta, and I suspect it would. Far better to find some other measures that can help reduce the risk of windward-leeward boat collisions in the first place.

For crying out loud

One rule change that I would like to see is that there be a mandatory requirement for the leeward boat to hail "windward boat" as loudly as possible at the boat coming downwind under gennaker. This seems like common sense, if nothing else for the reasons of self-preservation, but it constantly amazes me how often boats appear out from the shadow of the gennaker without having drawn any attention to themselves beforehand. I'm talking about other skiff sailors here, people who are fully aware of the blind spot that the asymmetric causes. They should know better.

John Parkinson made an excellent suggestion in his letter, also published in the 29th August edition: "Modern sails can give us much better all round visibility than in the past - with the exception of the kite which has not advanced at all. Isn't it time to get the sail manufacturers working on the problem before we consider rule changes or someone is hurt?" Angus Campbell makes a similar point in his letter of 15 August: "Perhaps he [Alan Mackie] should consider campaigning for a kite he can either see through or see under."

Surely sailmakers could design the cut of their gennakers with higher clews, so as to reduce the blind spot to a minimum? It might mean slightly reduced sail area, but if it brings added safety benefits then it is surely a price worth paying. I certainly believe it is worth considering all options before we revert to the asymmetric apartheid proposed in the final paragraph of Angus's letter, where he says: "I suggest that they go and blast around somewhere else leaving the rest of us to race our slow boats under control, using skill and tactics to gain our enjoyment."

This type of 'them and us' attitude makes my blood boil. Aren't we all fans of the same sport? Has it really got so bad between symmetric and asymmetric sailors that we can't co-exist side by side on the same stretch of water? Anyone would think we're talking about religion here. But then again, I suppose for many of us sailing is a religion, it's what we all do on a Sunday morning.

All I can say is, whether you belong to the symmetric or the asymmetric sect, or even if you sail without any type of spinnaker, don't knock the alternatives until you've tried them. Vive la difference. Most of our leading sailors have sampled all types of dinghy, and heaven forbid, perhaps even one of those beasts with two hulls, dare I mention the word, a catamaran. The end of season is upon us, so now is the time to have a go at something different for the odd weekend or two, and try the forbidden pleasures of other types of boat. Who knows, you might even enjoy it...

Back to the front

Admittedly, I've been somewhat guilty of being asymmetrically obsessed these past few years, but I did have a go at something quite different for a weekend in August. Having spent the past few years trapezing off the back of two-man skiffs, sitting out of the side of a three-man Etchells 22 keelboat was a bit of a departure for me. Crewing for old friend Andy Oddie who bought an Etchells earlier this year, we went to compete in the Bedrock Cup at Seaview Yacht Club on the east coast of the Isle of Wight. The standard of the fleet is pretty high, and double World Champion Stuart Childerley doesn't get it all his way in the racing. But like all great sailors he does have a knack of pulling off some great escapes when he is buried in the pack.

This was the last domestic event in the UK before Stuart and his crew Simon Russell and Roger Marinho fly out to Long Island in the USA to see if they can notch up a hat trick of World Championships in this tough class. Since the demise of the Soling as an Olympic class, the Etchells has probably become even more competitive, although it has for a long time attracted some serious heavyweight America's Cup talent of the likes of John Bertrand and Dennis Conner. Childerley made mincemeat of the fleet in a windy event in Auckland at the turn of the year, but beating a strong American contingent on their home territory might be harder.

Seeing how little boat speed difference there is in the fleet puts Childerley's achievements into perspective, although the same is true of some of the Olympic classes such as the Laser and Finn, where respectively Robert Scheidt and Ben Ainslie are dominating their fleets. In a development class it is easier to comprehend how someone can find a technical edge that leaves the rest of the boats in his wake, but to do so in a strict one-design is altogether more impressive. No doubt Childerley's own success in the Etchells is largely down to his impressive record earlier in his career in the Laser and the Finn, where he twice finished fourth at the Olympics.

All hands on deck

For me, crewing the Etchells represented the first time I'd done any serious rope-pulling for a long time. Helming the 49er requires no rope pulling whatsoever, as the crew does it all, so it was a bit of a wake-up call to the biceps doing the mainsheet and spinnaker on the Etchells. It was fun to rediscover the art of pumping, as there is little call for this technique on a skiff that travels at twice wave speed. With the Etchells travelling more or less at wave speed, good kinetics become crucial and getting it right can be very rewarding.

An even starker difference between skiff and three-man keelboat is the difference in pointing angle. Telling whether or not you can cross another boat is relatively simple in a boat that tacks at 90 degrees, such as the 49er, is relatively straightforward. In fact, in light winds the Etchells is very similar, but as soon as any sort of breeze kicks in, the tacking angles close up to 70 or perhaps even 65 degrees. At that point, I handed over any responsibility for layline calling or crossing other boats to the experts, because I didn't have a clue.

Overtaking laylines has none of the advantages that you get in a fast-planing skiff. Overstanding is still not desirable in a 49er but at least when you ease the sheets you get a corresponding increase in speed. The converse seems true in the Etchells where cracking off seems to be slower than beating, so overstanding laylines is an absolute no-no. The Etchells calls for precision sailing in many different areas - the rig, boathandling, boat-to-boat tactics and race strategy. It is easy to see why it has such a strong following right now.

My Etchells outing was also my first experience in a long time of good old white Dacron sails, and frankly I don't see the point any more. Why not have Mylar these days? The top Etchells sailors won't use a jib for more than two regattas, and a main for no more than three or four. Mylar would last longer and go faster, and would only be marginally more expensive. I can understand wanting to retain Dacron for those classes with a more 'classic' look and feel, but there is nothing sentimental about the Etchells. It is a modern, high-performance keelboat that is beginning to look a little dated because of its white sails, so why not - to borrow that Westminster turn of phrase - sex it up a bit?

Rules Guru

While I was at Seaview, I bumped into Bryan Willis, who will be known to many readers as the author of the popular Fernhurst book, The Rules in Practice. He is also well known to the top professionals in the sport, having chaired the jury of many major regattas, not least the Volvo Ocean Race, the America's Cup and the Olympic Games. He is Mr Rules in our sport. Another side to Bryan's busy life is his marine arbitration practice, where he helps resolves disputes between marine insurance companies with potential claims of up to £500,000.

But not just satisfied with being a Big Cheese at the top end of the sport, Bryan also runs two weeks of Optimist camps for beginners at Papercourt Sailing Club in Surrey, and then a further four weeks of Oppie camps at Wootton Creek on the Isle of Wight during the summer. In fact I learned my trade on one of his Topper courses on the Isle of Wight 20 years ago, with former Fireball and Topper Champion John Caig as our coach. Bryan's approach is all about learning while having fun, with emphasis on the fun more than the race training. The formula obviously works, as his courses are booked up year in and year out, and the parents rave about what the courses do for their kids, not just as sailors but as people.

In fact, the common factor that links all of Bryan's work together is one of wanting people to get on and see the other person's point of view, whether it is Oppie kids helping each other rig up, or finding common ground between two disgruntled parties in a marine insurance dispute, or even an America's Cup match for that matter. So following our chance meeting at Seaview, I called him up to discuss the windward-leeward conundrum and see what solution he had to offer. He had some very interesting answers, but I've run out of room, so for that you'll have to read the next Rolltacks in a fortnight's time.