Posted by deleteme
Posted by deleteme
Christian Birrell and Sam Brearey of Parkstone SC are winners of the 2024 Aspire Merlin Rocket National Championships…
Posted by deleteme
Wrong, that’s a brand new Hanse 410. Damn, those bow sections are getting full!
Posted by deleteme
The Cruising Club of America (CCA) is a collection of 1,400 ocean sailors with extensive offshore seamanship, command experience, and a shared passion for making adventurous use of the seas. Their experiences and expertise make them, collectively, one of the most reliable sources of information on offshore sailing. In partnership with SAIL, the CCA is sharing some of this hard-won know-how in SAIL e-newsletters.
Recently, I flew on a Boeing 737 on an international flight, and as luck would have it, I was able to fly in business class. The aircraft was similar to every 737 that you’ve flown in, but the business class cabin, consisting of 10 seats, was very different; sort of like a mini-version of a larger aircraft’s business seating. As I customarily do, I reached under the seat to find the life jacket, as some of our flight would be over the Indian Ocean. Hmm, no life jacket, nor was there a compartment in the armrest that I shared with Susan. Having never had to evacuate an aircraft, thankfully, this wasn’t a crisis, but it was curious: did they not offer lifejackets for some reason?
Eventually, I “found” them, although their location was indicated by the pre-departure briefing (in Arabic, Swahili, and English) as well as the card in the seat back. The life jackets were stowed overhead, where you’d expect to find the emergency oxygen masks. Furthermore, the seatbelt operated differently than every other seatbelt that I’ve used: to release, you pressed a button along the axis of the belt, rather than lift a handle. In the dark, or with smoke in the cabin, I am not sure I could have figured it out. And the card in the back of the seat in front of me illustrated a completely different seat belt design.
Posted by deleteme
You have to wonder if there’s anything more that World Sailing and the IOC can do to further devalue sailing as an Olympic sport.
For decades we’ve been told that the primary aim of ‘updating’ Olympic sailing was to make it more inclusive, more appealing to youth, and more exciting for television. Instead, the 2024 regatta has, with few exceptions, scored poorly on all three of those objectives. Admittedly, the weather was dismal, but the problems ran much deeper than a simple lack of wind.
Take nothing away from the athletes themselves. Where the events in Marseille were conducted in fair breezes, in genuinely popular boats and under sensible scoring rules the acknowledged champions usually did well. But elsewhere some fine sailors who spent years developing their skills were denied medals they probably deserved.
The conventional regatta formats we all know, where races are scored equally with few drops, evolved over many years to reward consistency and reduce the element of luck which can be such a disruptive factor in competitive sailing.
But rather than accept those established principles and concentrate on making Olympic sailing fair and relevant the governing authorities have let the tail wag the dog. By straining to create events they imagine might be more attractive to youth and television, the IOC and World Sailing distorted both the range of classes and the formats they race under…
Posted by deleteme
I mean, who among us hasn’t at least muttered, “I’d like to kill that motherfucker”?
A 64-year-old German sailor is suspected of murdering his 71-year-old crew member after the International Multihull Meeting 2024 in Horten, Oslofjord.
Following the Multihull regatta in Norway, a 71-year-old German sailor was found dead in the water, allegedly murdered by his 64-year-old companion.
The tragedy occurred on the return journey from the regatta when tensions between the two men escalated due to the unsatisfactory results.
Posted by deleteme
There are four days of racing still to go, with six events still in action at the Paris 2024 Olympics on the Bay of Marseille…
Posted by deleteme
After eight day of Olympic sailing the final two events take to the Bay of Marseille – the Men and Women’s Kite – there first time in the Olympics…
Posted by deleteme
The seventh day of Olympic sailing and the mixed multihull Nacra 17 joins the racing…
Posted by deleteme
North Sails (NorthTechnology Group) has been thought to have purchased both Quantum Sails and Doyle Sails, in their entirety.
To say this is potentially earth-shattering is to put it mildly! So far we have heard there are no plans to change any of the organizations day to day business, and for the short term, that is likely true, but we highly doubt that the staus quo will continue in the longer term.
What that will look like remains to be seen is of wild speculation, but we can bet there will a fair bit of dead wood to be tossed. Speaking of that, there are a couple of tossers at an inferior “loft” here in SD who will likely be sent packing! We just received the press release from NTG.
And of course, there a thread here that promises to be rollicking!
Posted by deleteme
It’s getting to be a habit. Yet another major Australian offshore race has ended with a controversial protest involving boats that placed first and second on handicap.
Keen followers of last weekend’s Sydney-Gold Coast race will have noticed the official results showed a tiny asterisk against the name of the winning yacht, Voltstar Yeah Baby (above). The * footnote confirmed that there had been a protest against the Class 40, but that the protest was dismissed.
What happened? As ever, it’s complicated and the facts are in dispute.
Rupert Henry, the owner/skipper of Mistral, the yacht that came second overall, believed that Yeah Baby had set a flying headsail during the race not listed on the boat’s IRC certificate.
Yeah Baby finished at 03:00. Mistral crossed at around 11:00am. Henry then asked the Race Committee to send a measurer to check Yeah Baby’s sail inventory for compliance.
Time now becomes critical.
SA has obtained a copy of the Protest Committee finding. It confirms the measurer didn’t come aboard Yeah Baby until 15:00 – 12 hours after the Class 40 had finished. The protest finding goes on to note that “the boat had been cleaned up, washed down and alterations made to the sail inventory”.
It is the nature of those “alterations” that was the crux of the protest. The measurer identified a Fractional Code 0 on the boat in addition to its declared sails. But the Committee concluded that “no evidence was presented to show that the Fractional Code 0 was on board or used during the race”. Protest dismissed.
It is understood that the owner of Yeah Baby attested that the extra sail had been put aboard after the race for the delivery.
Posted by deleteme
Following two attempts the men’s 49er skiff Medal race was abandoned to Friday, along with the women’s FX skiff Medal race…
Posted by deleteme
The Biz
Founded in 1966, Nautor Swan today boasts a comprehensive range of services. These include high-profile offerings through Nautor Swan Charter and Brokerage, Nautor Swan Global Service—which provides global assistance—and ClubSwan Racing, the sport division managed by professionals in the sailing world. Additionally, ClubSwan serves as a virtual yacht club, bringing together all Swan owners and fans under one roof.
With effect from today, following its strategy to evolve and never revolutionize, 60% of Nautor’s shareholding passes to Sanlorenzo ownership – a very important and positive step – a very important and positive step to facilitate continued growth and strengthen its reputation as one of the most important sailing shipyards worldwide.
The Boatbuilding Technology Centre (BTC) in Pietarsaari, Finland, remains the main production site for sailing yachts underpinning Nautor Swan’s heritage, together with the pillars of its DNA: elegance, quality, performance and reliability, and enhance the culture and the secular craftmanship, proper of the Ostrobothnia region.
Posted by deleteme
It’s sometimes hard to wrap your head around all that’s evolved since 1851, when a syndicate of owners from the newly minted New York Yacht Club brought their schooner America to the UK for a summer of racing and returned with the trophy that would become the America’s Cup.
It helps to remember that no matter the era, the Cup has always been as much a contest of cutting-edge yacht design as it is of high-level sailing skills. Seen through that lens, the foiling monohulls that are racing in this year’s 37th America’s Cup, reaching—and likely exceeding—50 knots and resembling fighter jets more than sailing yachts, make sense.
It also helps to look back. When the Americans returned with their new prize, a syndicate member authored the Deed of Gift to create an international trophy to be contested between two yacht clubs—defender and challenger. Vast fortunes were often wagered to contest and defend a trophy that the original winners are rumored to have considered melting down into medals, and over time, the Cup’s mythos far exceeded any rational worth.
But this irrationality became an important part of the Cup’s gravity, and the contest’s winner-takes-all ethic galvanized. Sir Thomas Lipton, for example, challenged five times, spending staggering sums, but ultimately sailed home empty-handed…
Posted by deleteme
Some of the best gifts come in small packages. So it was when my sister-in-law asked me and my husband if we would race her Herreshoff 12½ in the Annapolis Yacht Club’s Wednesday night series. Sidelined while recovering from back surgery, she couldn’t bear to see her beloved boat beached as well.
It was an intriguing offer, one you might say we couldn’t refuse. We had long admired the classy lines of this cheeky little sloop that Cindy had, for many years, sailed the wheels off of in the AYC series. We never got into the predictably Byzantine controversies surrounding the boat and its class (simply called H Class) including debates over rigs (Marconi or gaff-rigged), hull provenance (fiberglass versus wood), etc. When a boat has been in continuous production for 110 years—110 years—you can expect some kerfuffles.
All we cared about was the chance to spend time sailing this design, which Nathanael Herreshoff drew in 1914 to a brief from one Robert W. Emmons II and several of his friends. They asked the Wizard of Bristol—he of the likes of America’s Cup defender Columbia and countless other majestic and ultimately historic yachts—for a small boat suitable for children to manage even in the feisty breezes of Buzzards Bay (hence her first nickname, the Buzzards Bay Boy’s Boat). The goal also was a boat in which kids could “become familiar with the characteristics of the type of larger sailboats to which they might graduate later on,” according to the H Class Association website.
“It is unlikely that in 1914 or 1915 the genius of Nathanael G. Herreshoff or the inspiration of Mr. Emmons could have foretold the unique popularity and longevity of the design we have now seen for more than 100 years,” the website continues. “She is still considered to be one of the finest, if not the finest, small sailing yacht designs ever created. And as it turned out, the boat was perfect for all ages in the family, not just the kids.”
She really is a little big boat, with a full keel and a displacement of 1,500 pounds plus 735 pounds of ballast helping provide a profound stability we ran into on our first race day when the jib halyard block broke before the start. No problem, Johnny said, we’ll just sail over to a dock where we can get high enough to careen her a bit to reach the spar and replace it. Hah! Not a shot. We were DNS that day.
At 16 feet LOA, the 12½ refers to her waterline length of 12 feet, 6 inches, which sounds really tiny, yet her flared topsides and fine entry mean she can handle a chop (Buzzards Bay, remember), she rarely gets on her ear, and even if splashed now and then, you feel totally secure in her roomy cockpit.
You also feel like you’re in a Winslow Homer painting. The first time we sailed her, I found myself channeling Gatsby and Daisy. It would not go amiss, I thought, to include sloe gin fizzes in the gear bag.
That DNS, though, gets to the other reason we couldn’t refuse Cindy’s offer. It’s been many moons, two kids, a couple of houses, several jobs, six dogs, and several thousands of cruising miles since we’ve been on the racecourse together. What better way to ease back into it than this forgiving little boat which, in spite of its size or perhaps because of it, inspires a certain genteel intensity in those who sail her. Or intense gentility. Sometimes it’s not clear which.
But last night at the start, I looked over as five of us crossed the line together in a row, those jaunty bows glimmering in the late-day light, and I thought how remarkable it is that more than a century later, this little big boat can still be teaching us how to sail fast and well, and with joy.
Keep on sailing,
Wendy
wclarke@aimmedia.com
August/September 20247
Posted by deleteme
Gunwharf Quays in Portsmouth will be hosting the Clipper Round the World Yacht Race fleet from 27 – 29 July, after the official Race Finish of Portsmouth…
Posted by deleteme
Posted by deleteme
The men and women’s iQFOiL events will open the racing for the sailing events at the Paris 2024 Olympics on Sunday 28 July…
Posted by deleteme
All six America’s Cup teams are now established and sailing in Spain. As an exclusive service to SA readers, we consulted the ancient Oracles at Delphi (just up the road from Barcelona – not the Ellison Oracle). We sought their predictions about the coming series. As is customary, their response was given in seven stanzas of iambic heptameters in Attic Greek. Our regular contributor, Anarchist David, has kindly translated those verses for us into English:
’Twas dawn in Barcelona when the AC hopefuls met,
To settle who was ‘primo’ in the mono-foiling set,
Each team arrived with fervent hopes to lead the yachting news,
In truth their job was advertising auto tyres and booze.
First Luna Rossa sallied forth for Prada and Pirelli,
But soon their main hydraulics failed and turned the oil to jelly.
INEOS Britannia flew fast across the Bay,
Until their carbon mast collapsed beneath a splintered stay.
Alinghi Red Bull Racing had been twice-triumphant champs,
Their cyclors all pulled muscles and succumbed to painful cramps.
Team France arrived with national pride and loads of Gallic grace,
But capsized when a foil arm broke – and never won a race.
The New York Yacht Club turned up late with Magic USA,
A syndicate of millionaires all keen to join the fray,
Delamination rent their hull which sprang a fatal leak,
Reminding them of ’83 (of which we dare not speak).
Then finally New Zealand came with sponsors Emerati,
At last the true professionals had deigned to join the party,
Yet just before the starting gun their country’s hopes were dashed,
The Kiwi team refused to race without a lot more cash.
So, fans could only wonder what the Cup had now become,
A contest of technology (that mostly came undone),
A demolition derby for low-flying aeroplanes,
A frantic form of yachting where the dollars hold the reins.
Let’s mourn the days when sailing skill and tactics were at stake,
Of Turner, Conner, Mosbacher; of Hardy, Coutts and Blake,
Recall the great 12-metre jousts (alas to no avail),
The boats, it’s true, were slower then – but boy, could those guys sail!
Posted by deleteme
Bet you didn’t see that coming…!
Maximilian Maeder and Lauriane Nolot have established themselves as the gold medal favorites for the men’s and women’s Formula Kite classes at the 2024 Olympics. Both kiters are current double world champions, having clinched titles in the 2023 and 2024 championships. Their back-to-back victories solidified their status as the best in the world, showcasing their ability to perform under pressure—a crucial trait for Olympic success.
Despite their shared dominance, their paths to success in Formula Kite have been markedly different. One forged a solo path, while the other thrived with the support of an established national development and Olympic program, demonstrating multiple routes to high-performance sailing success.
Posted by deleteme
Heinrich Bayern with Tom and Andy Martin continue to lead after day 4 of the 18ft European Championship on Lake Garda…
Posted by deleteme
Shock, horror perhaps but I, Shanghai Sailor, have to compliment anarchist David on his latest couple of pieces. The keel first.
I remember notable keel failures all the way back to Cheeki Raffiki. Notable perhaps only because they resulted in fatalities and were very publicly reported.
Back in the “good old days” keels ran pretty much the whole length of the yacht. A modern view of this can be found by watching some of the earlier videos from Leo and the Tally Ho team which would suggest that a well found yacht would bounce off the hard stuff when the draft equaled a little bit more than the available water, and then just carry on.
Over the years however keel roots have become shorter and shorter especially on race boats to put the weight as low as possible the bulb is at the end of a long, thin foil. Sometimes this is made of carbon which, while known for its overall strength-to-weight ratio, is not fond of sudden shock loads.
Then of course there are the keel bolts and the laminate layup they are stuck through.
Some builders include a steel grid inside the boat to spread the keel loads and link them all the way to the rig, while other designers underestimate loads in this area. One notable case was the Clipper fleet which had to stop in the Philippines to deal with their wobbly keels even though the actual builders had added 12-14 layers of laminate beyond the specification they had been provided to the hull in the keel area…
Posted by deleteme
Many professional races bill themselves as among the most difficult feats in sailing, but I would argue that the comparatively small and ragtag R2AK should also hold a space on the list. The race is a two-legged beast from Port Townsend, Washington, to Ketchikan, Alaska, with a stop in Victoria, BC, along the way. The first leg (Port Townsend to Victoria) is a 40-mile proving ground (called, yes, The Proving Grounds), while the second 710-mile slog (Victoria to Ketchikan) is the real deal. The race itself bills it “like the Iditarod, on a boat, with a chance of drowning, being run down by a freighter, or eaten by a grizzly bear. There are squalls, killer whales, tidal currents that run upwards of 20 miles an hour, and some of the most beautiful scenery on earth.”
Unlike more traditional sailing events, this one lives by its own quirky set of rules—for one, that there are very few rules (and certainly no handicapping or complicated classes). Among them is that any vessel is eligible, provided that it does not have an engine. This means that the race is populated with unusual retrofit designs to let competitors row or paddle when they’re becalmed (or sometimes just row in general with no sails). There is enormous variety in the boats and people who attempt it.
This year, SAIL Technical Editor Adam Cove is making the trek solo in a Marshall 18 that’s been updated with oars and a custom tiller to accommodate the space taken up by the oars. Named Team Wily Wildcat, he finished The Proving Grounds (leg one) in fine style. He’s been sharing his race prep process on our Instagram page, and he’ll be updating us as he travels—when he has time!—so head on over to @sailmagazine on Instagram or catch our Facebook page for Adam’s updates.
View the original article to see embedded media.
(If you want to hear about previous races, SAIL contributor Norris Comer had a very different experience of the race in 2022 with a crew of three other people on a Corsair 760. Read his award-winning article about it here.
The winner gets $10,000 nailed to a tree in Alaska. The second-place boat gets a set of steak knives, and everyone else gets nothing but the satisfaction of knowing they made it—which is no small thing.
View the original article to see embedded media.
If you’re interested in following along this year’s race, the best way to do it is by signing up for the race organization’s newsletter, which provides pithy, sardonic, and frequently irreverent daily updates on the fleet. You can also check out the race tracker by clicking here.
View the original article to see embedded media.
Go Team Wily Wildcat! (And best of luck to all the racers.)
Posted by deleteme
Helluva a story. So who has the right o’ way?
A seaplane lifted off directly into the side of a boat while setting off on a Saturday sightseeing flight from a harbor in Vancouver, Canada. The pilot and five passengers onboard De Haviland DHC-2 Beaver escaped the crash uninjured, CBC News reports.
Those on the boat weren’t as lucky, with two people being sent to the hospital with injuries.
Posted by deleteme
The dark horse of the Louis Vuitton 37th America’s Cup is off and running. Persistence and tenacity were the order of the day for Orient Express Racing Team…
Posted by deleteme
From our friends at Stephens/Waring Design…
Last year, 76-ft Zemphira racked up an impressive array of hardware, culminating in an impressive first-place overall SoT ranking for the CYCS 2023 season. We connected with the yacht’s two skippers, Kirsty Morrison and Andrew Parente, to understand the magic behind the winning boat.
How did you first discover your love for sailing?
Kirsty: My father was an avid sailor. I grew up in London and when I was 8 years old he built me an Optimist dinghy in the spare bedroom. They were originally designed so they could be built out of 2 pieces of plywood. He forgot about getting it down the staircase so he had to take the bedroom window out and lower it out of the opening. I used to race it on a reservoir near Heathrow Airport. Entirely unglamorous, but it got me started.
Andrew: Sailing a sunfish around Third Beach in Middletown RI.
What is your experience and career path to becoming a skipper? Read on.
Posted by deleteme
The Italian team #204 Acrobatica sailed by Alberto Riva and Jean Marre completed their dominate two-week run, becoming the 2024 Atlantic Cup Champions. Their first place finish in the Coastal Series yesterday guaranteed them victory for the overall Atlantic Cup. More here.
Posted by deleteme
As James Harayda (Gentoo Sailing Team) clings to tenth, Britain has three skippers in the top ten. Sam Goodchild (VULNERABLE) is fifth and Pip Hare (Medallia) seventh…
Posted by deleteme
Charlie Dalin (MACIF Santé et Prévoyance) is back in the lead of the New York Vendée Les Sables d’Olonneat some 500 miles north west of the Azores….
Posted by deleteme
Posted by deleteme
Denmark’s Klaus Rønn Madsen was the winner of the UK Europe Class UK Open Championship and Tom Morris the UK National Championship…
Posted by deleteme
Welcome to the June issue of Latitude 38. As we sail into summer we’re excited to bring you our latest stories, photos, news and updates. It’s all possible thanks to our community of readers, advertisers, our printer, delivery drivers, and everyone who has had a part in putting these pages together. We hope you enjoy our latest offering!
Here’s a preview.
May Gray is one thing (plenty of that later in the month), but a winter storm on May 4 is quite another. While snow dumped on the Sierra, cold rain poured on San Francisco Bay all morning. The temperature dropped 25° from Friday (more in the higher elevations). We suspect that some competitors registered for the Great Vallejo Race saw the weather, hit the snooze alarm, and pulled their down comforters over their heads. The rest of us had a cold, wet romp of a sail in 10 to 21+ knots of southwesterly breeze, surfing the stacked waves whipped up in an ebb on San Pablo Bay. We hoped we wouldn’t see those waves going back on Sunday, and we pitied those who turned around after finishing to bash back on Saturday afternoon.
28 Days Before the Mast — A Sailor’s Experience Aboard Stad Amsterdam
Sailing across the Pacific Ocean on a Dutch clipper ship was not on my boating bucket list until I read about Stad Amsterdam’s voyage from Panama to San Francisco in ‘Lectronic Latitude. The ship’s stop in San Francisco before sailing to Honolulu and then Tokyo was part of its 2023-25 around-the-world voyage. The Pacific leg of this adventure had berths available!
The photo that ran with the article showed a three-masted, full-rigged ship, sails billowing, bow furrowing through the water — a picture I’d seen on the covers of all the sailing books I started reading as a kid on a farm in Oregon, far from any ocean. Thoughts of Richard Henry Dana, Herman Melville, and all the 19th-century clipper ships arriving at San Francisco during the Gold Rush filled my dreams. I was hooked.
$2 Catamaran, Priceless Adventure
An adventure like this is not for the faint of heart. When Terry Castleman found the boat of his dreams on eBay, he approached his three prospective boat partners to see if they’d throw down the cash to make the deal. After some deliberation, the three partners each Venmo-ed Terry 50 cents, at which point they had enough for the all-cash purchase of their two-dollar catamaran, Lickety Split. All that remained was cleaning it up and sailing the boat from its location in Stockton to their home in Los Angeles. Simple enough, right?
There are plenty more stories, plus our regular monthly columns:
We appreciate all readers and all our supporters. Without you there would be no Latitude 38. Again, we extend a big thanks and appreciation to our advertisers who have made this issue possible. We invite you to show your appreciation by supporting them.
And thank you to our distributors. Go grab your new issue of Latitude 38 from any of these folks listed. Or subscribe, and have your copy delivered each month.
The post Latitude 38 June Issue Is Out Today! appeared first on Latitude38.
Posted by deleteme
INEOS Britannia arguably put in the performance of the day, lighting the after-burners and just looking better and better…
Posted by deleteme
The Environment
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Space Weather Prediction Center forecasted a “severe solar storm” that’s expected to hit Earth tonight, according to a release. These geomagnetic storms happen every so often, but as the Sun approaches the maximum of its 11-year solar cycle, the space weather is getting more intense.
A geomagnetic storm occurs when solar flares and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) occur on the Sun, causing variation in the solar wind that hits Earth’s magnetosphere, the protective sheath of Earth’s magnetic field. Read on.
Posted by deleteme
“This is fun. This is fun. This is fu….” Lots o’ rain and plenty cold at the Sail Port Stephens regatta. Photo thanks to Promocean Media.
Posted by deleteme
Of course we love Jalopnik, and we love poking fun at SailGP. Needless to say, they did a great job with this. The comments are excellent!
It’s understandable to assume that yacht racing is solely the purview of ascot-wearing socialites. However, hydrofoiling catamarans used in the highest level of international competition aren’t toys. SailGP yachts are capable of reaching 60 miles per hour. Higher speeds also mean bigger incidents, and Team USA found out the hard way last Friday during practice for the Bermuda Sail Grand Prix. Read on.
Posted by deleteme
Taylor Canfield’s United States dramatically capsized during Bermuda’s practice racing…
Posted by deleteme
INEOS Britannia’s new race boat for the 37th America’s Cup has set sail for the very first time…
Posted by deleteme
Jérémie Beyou, one of the top hopes for the Transat CIC solo race from Lorient to New York is returning to Lorient after damage to his J2 forestay. The skipper of Charal made the decision to turn around after discussions with his technical team, to be able to make a repair as quickly as possible and carry out a complete check of the boat.
Beyou will leave again quickly with a reduced crew to deliver the IMOCA to New York. As determined as ever Beyou wants to make sure of starting the New York-Vendée race on May 29.
Follow Us!