Page2RRS

• 09 Feb 2010 02:40

  postcard xxv Jesús Renedo sends this shot from Valencia. Is there anything going on in Valencia - some sort of big regatta? 02/09/10

  usa why they won We had a thread asking for a story about why US sailors did so well at the OCR. After we told the poster to fuck off, we decided it actually might make for an interesting story, so we went straight to Dean Brenner from US Sailing for the inside dope.. Team USA at the Rolex Miami OCR I got a nice note from Scot the Editor asking me to share some thoughts on the performance of the US Sailing Team AlphaGraphics at the Rolex Miami OCR. I’m happy to share some thoughts here and then answer questions in a follow-up thread. Our team did indeed perform well at the RMOCR. We won 10 medals in 8 events, and four golds (in women’s 470, women’s match racing, Laser Radial and Skud 18). The event was well attended, with about 640 sailors from 45 countries. And in fact, we had a chance at medals in two more events. We finished 4th and 5th in Finn and 5th in men’s 470, with clear chances at a medal in both of those events. It was a strong performance all around. But how should we interpret this performance? What does it really mean? Here are some thoughts for you to consider and then we can debate it all in the thread: 1. This is far from the first time our team has done well at RMOCR. In fact last year we won 12 medals in 8 events, and we’ve medaled in many events several other times in the past. But I’ll argue that this is the best performance we have ever had at such a well-attended RMOCR. This was the fourth largest RMOCR ever, and most of the world’s best were in Miami. So in my mind our 10 medals this year is more impressive than our 12 medals last year. 2.  Part of the reason we performed well is that we have a large number of very talented (and now petty experienced) sailors putting in the time to compete and perform. Olympic and Paralympic sailing requires strong dedication and we have more sailors than ever before willing and able to make the necessary commitment. If you look around our team, we have 2008 Olympic medalists making the commitment in the Finn (Zach Railey), women’s match racing (Anna Tunnicliffe with crew Molly Vandemoer and Debbi Capozzi), and Olympians McNay and Biehl in the 470, and Barger in men’s RS:X. We also have highly decorated world-class talents like Paige Railey doing the hard work in the Radial. We have current Star World champions Szabo and Peters training hard in the Star. We have 2008 Olympian Andrew Campbell doing great work in a new class (Star, with Brad Nichol). We have 2008 World Champs Maxwell and Kinsolving-Farrar training in the women’s 470. And 2008 Olympians Clark and Mergenthaler-Chin are back, and just won gold at the RMOCR. In the 2.4mR we have reigning world champ and 2008 bronze medalist John Ruf still committed and training. In the Skud-18, Scott Whitman and Julia Dorsett won RMOCR for the second consecutive year and they won a medal at the 2009 IFDS worlds. And there is a long list of great sailors who are training and can do great things like Horton and Lyne in the Star, Storck and Moore in the 49er, Clay Johnson in the Laser, Olympian Sally Barkow, and Genny Tulloch both in the women’s match racing. The bottom line is that we have a lot of talent right now, and regardless of how strong your program is, you can’t replace great talent. And we have great talent. If you want to point to the primary reason why we are performing well, you have to point to the talent of our athletes. 3. But another part of the reason we are performing so well is that we are surrounding and supporting this talent with a better program than we have ever had before. I’ll save you the gory details here, but we are giving out more funding, providing more coaching, and giving more physical training, rules training and weather knowledge than ever before. The resources we are bringing to our athletes is unsurpassed in the history of US Olympic and Paralympic sailing. High, high kudos goes to our staff (led by Olympic Director Katie Kelly and Head Coach Kenneth Andreasen) for the work they are doing. They get little fanfare, but it’s pretty remarkable. 4. We also have a stronger commercial platform than ever before, which is not only helping us raise funds for the program, but it is also a platform that our individual sailors and teams can use to raise additional money for themselves. We are carrying branding on hulls, sails and clothing. We are and acting like a team more than ever. Our athletes are buying into it, our coaches are supporting it, and Commercial Director Dan Cooney is bringing it all to life. 5. We are quickly instituting a new team culture, and I’m not embarrassed to admit that we have paid attention to the success of Team GBR in this regard. We are training together, we are working together, we are living together on the road… we are sharing resources, making each other better and trying to lift our collective game. I won’t bore you with too much more. But if you want to know why we did well at RMOCR, it’s two reasons. We have great talent, and we are helping our athletes unleash that talent by giving them more support than ever. Now before anyone thinks I am getting ahead of myself, let me be the one to add a bit of realism. It was one great regatta. Let’s keep all of this in perspective. We did well and we all should be proud of that. But our goal is not to win medals in Miami in 2010. This event was a stepping stone. Our goal is to be at our best in 2012, and we have a lot of work to do to get there. We need more support for more athletes. We need to keep searching out world-class coaching that will fit into our system. We need more sponsors. And there are still a LOT of great sailors in this country who don’t make the commitment to Olympic sailing. We have room for more great sailors, and we have some clear ways we can continue to strengthen our program. I’m proud of our athletes. I’m proud of our program. But I’m not at all satisfied with where we are. We can be better. And we will be. I’ll answer any questions you’ve got. Thanks for reading. (Jump in the thread - Ed.) Dean Brenner Chairman US Olympic and Paralympic Sailing 02/09/10

  sa at the ac cocktail hour Team SA talks to some heavy hitters (Goram Mastrom, Mitch Booth, Peter Harken, and Kåre Ljungabout) about multihulls at the AC, which boat is faster, and when Mr. Clean will be arrested in Valencia. Okay we made that last part up, but here's the latest from Clean below. The video btw, starts at 1:17, we forget about editing sometimes.. To say we are beat is an understatement, but seeing over 800 anarchists on one thread yesterday made it all worth it.  After all, how do you measure your audience unless you crash your site every now and again? We're back on the boat tomorrow to watch BMW/Oracle and Alinghi training tomorrow shortly after noon.  We will be streaming the practice live - so be sure to check in to the 33rd Cup Special Report to watch them go play in real time, weather permitting.  And check back on the front page for a pile of great articles and links from our crew in a few short hours, and don't forget tomorrow night's Cocktail Hour with the Little America's Cup defender and a bunch of the other wingnuts. 02/09/10

  moving Anarchist Ronnie Simpson is getting ready for an epic voyage - singlehanded to Hawaii. he is part of a great organization and we are both following and supporting him along his journey, and hope that you do too... Last time I wrote for SA's front page (you mean there's a front page?!?!), I wrote from a comfy bed in a comfy house in North Carolina, where I was prepping the boat for the move to California. As I write this most recent installment, I'm laying on a pipe berth in my new fiberglass condo on the water, deplete of any creature comforts such as running water, a toilet, personal space, and television. (But I do have wi-fi!) Some people, namely my ex-girlfriend, think it’s stupid to live on a race boat in the Bay. I call it progress. The 2010 Singlehanded Transpac is just four and a half months away, and I'm already on my boat, just a handful of miles from the starting line ... Finishing up the boat work in North Carolina went about as well as could be expected. Everything got done, miraculously, but not without the usual amount of swearing, frustration, and bloody knuckles. If you recall, we were building a custom fiberglass dodger to add an extra layer of protection to the companionway. Finishing the job took more man-hours than I expected (do I sound like a broken record yet?), but Don and I are pleased with the results. Mounting the dodger took a bit of modification and creative engineering, but it now appears to be extremely sturdy and strong. A snazzy Lexan sliding hatch even makes it look halfway cool. Next on our list was finishing up the deck. Re-bedding the lifelines and deck fittings was pretty straightforward, and painting the deck with non-skid went well, whenever we had cooperation from the weather, which was rare in an uncharacteristically cold and wet North Carolina winter. We also spent a lot of time working on the inside of the boat; reinforcing stringers around the keel with carbon fiber, re-painting the bilge, and the obligatory deep-cleaning after grinding, glass work, carbon work and painting. We planned to install a new SSB radio once in California, so we un-installed the old SSB and auto-tuner. A new alternator belt and fuel filter went on without difficulty, save spraying diesel fuel all over myself and the boat while purging the system after putting the new filter on. At least I know there's fuel pressure! The final step in prepping the inside of the boat was to re-stow all of the gear and sails. It's amazing how much room you *think* you're going to have until you put all of the gear and sails on board! The Singlehanded Transpac requires an incredible amount of gear to be carried aboard; an emergency rudder and tiller, life raft, 6 jibs, 4 kites, storm sails, a spare  auto-pilot, anchors, rode, foul weather gear, safety gear, flares, tools, spare lines, comm equipment, food, paper charts, genset, first-aid equipment, ditch bag, and 5 gallon jugs of water and fuel. While re-packing the boat, I packed away my brand new Latitude 61 bibs and jacket, and Pro Sail 33 automatic inflation PFD, courtesy of Bluestorm foul weather gear and their distributor, Marine Tech International. This stuff is super nice! I can't wait for some snotty weather to test it out in. I also re-stowed our life raft, which has just been re-certified and serviced, courtesy of Wolverine Inflatables our of Michigan. A million thanks to these great companies for stepping up big time and helping out my SHTP effort. Thanks guys! One of the last things we put back on the boat was the rudder. The original Harken rudder bearing had become worn and sloppy; we originally planned to go the custom route, ordering the materials and having a shop machine the bearing to our specs. Unfortunately, we couldn't even source the aluminum needed as the vendor failed to send us the materials. Instead, we decided to order a replacement. PYI Inc, the exclusive US distributor of Jefa rudder bearings, had contacted us with an offer of support, so we took them up on their generous offer and bought a bearing from them at a healthy discount. 3 days after ordering, I had a trick, black anodized aluminum bearing in the mail. With Delrin roller bearings and a self-aligning body, the bearing went in easily and it feels oh-so-smooth. Ian at PYI was a pleasure to work with and we are really happy with the results. Thanks Ian and PYI! With everything completed and the boat ready to go, Don and I hooked up the Ford and rolled out towards California. Things were going well ... until about 60 miles down the road when the truck started overheating and losing coolant in the mountains of Virginia. Stopping every hundred miles to add coolant got annoying with a quickness, but we couldn't figure out what the problem was so we cautiously continued. The water pump wasn't leaking, the coolant wasn't boiling over, and there were no signs of coolant in the oil. Where the hell was all the fluid going? Find out the rest of the story tomorrow.. 02/09/10

  track it The boys at Velocitek have a cool little video for you that does a great job showing you not only what their technology does, but it is also interesting seeing and hearing about a win in a tricky race in a tricky place from one of NoCal's bettor sailors... 02/09/10

  ac biz sucking From our bro Aaron Kuriloff at Bloomberg... Billionaires Larry Ellison and Ernesto Bertarelli have turned an America’s Cup boom into bust. A 30-month wrangle over rules canceled a 19-team qualifying event, scared off sponsors like Banco Santander SA, UBS AG and Nestle SA and shrank the organizing budget to 8 million euros ($11.1 million) from a record 230 million euros in 2007, organizers said. The wait continued today. The start of the best-of-three sailing regatta in Valencia, Spain, was postponed for two days because of a lack of regular wind speed today, race officials said. The event is sandwiched between the Super Bowl and the Winter Olympics in Vancouver. International interest has declined so much that organizers gave away the television rights, officials of Bertarelli’s Alinghi team said.“This is not going to be a windfall for anyone,” Gary Jobson, the president of U.S. Sailing and the cup-winning navigator in 1977, said in an interview. “It’s going to cost them both a lot of money.” The economic impact of the 159-year-old event, sailing’s oldest competition, is less than 10 percent of the $7 billion last time, according to Tom Cannon, a sports business professor at the U.K.’s Liverpool University. There are no infrastructure benefits and most of the about-$500 million spent will be on the two competing boats, Cannon said. Switzerland’s Bertarelli, 44, said his team has struggled to get sponsors to replace UBS and Nestle, which used the last event to promote its Nespresso brand. The 65-year-old Ellison’s BMW-Oracle retained Bayerische Motoren Werke AG while losing backers including insurer Allianz AG. Read the rest here 2/08/10

  tonight at 6:30 gmt with multi-hull experts including; Goran Marstrom, Mitch Booth, and a couple other great guests. It is one you don't want to miss, esppecially after today....thanks to Thierry Martinez for the photo.

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• 08 Feb 2010 06:51

  ac update no breeze We've been watching and waiting and waiting and...well, let's just say there is no breeze and the AC had been in postpone mode for over 4 hours now and now it has been officially abandonded. Next race ias Wednesday. Maybe.You can jump in the OTW forum for the latest. Team SA is heading back from the water to upload all todays video and pics. Also don't forget to watch our live cocktail hour tonight at 6:30 gmt with multi-hull experts including; Goran Marstrom, Mitch Booth, and a couple other great guests. It is one you don't want to miss, esppecially after today.... 02/08/10

  postcard xxiv It only seems fitting to use this shot from BMWO for today's postcard. And to be fair, because we're really concerned about being fair, here's one of Alinghi from Rick Tomlinson. 02/08/10

  ac countdown t minus zero As our sleep deprivation hits an all-time high, we're putting the final touches on what is the most rushed project we've ever done - and that's saying something!  At least PRO Harold Bennett feels the same - in a 25-minute interview we did with him today he explained that he was putting out brush fire after brush fire, but is confident that there will be a race on Monday (that's 5 hours from now).   Bennett also explained that the info about the wind limits being decided by committee that the public heard was not the reality - the buck stops with him and though he hemmed and hawed a bit about safety, his history would dictate that we're going sailing.  We also got some great insights from some of the sports legendary journalists during the best OTW Cocktail Hour yet, and we'll be rebroadcasting it Monday afternoon as well as getting you an on-demand version around the same time.  And the Bennett interview, and one with Grant Davidson, and so on, and so on...In the meantime, here's a report from John Casey, our OTW team's multihull expert: I was the last of the OTW Anarchy crew to arrive in Valencia, just in time for Jane Eagleson, BMW/Oracles PR chief, to toss us out of the building (nicely).  Apparently they've got some business or other at 0430 - wonder what could be so important to wake up at such an ungodly hour.  We jumped across the street to the first place that looked like a restaurant - a nameless bar with tasteless tapas and mystery meat and more mysterious sauce, but at least it was something to keep us fueled for hours in front of the computer to get today's front page and the AC33 Anarchy Special Report site up and running.  As a first timer to Clean's coverage circus, it's hard not to be impressed - this hardworking bunch's laptop buttons are popping here in our flat with at the same frenetic pace as the bizarre fireworks display I heard about during the opening ceremony.  Genny's ears are still ringing hours later - apparently the Spanish don't mind not being able to see fireworks as long as they are really, really loud. For some reason, the only thing I can think about is the sight of both of these monsters hauling the mail in front of us, hulls out of the water, drag racing to the next shift they find with doppler laser/radar systems. So many questions all the enthusiastic fans have had for so many months are about to be put to bed - what a great time to be here!  With the forecast breeze from the Southerly quadrant the start line is going ot be 30 miles or more offshore, and most late models are calling for 5-6 knots - plenty to fly hulls, luckily for us. Stay tuned because both Genny and I think the real fireworks will be going off as soon as the boats enter the starting area! BMW/Oracle won the coin toss and are coming in on starboard, and Jimmy Spithill is going to be something to watch with the surgeon's scalpel he has in the big black trimaran.  Let's rumble! You can find pictures, videos, and all the essential links you'll need to watch the variety of coverage for the 33rd Cup here at our Special Report page.  BMW/Oracle's site will have their own dockout and a pre-race show while the OTW team will go live around 0900 CET (0300 EST) and take you as far as we can before we lose signal, and then we'll be broadcasting again when we are close enough to land to do so, hopefully showing you the top mark with our expert commentary from the best sailing commentators you'll here for this one. And remember to check out the all-new Layline.Com site and stay tuned to the OTW Anarchy forum for Layline principal 'tweisleder' to offer special coupon codes for all kinds of great sailing gear.gear added throughout the week, and it's a perfect time to save a bunch of money using special coupon codes that we will announce shortly.  Tune in for some serious tests of the brand new Gill Race Collection, and to see how it looks on Mer and Genny, and you must have a look at what presenting sponsor GUNBOAT and PURE have in store for you if you like carbon and speed - lots and lots of both.  Sign up for Oman Sail's facebook page to learn more about one of the truly groundbreaking sailing programs in the world today, and take a look at the all-new McDougall Design site for a teaser on Amac's plans for a new revolution... 2/08/10

  one look Here is the BMWO perspective.... 02/08/10

  good news/bad news The latest from Brad Van Liew as he brings his new steed home to get ready for the 2010-2011 Velux 5 Oceans Race... Okay, we really did not plan to stop in Tenerife, I swear. We most certainly did not plan on stopping here during their Carnival season, although we all enjoy a party now and then. Tenerife is a small island city bustling with life in the Canary Islands. It is a wild place, with booming sounds of music and a much unanticipated city-vibe, although that may be heightened right now due to the annual celebration. On to the news of why we are here… Bad News: The bad news includes a dismal forecast for weather across the Atlantic. The light weather hit us like a brick wall after the wild surfing we did two days ago. It was so intense that we decided to check in with Ken Campbell, and review how long this trip really could take given the worst of weather circumstances. It became clear that there was potential we could be sailing for the larger part of a month instead of 14-20 days. This presents a problem, as I have a couple important sponsorship meeting coming up. To be honest, I can’t jeopardize these potential partnerships that we have worked hard to nurture, thereby jeopardizing my main goal of competing in the Velux 5 Oceans. I will depart Tenerife via plane instead of boat with the intent of balancing the competition and training side of this venture, with the business side. Dr. Kevin Hogan will also head back via plane, as he has equally important commitments with patients. Good News: The good news is that we have put the boat through her paces, covering about 2,000 miles and every imaginable condition, from 50 knots upwind to no air downwind. We have achieved a lot since leaving France, including a detailed plan for the refit and a timeline for all to happen with room for considerable training offshore. The other good news is that we have sponsorship meetings, and an energetic team on land lining up more as we speak. I feel good about the decision to take off and let the boys deliver the boat to Charleston, while I do what I can to support the sponsorship quest and reach our ultimate goal. The blog will continue once Jeffrey and JC (plus Adam Currier coming aboard in Tenerife) are underway again. They are adding provisions and water to the boat for the additional time expected offshore. I’m sure they will not mind the Carnival atmosphere here in Tenerife while awaiting their weather window! All the best to those following our adventure and more news as we move on… -Brad 02/08/10

  snow job Because man cannot live by AC alone... This is what Austrian sailors are doing in wintertime when water is frozen. Anarchist Martin just started to test his Optimist a few days ago close to Vienna. Check out the modified steering system which still needs some work.... 02/08/10

  

  

  

  

  

  

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• 06 Feb 2010 18:52

  ac countdown t minus 2 There is so much going on now that it is simply impossible to keep up with it all - fortunately between the SA legions peppering the forums with an endless stream of news, the assembled media, and at least one team there is some good stuff getting out.  BMW/Oracle is showing a nice level of transparency with their well-done livecasting solution, which while spotty outside the US is fairly strong in the homeland, provided you have decent broadband.  Yesterday the BMW heads answered a pile of questions - some of them even relevant - at this press conference, with Coutts and Spithill laughing and joking with hundreds of assembled journos and VIPS and Ellison getting his message across as well.  Contrast that with Alinghi's press conference where Butterworth and Bertarelli looked like they were sitting in a dentist's chair waiting for a root canal (linkie).  Perhaps the most interesting part of the presser was Ellison's explanation for why no one from BMW/Oracle would be at the official event press conference on Sunday - in Cups past, the place where the real fireworks were laid out.  Who can forget Connor's famous quip during this traditional meeting "Why would you build a boat out of plastic unless you wanted to cheat?"  Like a boxing match, the final press conference is the final build-up of drama, but although this is ostensibly a Consorcio event and purportedly meant to make Valencia look good, Ernesto's power over the city apparently allows him to have specifically excluded Russell Coutts from this tradition, and Larry showed some stones by telling them to pound sound.  "If Russell is not good enough" for the venomous Bertarelli, neither is anyone from BMW/Oracle's team. Between this ridiculous flexing of his muscles and rules we've learned about media and spectator boats, it is more clear now than ever that Alinghi's goal for this Cup is to make it a non-event.  Win or lose, Bertarelli wants to get this over with in quiet.  Is he finally feeling the glare of the world on his thinning hair?  Is he intent on hurting Valencia as payback for the meetings they've had with BMW/Oracle and the Formula 1 mess that caused him the loss of tens of millions in fees for the leasing of the Alinghi base?  As usual with Alinghi, logic doesn't provide a good answer when divining Alinghi's intentions and we can only speculate. And while there are loads of interesting people and things to see, what sets this Cup apart from the other is that the stars are not people, they are boats.  And just below this article i's a ten minute look at the most advanced part of either - the massive USA 17 wing, with some very interesting comments from two guys that hardly every get in front of a camera and the men responsible for building the Challenger, Mark Turner and Tim Smythe. Please don't forget to thank our sponsors by checking out their sites and letting them know you appreciate their support.  The completely redesigned Layline.Com site will go live on Saturday with new gear added throughout the week, and it's a perfect time to save a bunch of money using special coupon codes that we will announce shortly.  Tune in for some serious tests of the brand new Gill Race Collection, and to see how it looks on Mer and Genny, and you must have a look at what presenting sponsor GUNBOAT and PURE have in store for you if you like carbon and speed - lots and lots of both.  Sign up for Oman Sail's facebook page to learn more about one of the truly groundbreaking sailing programs in the world today, and get psyched to learn more about the new company formed by the man behind the incredible growth and popularity of the foiling moth - Bladerider and Mach 2 designer Andrew "Amac" McDougall's new Mcdougall Designs.  There's no site yet, but Amac's got some great stuff coming down the pike that you'll have to see to believe... 2/06/10

  As you may or may not know, Mr. Clean and our AC broadcast team (Genny Tulloch, John Casey, Petey Crawford Ms. Block, Aaron) are in Valencia getting ready to cover the Cup like no one else can. We'll be live from the water, we'll have interviews, stories, the AC Anarchy forum, a brand new SA AC page with tons of info, chat, photos, you name it. Clean is already getting some great stuff, starting with this vid on the BMWO wing. There is really only going to be one place to hang out during the next few days, and it's not teenmodels.com. Okay, it might be, but for all things AC, you'll be right here. Be sure to jump in our

  

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• 06 Feb 2010 01:19

  

  sa at the ac wing menAs you may or may not know, Mr. Clean and our AC broadcast team (Genny Turloch, John Casey, Petey Crawford Ms. Block, Aaron) are in Valencia getting ready to cover the Cup like no one else can. We'll be live from the water, we'll have interviews, stories, the AC Anarchy forum, a brand new SA AC page with tons of info, chat, photos, you name it. Clean is already getting some great stuff, starting with this vid on the BMWO wing. There is really only going to be one place to hang out during the next few days, and it's not teenmodels.com. Okay, it might be, but for all things AC, you'll be right here. Be sure to jump in our AC Anarchy forum for the latest... 02/06/10

  so far so good Well at least he hasn't been kicked out. Yet. Here's Clean with Tom Ehman at the BMWO press conference today, which you can check out here if you wish. Thanks to Juerg Kaufmann for the shot. 02/05/10

  long winter... Just a reminder to - among other things - freshen up the port/starboard rules before starting the 2010 season. This picture is from Sunday's regatta outside Scheveningen (NL), and shows Antares (a Trintella 53") visiting the cockpit of Joris K (Elan 37). No injuries, but substantial damage to both vessels...Thanks to anarchist Thor. 02/05/10

  t minus 3 After 26 hours of travel, the On-The-Water Anarchy team has made it to a cold and drizzly Valencia, and the excitement is cranking up like nothing we've seen before.  Unlike any AC in memory, this one has a level of anticipation that is palpable - with no comparisons available, there are only a tiny group of people that know who is going to sail away from whom come Monday morning.  And we're not in that group.  But we can tell you how to find out... ONE STOP SHOP The volume of emails we've received asking about coverage of the AC is frankly overwhelming, but finally, enough ducks are in enough rows that we can give you this - the comprehensive guide to the various coverage options you have starting Friday. Layline 33rd Cup Anarchy Special Report As we've been telling you all this week, the OTWA team for this event is a special one, and we're committed to bringing you the most in-depth coverage ever seen during any America's Cup.  Our team is six strong, with Mer shooting pics that will rival anyone's, Petey shooting video with his customary flair, Aaron holding down the IT fort, multihull star John Casey and match racing studette Genny Tulloch calling the play-by-play, and yours truly holding it all together.  Our coverage will all be centered around our Layline AC33 Anarchy Special Section, with multiple videos, a live player, photo galleries and slideshows, latest news headlines, and the hot topics in the AC forum.  We'll also have an AC33-only On-The-Water Anarchy forum where only our reporters can start topics, ensuring that the Cup talk stays on focus - at least as much as anything on SA can, and the dozens of AC Anarchists on the ground will update you constantly like only a community this size can.  You'll note that our microsite isn't quite ready yet; you can thank Bertarelli's antics for that, having left us a total of seven days to plan and fund our entire coverage at the same time as ensuring that real television shows would only make it to a tiny fraction of the people that would love to see it.  Expect to see the Special Section site live sometime on Saturday, and expect to see future events use a similar strategy to give you the best watching experience possible. Today, you can catch the BMWO press conference right here. We'd carry Alinghi's press conferencel, but Bertarelli's doing to us exactly what he has done to media everywhere that dared to criticize him - he's banned us from attending any event in the Alinghi base.  Is anyone still wondering why the sailing media are so afraid to ask him the tough questions? Sometimes the truth is painful... Tomorrow we also start our interviews, which may end up being the most interesting part of the entire week.  Mer and I will be taking a tour of the BMW wing around noon, and the list of folks we'll be talking to over the next week is longer than Bertarelli's face when the Jury threw out his pathetic wind limits.  We'll be posting them to various places, and you'll be able to find our everything via the front page and the microsite. We'll also be bringing you live, On-The-Water Anarchy coverage of the actual racing starting early on Monday morning - REAL EARLY.  We will hit the water sometime around 0800 CET, which is 2 in the morning in New York. Ouch!  The racing itself starts just past 1000 CET/0400 EST/0100 PST, giving you West Coasters a great option for what to do after the Super Bowl; keep drinking and turn on your computers!  We've got gyro-stabilizers and lots of toys to make our feed good, but this is the grass-roots stuff and we won't pretend that we can do what the pros with the multi-million dollar production bid can.  And while we can't guarantee that our internet solution will work when we get more than 15 or 20 miles from shore, we will do our best to stay live all the time and give you the information that the official feed can't or won't, and we'll be rebroadcasting our coverage of the race in its entirety the moment we get to shore.  And while we will pimp our sponsors in the hopes that you patronize their company websites, we promise that we'll never break for a commercial at an inopportune time to show you a pretentious Rolex ad. If there is practice on Tuesday, we'll be there live.  Same for racing on Wednesday, and every day afterwards when the battle is on. Americascup.com Official Live Feed Despite a somewhat nasty reputation that shoreside director Michel Hodara earned as the director of the 32nd Cup, he's acquitting himself amazingly well, and the total shit show that we expected here in Valencia looks almost well-managed despite no time and a mountain of work.  Hodara and his team - working for Valencia instead of Alinghi - have pulled together what should be a pretty damned good TV and internet feed.  They've got multiple choppers with gyro-stabilized cameras, some unique OTW footage solutions, on-board telemetry, and most importantly, an entertaining coverage team.  Cup icon Peter Montgomery's voice might make you want to punch him in the mouth, but you can't deny that he is knowledgeable and enthusiastic, and pretty damned funny whether he means to be or not.  Andy Green is another vet with great knowledge of the players if not the new multihull game, but ACM have solved that problem with the addition of RTW multihuller and cat rock star Cam Lewis - a great move and a real coup. You can watch the feed from anywhere in the world at the 33rd Cup site, and if that site goes down from the traffic, you'll still be able to catch the identical feed at BMW/Oracle Racing's site.  For a preview of the kind of work we can expect, check this out and get psyched. The Pretenders Other than On-The-Water Anarchy's live video, the official ACM feed is the only one coming from the race course, despite what some would have you believe.  There are two such re-broadcaster so far, and the first comes from online-only broadcaster ESPN360.  They bought the feed from ACM and are rebroadcasting it over their own site and peppering it with their own ads, passing it off as their work, at least in the initial press releases we've seen. The other voiceover commentary will be undertaken by the 'Stache, Paul Cayard, who will also be in a studio talking over the official feed for rebroadcast on Eurosport TV all over Europe as well as on their own internet feed.  Same stuff as at the official AC site with more commercials and the Cayard's monotone...not really the kind of inspiring television that you'd hope for, but to be fair they do love Paul Cayard over here.  And David Hasselhoff is big in Europe too. Yanks To The Rescue In a late-breaking announcement, BMW/Oracle announced that not only would they be hosting the official feed on their own site, but that they would be broadcasting an entire program of race day coverage, including their exclusive footage of the dock out, a history of the AC, and pre-race analysis from some folks that certainly know what they are doing.  We'll have BMW's coverage available on the live video player of our Special Section (clearly labeled as such and with their blessing) and you can watch it yourself at the BMW/Oracle site Pimp Our Ride Please don't forget to thank our sponsors by checking out their sites and letting them know you appreciate their support.  The completely redesigned Layline.Com site will go live on Saturday with new gear added throughout the week, and it's a perfect time to save a bunch of money using special coupon codes that we will announce shortly.  Tune in for some serious tests of the brand new Gill Race Collection, and to see how it looks on Mer and Genny, and you must have a look at what presenting sponsor and PURE have in store for you if you like carbon and speed - lots and lots of both.  Sign up for Oman Sail's facebook page to learn more about one of the truly groundbreaking sailing programs in the world today, and get psyched to learn more about the new company formed by the man behind the incredible growth and popularity of the foiling moth - Bladerider and Mach 2 designer Andrew "Amac" McDougall's new Mcdougall Designs.  There's no site yet, but Amac's got some great stuff coming down the pike that you'll have to see to believe... It's off to bed now for three hours of sleep before about 90 more without...come back and see us real soon - you wouldn't want to miss anything!  Oh - and for a little more fun, put some money down on the winner. 2/05/10

  the giant horseshoe Perhaps the perfect antithesis to the Reid Stowe's moronic Sea Turtle voyage, Brad Van Liew sends in another report from the transatlantic delivery of his new Open 60.  Follow his blog here Blasting A Giant Horseshoe in the Atlantic Yesterday was full of big breeze and we made the best of it, blasting off in the high teens and reaching 20 knots on occasion.  The boat handled it well and I am very impressed with her - it was a good day.  And if our destination was Morocco, it would have been a great one! We call this route 'the Atlantic horseshoe," and the first leg is basically straight South as we leave France and head past Madeira and the Canaries.  We will likely not be able to start our Westward turn another 1000 NM past there before this silly route ponies up with the trade winds. To put it in layman’s terms, our Transatlantic has really not begun yet. The crew is all doing well, and with all the free time that this kind of delivery allows, we're exploring every nook and cranny on the new boat.  We have a daily meeting (quite a formal step considering the personalities aboard) with Kevin Hogan as the acting secretary.  We haven't yet pulled out Robert's Rules of Order, but we incorporate them during our meetings in a slapstick way - the laughs never end here aboard Team Lazarus.  Today's debate was about deck layout, while yesterday was all keel all the time.  It may sound silly, but all the brainstorming means we will be exceptionally prepared for the refit when we hit the ground in Charleston, and every second of thinking we can save now is a second we get back later. At the moment we are headed towards Santa Cruz de Tenerife and we expect to get by it tonight, it's slow sailing now, and looks like it will stay slow for some time.  Quite a downer after our wild ride yesterday, but hopefully there are some more white knuckle moments to come soon. Thanks for checking in with us, -Brad 02/05/10

  ac harold's alright? There has been a lot of speculation about the impartiality of the America’s Cup PRO Harold Bennett given that he is being paid by Ernesto.  But after an incident on the RC boat this week, we can safely put any such speculation of Harold being owned by Ernesto to rest. It turns out that contrary to popular belief, and probably including his own understanding of his role in managing the races, Harold will not be making the determination of when the races will start or stop based on the weather.  It now comes to light that the decision about when a race will start or be abandoned will rest with the “SNG Race Committee”, of which Harold is only one vote.  One wonders what the International Jury thinks of this arrangement and if they knew that the PRO was not really calling the race day shots, and more importantly, what this could mean in the scheme of the things for the BFD suit that looms large on the horizon. Earlier this week, while aboard the RC boat, Fred Meyer, who is the key member of the SNG “Race Committee” was wearing an Alinghi jacket.  To his credit, Harold made Fred turn the jacket inside out so that the Alinghi colors were not showing. So now the world is watching not Harold, but instead, Fred, to see if the America’s Cup races are run fairly. For anyone who doesn’t know Fred, that's a picture of him during happy hour. Anyone else notice the uncanny resemblance to Judge Smails, of “Caddyshack” fame? 02/05/10

  rocko to freo Those Crazy Feo Laser Fuckers are back at it! 02/05/10

  cruising anarchy We don't give nearly enough space to the cruising end of things, so we dig it when we get stories from the peeps. Anarchist Hans sent this one in. If you've got something cruisey that you think is interesting, send it in! Someone told me once that I’ll be doing fine if I get a foot of boat for every year of my age.  At 34, my second life for some years now had been as a racecar driver.  But with a four-year-old, racing was just taking time away from my new family.  As a kid, I sailed Lasers at the Club Náutico de San Juan and spent many summers sailing the Virgin Islands on my best friend’s sailboat.  I grew to love the ocean and the adventure of discovering the thousands of destinations on land and under water that Puerto Rico and the Virgins offered.  It was the lifestyle I wanted for my children one day, so it was logical to go back to sailing.   They say every time two sailboats heading in the same direction see each other on the water, a silent race is on.  It’s true.  I wanted a cheap superfast cruiser.  What is it?  How about retro-fitting an aged race boat to cruise? This red hot rod of a boat caught my eye on December 2004, standing on the yard at Puerto del Rey, in Fajardo, PR.  The 1984 J35 “Ventajero” was a local legend.  Previous winner of the ‘Round Puerto Rico Race and the St. Thomas Rolex, it was full of great stories.  After a quick visit and some research on the internet, I was very interested.  Over two-hundred boats on the water, five active one-design fleets, and an American Sailboat Hall of Fame Inductee.  In other words, a “Certified Classic”. If my dream car would have been a Ferrari, at least here I got my fast red toy for a fraction of the cost. I called my friend, professional sailor and rigger Jorge Hernandez to please come and see it and give me a dead honest opinion whether to purchase the boat or keep looking.  Jorge came and after a close inspection, I still remember his advice:  “It’s on its way to becoming a cadaver, but the basics are healthy and we can save it.  It’s an awesome boat.  You’ll sail faster than most 40-footers today.”  He was in, and so was I.  So here I was, $27,000 later, with my beat-up-racer-to-become-superfast-cruiser.  I was lucky to have a multi-talented construction employee, Albert, who lived nearby the yard.  We took the thing apart and called it Monster Garage J for some time.  Jorge supervised.  I also called J Boats, to see if by any chance, I was able to get a copy of an owner’s manual for the restoration of my almost twenty-year old boat.  I talked briefly with a very nice lady on the phone and got a quick reply: “Just mail us a check for $20.  I’ll be mailing you right away.”  She even offered Rod Johnstone’s phone number mentioning he’d be glad to offer any advise if I needed.  I was very impressed.  That’s how a world-class family business services, and I had just bought an old boat!  I received my owner’s manual copy in two days. I won’t go into detail, but after three months, the project wasn’t worth $1,000.  Outside, all deck hardware was out.  Thankfully, balsa core was in very good condition, except for the genoa track and winch locations.  We spent a few weeks just removing the rotted balsa and re-coring with a mix of epoxy resin and micro-fibers.  Jorge prepared routed fiberglass backing plates for all new hardware.  Inside, everything went out, with the exception of bulkheads, engine, diesel tank and the only two small cabinets.  That’s when the news came, my wife was pregnant!  Make that a family cruiser, baby included, with a wife who had never sailed.   Call it either brave or stubborn.  I was kept excited by many who I met in the marina, asking if I was the one who purchased Ventajero.  Eyes lit up with awesome racing stories…many.  I’m an architect, with 15 years in the construction business.  That means probably too much creativity for the assignment and no fear of destruction and reconstruction.  Jorge, a perfectionist.  We discussed the project.  The basic requirement for the ideal boat given the situation:  safety first, and it had to sail singlehanded. Fifteen months later, with new everything and then some, “Cavallino” went in the water.  It looked beautiful, shiny red hull with brand new white non-skid and all new Harken hardware, running and standing rigging.   With tiller steering, it felt like a big Laser.  It sailed beautifully, although a bit “sporty” for the family.  By that, I mean a wet cockpit, and a bit too much heel.  The boat also felt light against 3’ chop.  You usually see these boats crewed with 8-10 guys, 6 of them on the rail, and now I know why. The J35 sure is beamy, at 11.8’.  I also needed more fresh water.  Ta-da! Two custom fiberglass tanks behind settees.  I met a local artisan, Ismael, who promised to deliver.  He built both tanks shaped and bonded against the hull.  We measured and they made about 95 gallons each!  We installed them with Rule bilge pumps inside each of them and placed switches at the cockpit.  Water ballast transfer happened at 3.5 minutes for a full tank.  The heel correction is good for about 3-4 degrees, and the boat feels a lot more planted as it slices upwind.  It was time to make the cruiser look like it inside.  I worked with local shop Sand, Sea and Air interiors to design the interior upholstery.  Sunbrella textile was child friendly, and a top 1” layer of memory foam provided extra comfort.  We got an award from the Marine Fabricators Association for “Ourstanding Achievement” in 2008.  Custom teak cabinets were installed for storage above tanks and many more projects followed.  With plenty of water, extra-large batteries, new AC/DC panel, inverter, diesel generator, A/C, microwave, electric cooktop, fresh water electric head, auto pilot and GPS now we have a fully equipped cruiser.  The kids’ biggest smile was when they saw the 22-in. LCD, where we hookup our Apple TV.  I had gone from “Monster Garage” to “Pimp my J”. On the cockpit, custom molded fiberglass backrests deflect water and keep the seating dry.  A table was fabricated and it doubles as a center insert turning the seats into a big lounge pad, with cushions also by SSA.  The last projects were to move the primary winches back and make them electric.  The main halyard was routed back and I can raise the mainsail from the helm with the electric winch.  Also, I added a hatch for the bow locker.  J35s have huge bow lockers, but only accessible from the v-berth.  The space was good for anchor locker and also for the gennaker bag.  A Forte Carbon bowsprit was installed on deck and rigged to extend and retract from the cockpit. I’ve had the best time pimpin’ my J and sailing Cavallino, our pimped superfast family cruising classic.  Hope you enjoy our recent YouTube movie, “Sailing Culebra 2010”.  In contrast to very tough economic times, we had some great moments to start the new decade. To be continued. 02/05/10

  ac the winner? The more we hear, the more we think you are looking at the winner (on the water, at least) of the upcoming AC. Thanks to the BMW Oracle racing photographers for the killer shot. More here

  Imagine 20 years of design and racing experience into a compact offshore boat...that is what the Pogo 2 is about. In respect the Mini Class Box Rules, the Pogo 2 is 21 feet long, 10 feet wide, for a total displacement of 2,000 lbs and can carry over 1,100 square feet of sail area downwind! Please see Elodie Riou in the video above of the Pogo 2! The Pogo 2 is indeed a boat that you can race around the buoys, take for a d aysail and if you are well motivated, take offshore and cross the oceans with. website. In the meantime, welcome aboard withand feel free to 02/04/10

  

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  postcard xxiii Here's a shot of my dad's trimaran, Airmail. She was built (WEST System) in 1979/80 on Negros Island in the Philippines and looks just as great today as the day she was launched. My dad and I enjoy sailing her around the islands there--now at a more leisurely pace than before--and I can't wait to make some passages on her in the future with my son who's now 2-1/2 years old. He's been out on her a few times, and with luck, he'll catch the multihull bug, too. Little Pat. 02/04/10

  ac countdown t minus 4 Clean is likely loaded to the gills on airplane bottles of vodka right now as he and Mer head to Valencia, but before he jumped on the plane he sent us something really interesting - it's the Extreme 40's in Oman, who decided to show the world yesterday that match racing in ultralight multihulls is every bit as good as in big monohulls - if not better.  They were understandably proud to have done it before Monday, when it will occur on a much bigger scale....Check the vid Those who are getting psyched about Sailing Anarchy's in-depth coverage of the cup have another great development to cheer for;  the last-minute addition to the Layline/OTW Anarchy team of reigning US Mutlihull Champion, Extreme 40 racer, and past Tybee 500 champ John Casey to the coverage team.   JC adds his encyclopedic knowledge and multi racing experience to Genny Tulloch's mastery of match racing, and the end result is that Clean is out of a job! Finally! Remember; the first live talk show is Sunday at 1900 local/1300 EDT...get ready! 02/04/10

  taking off Bora Gulari fills us in on his trip out west... From not having an organized fleet to 24 boats at the recent Gill Moth PCC’s it is amazing to think how far the US Moth fleet has come in about two years. Based on the number of new Mach 2’s present the fleet shows no sign of going back. There were another three brand new boats at the event and each one looked great and went together well. The boats were totally plug and play making new owners fast out of the box and showing potential moth sailors the ease with which they can get into the class. On the other side of the spectrum, we had some new home builds that were extremely light and very quick. It is good to be able to have both the polished production boats and home built rockets racing against each other all the way around the track. It is also nice to know that the pioneering and development side of things is alive and kicking here in our younger U.S. fleet.  The sails are also seeing a good amount of experimentation.  Chris Williams, of North Sails, had the latest offerings from Big Blue. Dan Kaseler, of Raptor sails, turned up with his 17th iteration of a more windsurf based sail and the fast and reliable MSL 10 from Amac and KA sails was also present.   All sails showed good speed, and in the end the guy holding the sheet usually made the biggest difference. With the shifty winds and the debris from recent storms making plenty of obstacles to avoid, South Bay served up perfect conditions in anticipation of a light air worlds. We actually sailed a couple races in marginal foiling conditions and I think we all agreed that moths are much more fun when we can foil.   We also seemed to settle on the idea that if you are trying to get on a foil, rule 42 does not really work. But if you are just going in a straight line with no attempts to foil then rule 42 should apply.  If you are on the fence about getting a boat, do it!  It will be the best sailing you have ever done (as long as you don’t mind getting wet). 02/04/10

  new class farr New Zealand based Project Coordinator, Lapo Ancillotti, and businessman Francesco Piva have created BTBoats Ltd in order to manage the New Zealand production and Worldwide marketing of the KIWI 40FC – an exciting production Class 40 designed by Farr Yacht Design and built by Cookson Boats. Ancillotti, Farr Yacht Design, and Cookson Boats have collaborated on numerous projects over the last two decades. This experienced and successful team, enriched by the arrival of Francesco Piva, has enthusiastically embraced the challenge of creating a very innovative, fast, and competitive production Class40 yacht - the KIWI 40FC 02/04/10

  stopover anarchyThe farcical interpretation and application of rules in the 33rd America’s Cup, allied with the evident lack of sportsmanship from both teams flies in the face of everything sailing stands for, be it as a competitive sport or a family and friends weekend sail. To many, sailing takes camaraderie to another level, forging friendships through sharing the highs and lows of time spent on the water. It is the stranger on the shore, ready to catch your bowline or the boat 200m away that waves as you pass. It is not and never will be anything like the childish behaviour of both teams currently in Valencia.  One would think that being associated with such boats would be inspirational; sadly they appear to reduce their respective teams to the lowest level of sandbox politics. Fortunately for us all, one race that ebbed away after the summer, is slowly gathering pace. The Volvo Ocean Race in 2011 is in its infancy but with two teams already signed up and driven by CEO Knut Frostad’s goal for the race “to become the World’s 1# sailing event”, the super cats of February in Valencia will soon be consigned to history. One key element of the race that is underway is the selection of the stopover ports.  The competition this year is intense as there are fewer stopovers than in the 08/09 race and the race itself being circa 1 month shorter.  On the shores of Western Europe, Ireland is holding its breath. Galway, the most revered stopover of 08/09 is locked in a 3 way duel with a Portuguese city and Lorient, the French city in the northwest tip of France. A melting pot of offshore sailing, all things water and Franck Cammas’ Equipe Groupama. While few could argue against the success of the Galway stopover, one feels that the interests of the race itself will lean towards a French stopover following Groupama committing to the next two editions of the race. This in turn allows the race to tap into a new fan base, for the French have a long and proud association with offshore shorthanded sailing. Lorient reaps the benefits of where the sudden incline of the seabed on the Bay of Biscay ensures waves of Biblical proportions and weather to match. It has produced a conveyer belt of offshore talent. Without casting aspersions on French frailty, it will be interesting to see how the French entry performs in the race. Indeed they have the services of the celebrated Juan K (no introduction needed); will this see input from the Irish master boat builder, Killian Bushe (Ilbruck, Abn Amro, and Ericsson)?? But as a team, French sports teams-such as their rugby team are frustratingly fickle and French sailors seem stronger alone than as a unit of 10. One look at the crew lists for the 08/09 edition of the VOR shows less than a handful of French sailors- including the exit of one from a team prior to the finish of the race. The sailing world eagerly awaits.  Returning to the stopover final. Local newspaper reports in Galway are giving the impending decision a lot of column inches. It means a lot to the city. As a city on the western seaboard, Galway revels in celebration, festivals and no city in Ireland comes close in this regard. Sadly, for Galway, it is lacking in maritime infrastructure. Like the rest of Ireland, the lack of municipal marinas betrays the geographical state of the country. As an island nation we have a long running association with the sea, a proud history and yet, we fail to harness its true capabilities. Be it through fish farming, wave energy, tidal energy or tourism. With that in mind, Galway offers tremendous potential for harvesting the benefits of the sea.  As opposed to Crosshaven in Cork or Dún Laoghaire in Dublin, Galway’s docks is right in the heart of the city. It is within minutes of; air, rail and bus services, shops, restaurants and its excellent pubs. Despite this, the Volvo Ocean Race has not had the same effect the America’s Cup had on Auckland. Galway needs to go for broke and follow up on its proposal to further develop its dockland area. To build the pier to facilitate cruise liners, commercial transport and a 300 berth marina. Galway should consider conceding the 2011 stopover to Lorient, in the interests of the race and Galway itself. Then, on the back of the development, return as the premier stopover in Europe. As the ideal end of the trans-Atlantic leg, where Guinness, Oysters and 10,000 plus fans await the arrival of the boats at 3am.  - Gilligan. 02/04/10

  mini anarchy Our friends at Open Sailing have some really ambitious plans underway, and here is the first of them. Might this boat be a breakthrough here in the states? Imagine 20 years of design and racing experience into a compact offshore boat...that is what the Pogo 2 is about. In respect the Mini Class Box Rules, the Pogo 2 is 21 feet long, 10 feet wide, for a total displacement of 2,000 lbs and can carry over 1,100 square feet of sail area downwind! The Pogo 2 is indeed a boat that you can race around the buoys, take for a daysail and if you are well motivated, take offshore and cross the oceans with. The Pogo 2, designed by Finot/Conq Architect, is the reference boat in the mini transat world, taking over the podiums in most racing event. Open Sailing, proud license builder and distributor of other well know Finot designs (Open 5.00, Open 5.70, Open 6.50) is extremely excited to introduce the Pogo 2 in the USA and make it available to American sailors: "The Pogo 2 will be built in association between Open Sailing and Columbia Yachts in Southern California: following the success in building the Open 5.70 in NA, it just made sense to continue and extend the adventure with Columbia Yachts which has shown great craftsmanship and professionalism in building the Open 5.70 with us", said Jerome Sammarcelli, President of Open Sailing. The tooling from France will be shipped to the USA in the next month or so and we are anticipating production of 2-3 boats as soon as receiving the molds. If all goes as planned, the first "Made In The USA" Pogo 2 will be sailing and racing this summer. With a little luck, we might be able to enter the Pacific Cup, from San Francisco to Hawaii! If not, there are still plenty of other races and with another 30 + other Mini Transat owners in the USA" said Sammarcelli. Complete information will be updated in the next two weeks on the Open Sailing website. In the meantime, welcome aboard with Elodie Riou in this video of the Pogo 2 and feel free to contact us if you have any inquiries. 02/04/10

  postcard xxii Here's a shot which was taken during the Austrian Finn Championships at Lake Traunsee.. Lovely sailing and if it was a 360 degree shot, you'd see some Finn guys enjoying schnitzels and a fresh beer!! Thanks to anarchist Wietze. 02/03/10

  ac countdown t minus 5 As the International Jury decided ballast issues and the assembled throng waited for other rules decisions that never came, another Alinghi training breakage - this time the jib halyard - makes us think that the Swiss are working their gear hard as they tune not far from the US trimaran.  That's two line breakages in two days for the cat, and hopefully both boats finish breaking what they can before Monday's race.  As much as we think this one might be decided by attrition, it would be nice to see a close race...we can dream, right?  This shot, like most of the great shots we've featured lately, is thanks to SA'er 'Malvarossa Beach' from possibly the coolest America's Cup discussion in history, the "Valencia In Motion" thread, which has already reached well over a hundred thousand views and 2000 posts.  MB even shot Alinghi in their first-ever publicly available tack. And don't forget that MB's charter company still has some boats left if you wanna grab some friends and watch the action... And yes, it's THIS MONDAY, though if you're in California it's more like Sunday night at 1 AM, and already clubs up and down the Pacific are scheduling late-night Cup parties, and yours should to!  Aside from the official coverage, we will be doing our thing, getting you in on the action and the dirty reality close to the water. There is NO North American television planned, though there are likely to be a few places to watch it online, and we will do our best to vet them for you beforehand to see which will be reliable and which will not.  We also continue to discuss the coverage with ACM to make sure that none of the worldwide fans are left in the cold, and that those of you who prefer to watch the Cup delayed can do so as well. The Pimpin' Goes On If you don't like commercials, you might not like our coverage of the Cup, but the reality is that we could never do all the coverage we have planned or recruit great cameramen like Peter Crawford or a commentator like Genny Tulloch without some real cash.  And we are proud to announce that our sponsorship drive is over after just 6 days, and our sponsor list is some of the coolest organizations and companies in sailing. You already know that Layline.Com is back in the mix as our title sponsor, using AC Anarchy as an opportunity to launch their all new website and the kind of service that once made them the best in the US.  But the big news of the day is the support of presenting sponsor GUNBOAT - and a multihull America's Cup is just the kind of thing to get folks pumped up about the best luxury multihulls ever produced.  And of course we've got a big bag of brand new Gill RC gear - and it seems light, durable, and exactly what we want to wear as an outer layer on the waters of Valencia. Thursday we'll show you just how our Internet For Boats system works, and tomorrow you'll get to meet our final two advertisers - both from far off lands and both with excellent tales to tell. It's off to the airport for us - next stop - THE AMERICA'S CUP. 02/03/10

  the long road home Brad Van Liew checks in from somewhere off the coast of Portugal on his Open 60 delivery to South Carolina.  Photo Olivier Blanchet/Velux5Oceans.  Check out more about his Velux program at the the official team site...and follow Brad's transatlantic reports and position updates here. Hey Anarchists! We continue our trek south to Madeira and possibly even further than that before we get the tradewinds that will make our trip across the Atlantic manageable.  How strange that we are pointed right at my home in Charleston right now - so tempting - but we are soon to gybe to port and head on down the rocky and forbidding coast of Portugal. The good news is that I think we are through the roughest of the North Atlantic winter weather. Thankfully, today was a bit dryer and we took the opportunity to dry out a bit (both our gear and bodies). One thing to never forget in this part of the world: The Bay of Biscay SUCKS this time of year! We are currently sailing at 10.5-11 knots with the Code 5 and mainsail up with the wind at about 15 knots from the North-Northeast.  The crew is all well and we checked in with Ken Campbell from Commander's Weather today on weather expectations. He is a great guy and always an excellent resource in addition to the data we have onboard. This is no doubt going to be a long trip. I talked with my 7 year-old daughter Tate today just as she was getting out of school. She is already anxious for my return, and my heartstrings get tense when I hear her ask “how many more days?” It is tough to think about the moments I will miss in her young life and that of her brother Wyatt (5), while I am at sea. They will be on my mind often and in my heart always. Thanks for reading these reports and for sending them on to your friends - we've got a long road ahead of us and hopefully you will enjoy the ride. Back on deck now for the gybe! 02/03/10

  toast Well this sucks - an explosion on the Wally 88 Tiketitan not only injured three people but also resulted in a fire which has resulted in this sort of damage. Ouch. Many thanks to Jesus Renedo for the picture. Thread 02/03/10

  wright does no wrongEd Wright from Great Britain took out the Finn class at the 2010 Rolex Miami OCR in style after winning four races in the 11 race light air series this week on Biscayne Bay, in a very competitive fleet of 35 Finns. Wright won last year's inaugural ISAF Sailing World Cup after a pretty much dominant series and has started his 2010 campaign in the best way. However, he is still looking for his first Finn Gold Cup win, which this year is being sailed from St Francis YC in San Francisco. Wright would clearly like to make amends for last year's disappointment in Copenhagen, when as one of the favourites, and in the overall lead of the regatta, he picked up a black flag mid series and lost all chances of the world title. Second place in Miami was Wright's team mate Giles Scott. Scott was the only sailor who could take the gold medal from Wright going into the medal race, but he needed to be six boats ahead. Wright is renowned for sailing great medal races, so that was unlikely to happen. A seventh place in the race was enough for Scott to hang onto silver. However the battle for the bronze provided the interest of the day with USA's Zach Railey starting the day in third and then losing out against both Scott and fourth placed Gasper Vincec from Slovenia to drop one place to fourth, while Vincec, who has returned to the Finn after nearly a year out, took the bronze medal by a slim one point margin after a second place finish in the double scoring medal race. Railey, who had spent all week in the medal zone, went home with nothing. The current Olympic silver medalist - who also took the silver medal at last year's Gold Cup in Copenhagen after losing the title on the medal race by just one point to the Dane Jonas Hoegh-Christensen - will also be looking to take his first world title later this year in San Francisco as the most successful US Finn sailor for nearly a generation. More at: www.finnclass.org 02/03/10

  must cat The final stage of the first-ever Extreme Sailing Series Asia is happening in Muscat, Oman this week, and looking at the shorts and t-shirts racing in this vid, we can sure see the attraction of a multihull AC here!  It's cool to see this area making the effort to grow sailing, and we'll have much more about them soon, and have planned a little side trip to learn more about Oman Sail when we're over for Moth Worlds in just a month. In the meantime, here's more of the consistently good video production we can always rely on the Extreme 40 crowd for.  Breeze is scheduled to pick up for the remainder of the stage, and we'll have an Anarchist aboard one of the boats to report from the inside... 02/03/10

  some sun/more funAfter yesterday's washout, I went home hoping for a better day today. The weather forecast was not encouraging. Another cold front was on the way probably pushing squalls before it but no-- this time the weather lost and we won. Under slightly gloomy skies, We ("we" are the race committee) set a racecourse in a light SW wind and began to roll out the races. We got 5 in altogether and they just got better and better. The Biscayne Bay seabreeze filled in and our famous sunshine beamed down through the clouds. After 6 races the clear leaders are USA 6--Hannah Nattrass with crew Graham Biehl, but the big story so far seems to be Adam Roberts and David Hughes sailing USA 1. This is their first time in the 29er and they are tied for second with the Argentines Francisco Piccini and Sofia Tedin In ARG2. Kit Temple. 02/03/10

  ac countdown t minus six The six-day mark sees little improvement in the TV prospects for North Americans, Alinghi's busted cunningham ending their training session, and Spithill showing off with some serious air as USA's windward hull rises higher than the masthead of a typical dinghy.  The International Jury hears 6 hours of testimony on BMW's rules issues, and Malvarossa Beach was once again out reporting on both Alinghi and BMW/Oracle while getting beaten by short chop and plenty of breeze, but his photography is getting better and he needed a tan anyway.  Don't forget to check out MB's SportNautica for a great yacht brokerage and all sorts of cool boats to charter for your America's Cup-watching pleasure. For our part, we're almost packed up for Valencia, and we can finally let some fun news leak out about Sailing Anarchy's coverage of this glorious mess.  Much is still up in the air, but we can promise that SA will be Cup Central - everything you want to know will be found right on these pages.  And read on for some surprises. But first, the pimpin. While lesser websites literally beg for money to send crusty old legal writers to Valencia, we are proud to have the financial and moral support of an old friend as the Title Sponsor of the Layline.Com America's Cup Anarchy Special Report. Southeast US-based equipment and apparel retailer Layline knew that the SA community would appreciate their support of some in-depth coverage of the Match, and that SA's Cup coverage would be the perfect way to announce their new ownership and the launch of their brand new website.  Layline is a familiar name to the highest performance racers as well as one-design enthusiasts everywhere, and the new owner is committed to bring back the excellence in services that Layline was always known for - and the folks that made it that way. They've also brought in Gill, N.A. to highlight their sexy new RC (Race Collection) line of foul weather gear, shorts, tops, hats, and soft shells.  Our coverage team - five people strong - will be putting it to the test at 50 knots, and we are anything but easy on gear. We're also extremely grateful to our Gold Coast, Oz friends at Internet For Boats, who've supplied us with an amazingly simple broadbad solution that will revolutionize coastal racer and cruiser web use because of its affordability.  We'll show you a battery of tests and just what this thing can do, and trust us - you'll love it.  And we're also stoked to hang with our long-time reader Vincenzo Onorato and the Mascalzone Latino boys, who are supporting us with a boat fast enough to keep up with the DoGs, and will hopefully give us some exciting news about the upcoming Louis Vuitton World Series coming up in Auckland and then Onorato's home club in Maddalena, Italy.  We'll have more announcements very soon on some other cool sponsors that are aboard the SA ferry to Spain. The Program is... While we still can't tell you exactly how much of our coverage will work or just what ACM have planned with their live feeds, we know the elements that we love to create.  OTW video of the event - both live and post-race HD highlights, live chat room, live daily talk shows, interviews with the interesting and not-so-interesting, beautiful on-the-spot photography, and more inside news and first-time information than anywhere on Earth. Our first OTW Anarchy "Cocktail Hour" will start at 7 PM local/1 PM EDT/10 AM PDT on Sunday the 7th, and it will bring together the world's leading AC journalists to share a drink and some analysis on the action of the next morning.  And our biggest surprise of all is my co-host for the week:  Current reigning US Women's Match Race Champion, Morning Light alum, and all-around badass sailor chick Genny Tulloch.  If I were smart, I'd shut up and let her do the talking - but I'm not that smart. More announcements here tomorrow.  Clock is a tickin'.

  postcard xxi

  love it

  abby out

  t minus seven

  super bowled

  fiasco online

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• 01 Feb 2010 22:49

  postcard XXI Well, like a total idiot, your Ed cannot remember who sent in this one, but it is good! 02/02/10

  the skinny Rolex Miami OCR Medal Race Augie Diaz and Bruno Prada show some late form towards the end of the regatta when they went on to win the medal race. They had a strong finish to their regatta, jumping from 9th to 7th over all. George Szabo and Rick Peters were the other upward movers after the medal race so were the Norwegian team of Eivind Melleby and Petter Morland Pedersen who were in second the whole regatta but managed to hang on to beat Horton/Lyne when they were OCS at the start of the medal race. There has been much talk and conjecture around the boat park between many of the star sailors who have noticed that Andy Horton's Lillia Star boat (left)has a keel that is much much narrower than any others in the yard (right). Some suspect that the boat would be very very hard to drive in light choppy conditions with so little lift available from the keel. Most suspect that the skinny keel would be less draggy and very fast once that boat was powered up enough to get moving forward and generating lift. That said Horton was not slow in this regatta which did have its fair share of light sloppy conditions, when the pressure did come up Horton and Lyne were sometimes almost half a leg ahead. Hmmmm The night out at the pub after an international regatta is always one of the high lights of these World cup events. The venue and local brew to be had on tap may change but the characters stay the same. Last night after the awards ceremony, many of the 600+ sailors descended on the SandBar in Coconut Grove. The locals were starting to get visibly nervous when a pack of drunken Finn sailors surround them and tried to take off with their women....one was last seen tossed over the shoulder of a certain former Junior Finn World Champion as he headed for the door. Another Finn sailor who was so disappointed that he had barely missed the cut off for the medal race, he decided that a bit of cross training might be in order, so naturally a beer pong training session was quickly organized. After completing this time tested form of training, and in a solid state of inebriated zen, said Finn sailor decided that a fine athletic specimen such as himself needs to properly fuel his body to stay at its peak performance. Hopping on his push bike he took off for the local pizza joint, while on his return journey, with pizza in hand he ran smack into a rather large tree sending him, the pizza, and bicycle all asunder. Later at the pub he was over heard saying that " there I was just minding my own business trying to enjoy a bit of Dominos finest, when a tree jumped out and viciously accosted me..." Looking forward to Rolex Miami OCR nest year!!!! 02/02/10

  community run what ya brung Your Fire on Ice article inspired us here in Connecticut. My brother and I have been sailing are whole lives, most recently on the UConn Sailing Team. Being frozen in for the winter, we decided to take a stab at the iceboat thing. Being college kids, we didn’t have any money to spend on a fancy DN. Using junk lying around, we made an iceboat. Some old 2x4’s, old ice skates, old skis, and a couple old windsurfer rigs and we were on our way. Long story short, we took it out in wind that was sustained above fifty. Wind advisories simply spell fun around here. GPS recorded speeds of 34.7 mph. Not bad for spending nothing. If anyone has the opportunity to sail on ice, it’s more fun that you can imagine. Oh, and we challenge anyone to break 34.7 without spending a dime on their boat. And yes, we did wear life jackets. - Pete. 02/02/10

  frosty There’s something strangely addictive to frostbite dinghy sailing, if not downright masochistic.  For me, this is especially true in the dead of the winter, when the mercury drops below freezing, and better still, when the racecourse environment includes some wind, snow, and ice as it did this past weekend at the InterClub Midwinters in Annapolis - video here.  I love it, and so do many other people.  Adding to the sense of adventure is the element of risk, which is mainly perceived but always lurking in the back of one’s mind while sailing in breeze.  In a dinghy like the venerable InteClub – our beloved traditional frostbite dinghy designed specifically for winter sailing by none other than Olin Stephens himself - the luxury feature of being self-rescuing was never a design requirement, nor could it have reasonably been in 1945.  This is only a slight inconvenience in reality, but the knowledge that one might end up swamped or swimming among ice flows adds some excitement. Taken in proper doses (i.e. just enough sailing to peek the senses without losing blood flow in the extremities), frostbite dinghy sailing is just the right combination of competitive sailing and masochism.  If you secretly derive some sick pleasure from dental work (I admit that I love a good cleaning below the gum line), you might just like frostbiting too.  If you like top-shelf dinghy competition, I encourage you to sail a major IC regatta.  I’m not quite sure how my kids view it at the moment, but I’m pretty certain that they will ultimately look back at time spent in the “tub” with their old man with fondness.  It is my hope that one day they too will carry on this great tradition, soon to celebrate its 80th birthday. And it is with this sense of tradition and even sense of duty, that many of us saddle up each winter, despite dwindling numbers in many IC fleets (Larchmont Yacht Club remains the benchmark for IC fleets).  Frostbiting, however, has prospered in many other dinghies and keel boats.  I can’t say as I feel that it’s “proper” frostbiting, but people love it regardless, whether it’s in Laser or a keel boat.  I imagine the reasons are the same – we like to tempt fate and come out on top, and we like to compete without the dire necessity to win (at least for most of us).  Above all else, I truly relish the camaraderie of the frostbite, including the light banter I’ve had with many fun-loving crews through the years, and the always inspiring smack talk and verbal jousting among friends. While Larchmont Yacht Club may be host to the largest IC fleet, it’s not the oldest.  That distinction lies with the Frostbite Yacht Club at Manhasset Bay – a club that proudly announces that it has “no dues, no assets, no nothing.”  How great is that?  What they do have is a great tradition dating back to 1932, and that’s reason enough for me to want to keep frostbiting ICs. - Jesse Falsone. 02/02/10

  short report no sun/no fun Today was the first day of racing at the 29er xx Superbowl in sunny South Florida but today we had liquid sunshine. We set up a windward-leeward course in a steady SE breeze at 7-8 knots. We got nine boats in one race of what we hoped would be three or four but it was not to be. The wind died at noon and after floating around for awhile the sailors called for an informal singlehand race in the light air. Again, was not to be. A squall set on us as we were setting it up and everyone ran for shore. All the powerboats on the scene towed two or three boats apiece and some sailors opted to sail back. We counted heads at the dock. We were all safe and wet. Tomorrow's a better day.  - Kit. 02/02/10

  woody Gotta dig the new CW Hood 32 daysailor pictured above. We're suckers for this classic look. Who isn't? $89,500 with carbon mast, carbon rudder, sails, solid teak joiner work, bottom painted  and ready to go sailing. Photo by Billy Black. 02/02/10

  short report no sun/no fun Today was the first day of racing at the 29er xx Superbowl in sunny South Florida but today we had liquid sunshine. We set up a windward-leeward course in a steady SE breeze at 7-8 knots. We got nine boats in one race of what we hoped would be three or four but it was not to be. The wind died at noon and after floating around for awhile the sailors called for an informal singlehand race in the light air. Again, was not to be. A squall set on us as we were setting it up and everyone ran for shore. All the powerboats on the scene towed two or three boats apiece and some sailors opted to sail back. We counted heads at the dock. We were all safe and wet. Tomorrow's a better day.  - Kit. 02/02/10

  big pimpin' light 'em up Although it's the right thing to do from an environmentally conscious standpoint as well as for safety and improved electrical system management on your boat, LEDs haven't yet become mainstream because they're more expensive and comparably dim compared to incandescent lights – that is, until now. The same company that distributes RejeX and CorrosionX in the marine industry is now introducing LED Array lights. These lights use the breakthrough Citizen (like the watch) diodes, which are the first LED's to break the 95 lumen per watt barrier, so they're as bright as the halogen bulbs on your boat, but they use 1/10th the electricity. Plus, they don't get hot so they will never warp your light fixtures, they won't explode if you touch them, they're actually dimmable, and they're available in three color temperatures depending on your preference and decor (available in cool white like a regular LED, natural daylight, and warm white like a halogen bulb). Unlike fluorescent bulbs, they contain no lead or mercury, and the bulb bodies are made from 100% recycled plastic. Depending on the bulb, they're guaranteed for 3-5 years and 20,000 - 70,000 hours – which translates into as much as 26 years if you were to run them 8 hours a day (no need for cruisers to carry spare bulbs, even if they plan to be away from shore for awhile). A variety of bulbs are available for both your boat and your home, which will on average knock 80-90% off your light bill (in a typical home that'll save $60-$100+ per bulb a year). As you can see, they pay for themselves very quickly. Click here for more information. The owner (J.D.) is a frequent SA poster and is glad to answer any questions. The company is currently seeking marine industry/boating distributors and retailers to carry the product. 02/02/10

  Love it Christophe Launay catches Seve Jarvin's Gotta Love It 7 during practice for the SP HighModulus Australian 18-foooter Championship in this great shot.  Jarvin retained their crown despite losing race 5 to Micahel Coxon in Thurlow Fisher Lawyers Sunday and finishing even on points with Cocko.  John Winning on Yandoo was third.  Check out SeaLaunay.com for the full galleries.There will be a Twilight race next Friday, followed by a race in the Club Championship series on Sunday with some of the visiting overseas competitors expected to sail in both races as they gear up for the coming 18 Foot World Champs a/k/a the JJ Giltinan.  With huge crowds  of 18 foot fans recently, the League is urging spectators to buy their tickets early.  GO here for more info 02/01/10

  Abby Out Teenaged would-be circumnavigator Abby Sunderland has already proved many of her naysayers correct, with issues with her poorly prepared Open 40 leading to her announcement that she'd be pulling into Cabo San Lucas just days after leaving California for her 'youngest round' attempt. Abby lost data from her wind instruments almost immediately after her departure, and it seems that her team made some basic and fundamental errors in calculating Abby's power consumption.  Mom and pop will meet Abby and modify her boat to better accomodate the power needs of a young girl with a huge DVD collection and 10,000 Facebook friends.  Her blog - obviously written by a doting and publicity minded shore team - reassures her fans that "since I'm still North of the equator I won't have to give up" on her ridiculous Guinness Book  record attempt.  The dubious record, which doesn't recognize a single unique skill besides age, requires her to cross the equator during her circumnavigation, and Cabo is still a long way North, though her diversion will cost a minimum of a week in total. With the Cape Horn winter marching ever closer and Abby sure to feel the pressure of getting around sooner rather than later, is a last-minute re-fit of batteries and fuel tanks the right way to send this young girl off to round the Great Capes?  Read what the builder of Abby's boat thinks about that idea right here in the forum and add your opinion. 02/01/10

  T Minus Seven The UFC-style 33rd America's Cup is about to happen, and this shot of Alinghi testing today in 20+ knots of breeze - well above the limits in the event rules - is good evidence that no wind limits are going to get in the way of the fastest course racing boats ever built.  The rhetoric has thankfully seemed to slow way down - both in the press and in our wildly active AC Anarchy forum - and these teams are getting down to business like they have never before.  And with PRO Harold Bennett already inviting both teams to practice on the course his Race Committee sets during its own practice this week, who knows what surprises we'll see.   For our part, we are assembling the On-The-Water Anarchy team for battle. The details are top-secret at the moment, but we're fairly certain that our crack team of top cameramen, photographers, electronics gurus, writers, and very special guest commentators will be documenting the 33rd Cup more thoroughly than it has ever been done before, for more online spectators than have ever watched a sailboat race.  Add the official event footage and the teams' dedicated media teams, and hundreds if not thousands of SA readers on the ground in VLC clogging the town's broadband up, and we've got a party started already. Some very exciting announcements will be forthcoming very soon, and you'd better make sure you are in front of a computer in 7 days' time.  Until then, watch this space. And to finish pumping you up, have a look at this training video from the other day, in 'fresh to frightening' conditions for the alien ship from Anacortes. And see some onboard video here thanks to Valencia Sailing. 02/01/10

  360 You can't help but get goosebumps when you see over 360 sail boats scattered across the entire San Francisco Bay.  The SSS Three Bridge Fiasco brought all comers out on the water, from big old double-enders to twenty-foot sport boats and all sorts of multi-hulls.  I decided to bring a little East Coast Anarchist tradition to the race, doing some of the same information-collecting and web-posting that I've done for the past couple of years for SORC races and other events. Of course in San Francisco the Anarchists are always there in force, making our progress in moving the 3BF live coverage forward easy.  We took advantage of the Bay-wide cell coverage and 3G speeds, keeping the live thread truly live with video, photos and reports from all over the bay.  Take a look at the OTW coverage - it's pretty neat to be able to replay a race from start to finish through a thread, from morning videos to GPS recorded tracks, and maybe we'll even get to see some results soon. For those who haven't read the stories in the last week, the Three Bridge Fiasco is a double-handed or single-handed race whose only real requirement is that you round one mark and two islands - each near one of the three bridges that border the central part of San Francisco Bay.  The Fiasco comes into play because all other normal racing standards are thrown to the wind - boats can start in either direction, finish in either direction, round marks in any order and in any direction.   Looking at the current and the teensy amount of wind forecast, the general consensus seemed to be to go CCW (counter-clockwise), but there was a hint of wind on the water somewhere around the starting area causing some unfortunate racers - like our own War Dog - decide to go the slow way. Photoboy picked me up at South Beach Marina and we headed over to Yerba Buena Island to camp out and wait for boats.  Given that I'd just finished a stretch in Miami and Key West working with the Etchells and SORC groups, seeing more 6 times that number of boats sailing around on SF bay was absolutely staggering. Thanks to EVK4 for the mouse pic, solosailor for the 'you are here' pic and Sergei Zavarin/Ultimate Yacht Shots for the good stuff.  You can check out Sergei's full 3BF gallery right here. -Dixie PS:  Here's EVK4's race report: You all know that clumsy big kid with the heart of gold who just can't get out of his own way? He's always bumping into people, accidentally causing trouble and tripping over his own feet? Yep, that was us at the start line. With little to less wind, we came barreling into the start wielding 26,000 pounds of ocean-ready cruising boat, hanging a big anchor off the bow and a wind vane off the stern. And we were on port. So we ventured into the scrum, almost fouled 8 boats in one fell swoop, did our slow motion version of a crash tack, rinsed and repeated. We just kept going in there and getting pushed back out. I'd love to blame the Moores but they only caused the first two failed attempts. Things finally cleared out enough that my helming skills could get us "near" the line about 45 minutes later! Of course I'm kidding, Paul and I are great sailors and even better racers, we just happen to disagree with PHRF's assessment of Valis at 126. Our egos know the truth, given the boat's maneuverability and straight line speed, combined with our cat-like racing instincts, we should be about a 18, so we just wanted to start with our faster brethren. Give those guys with the high ratings a bit of a head start so we could teach them and PHRF a lesson in Yacht Racing 101. The proof of this skill comes in our actual belated start. Paul: "you're not going to make the mark", me: "crap, you're right", him: "hmmmm", me: "uh oh", him: "maybe stuff her into the wind for a second", me (this one is a thought bubble): "I wonder how much gelcoat costs on a Pacific Seacraft like this?" And, then, miraculously, our skill paid off, we missed that big rusty ball by about 4 inches (Mr. Crealock, good idea on the canoe stern) and our wind vane cleared the top by about 1 inch. We didn't hit it! After high fives and a brief debate on whether it was like football where breaking the plane was the same as hitting, we kept going. This is where our strategic insight came in. Thanks to our head start strategy, we knew what the two halves of the fleet were doing and it was obvious that CCW was the way to go. As we got to the point of tacking towards TI, we just kept going. Not sure if it was deliberate but we had wind and neither of us wanted to go through all of the headache that involved tacking the beast. Besides, it was sunny over by Richmond and foggy over by Oakland. Decision made, we were going to Red Rock first. We cleared Point Blunt, bore off and started talking kite run. Paul, as the man that pays the bills, was selected as foredeck (we hadn't discussed this beforehand) so off he went up into the war zone to get the kite hoisted. He came back about 3 minutes later and said, "no spinnaker we have a mouse nest." I'll admit here that despite my huffery over my many ocean miles and insistence that I really know how to sail, my first thought was, "crap, another term I don't know" and figured it was some technical term describing a spinnaker that was tangled up somehow. But, nope, it meant that a mouse had chewed up his spinnaker and made a nest with little pieces of his spinnaker. We had a very expensive laugh over the absurdity of that situation though I know there are some sailmakers out there right now thinking about breeding rodents. Read On. 02/01/10

  big pimpin' Super Bowled The Super Bowl is the biggest event in US sports, and the advertisements played during its half-time show cost well over a million dollars for just thirty seconds of air time, not to mention the huge cost of producing the videos themselves.  The whole thing made us think of just how backwards so much of sailing industry marketing has been until very recently, and how slowly companies are adopting modern, web-based forms of advertising to replace the print marketing that has delivered so little return over the past few years. So we've started a thread to highlight clever examples of the kind of ads that accomplish some of the important goals of a good marketing effort:  They excite, they inform, they create buzz, and they sell stuff. The first is a short, slickly edited YouTube vid from longtime SA contributor and award-winning cameraman/editor Peter Crawford, and he put this one together for Velocitek.  This is the stuff that every product needs to catch attention on a global stage, and if your company doesn't have something like this stuck all over its e-marketing, you ought to do something about it.  Have your own guys do it or give Petey a call, but he'll be busy til the Cup is over... Got some great marketing that you think others should emulate?  Pimp it in this thread and see if the community agrees. 02/01/10

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

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• 31 Jan 2010 21:23

  

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• 30 Jan 2010 21:38

  FIASCO ONLINE The Three Bridge Fiasco has some incredible rules, ones that could drive most race committees and any novice racer up a wall. The salty sailors of San Francisco seem to love this race and basically everyone who sails will be there. With 360+ boats registered, a starting line that goes either way, no set course and a finish line that also goes either way, the name of the race - Fiasco - seems comparatively mundane. The Three Bridges and associated marks are: Golden Gate (Blackaller Buoy) Bay Bridge (Treasure Island) and Richmond-San Rafael (Red Rock) and can be rounded in either direction. War Dog started an unofficial "Anarchy Fleet" a few years ago, and now more than 40 boats race for doublehanded or singlehanded honors along with SA swag and booze courtesy of the anarchists. In heavy air it would be a bear for two people to sail some of these boats around this 21 mile course with a heavy afternoon ebb tide, but this year's 3BF looks like it could be a drifter. If the wind picks up, some of the folks who've been planning their course all week may change it from Counter Clockwise (Treasure Island, Red Rock, Blackaller) to Clockwise. Either way, the SAers are not just racing for fame and glory, but also for Rum and Tequila, along with some SA and H20 Shots swag. This fun race has more participation than most sailing bodies of water ever see...something to think about if you're trying to get the boats out in your lake or bay. For those of you on course who want to send in reports - have at it. Clean, Photoboy and I have cobbled together a little plan and I am going to be out on with H2O Shots' Photoboy on his 20' red rib starting in the mid morning near TI and will send in reports from my Blackberry. You can call or write me, and we'll also be monitoring the "Unofficial" SA channel 72. Clean's gonna help with the posting. If you want to report in, contacts for us media whores are in the official OTW Anarchy 3BF thread, where you can watch all the action today. Videos and pics are already up, so jump in. Good luck y'all. Dixie 01/03/10

  

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• 29 Jan 2010 19:24

  Beach Party IV Not exactly a beach party but close enough.  This happened last summer while sailing with a few friends in Coos Bay, OR.  Having a good time and forgetting to watch where we were going led to this.  I was attending a marine biology school over there at the time and ended up having to call my professor to come pick us up in a motor boat.  We left the boat anchored and planned on coming back the next day at high tide to retrieve her.  When I checked the next day through a spotting scope to make sure she was still there, it appeared that she was gone.  Instead an unknown man had 'salvaged' her and was taking off up the bay, motor running.  Needless to say my professor and I chased after him up the bay to where we found him pulled over to the side scrambling around on the boat.  With a short conversation explaining that he was on my boat and the no he did not get salvage rights he reluctantly got off and we gave him a ride to shore.  Once on board I noticed that every single line that could have been tied, wrapped, or knotted to something had been.  The anchor line had been wrapped completely around the boat.  Luckily, nothing had been stolen.  While sailing the boat back to the marina I kept saying "man, that is so weird," to which my professor replied, "not for Coos Bay" Pretty lucky everything worked out so easily.  I didn't have to worry too much about getting my boat unstuck as it was done for me and the man handed over the boat fairly easily.  Definitely could have been a much worse situation as the meth heads in Coos Bay can be quite unpredictable.  Anarchist Craig. 01/29/10

  Against The Ropes Despite yet another breakage (claimed to be minor) in BMW/Oracle's wing today, there is a smell of defeat that's beginning to waft up out of the Alinghi camp.  Ehman's orchestrated attack on Alinghi's continually gerrymandered rules and now the escalating rhetoric around possibly illegal non-Swiss sails have Bertarelli's team up against the ropes, and watching the far more versatile, maneuverable and technologically advanced BMW wing out practicing must be like sharp jabs continually weakening the Defender as he struggles for a breather and secretly hopes someone will call the fight. You could really feel the beginning of desperation in SNG honcho Fred Meyers' response today to Golden Gate's latest public call out on the illegality of Alinghi's sails.  The Swiss have stopped even attempting to show that the sails are constructed in Switzerland, and their arguments are basically now down to one; that sails are not part of the 'vessel' according to the Deed.  They know that if this simple argument fails - either before or after the match - they lose the Cup.  There is no backup that we know about, no super secret loft working deep into the night on a million bucks worth of carbon and film, and if Alinghi's bet is wrong - especially after having been warned and then offered time to build legal sails -  they will forever be branded with the ignominy of losing the cup by breaking the rules.  And based on Meyer's comments today, they know it, and the frustration at having been outmaneuvered is something they have not handled well.  Meyers writes, "If BMW Oracle succeeds in disqualifying the Defender’s sails then there will be no Match."  The SNG official went on to rant and rave at irrelevant issues, but there is little question that Alinghi has drawn a deep line in the sand:  They are racing with their 3DL sails regardless of what anyone says, and they are not negotiating with BMW/Oracle even if it means the Cup is stripped away by the Jury and the Court.  They are certainly committed to their course of action, though they are beginning to look bloodied before the on-the-water part has even begun. Speaking of OTW, our spectacularly thorough on-scene reporter "malvarossa beach" continues to supply an incredible hour-by-hour journal of what's happening during practice and at the bases of both teams. He spent today following both boats in winds of 6-10 knots and flat seas, a welcome break from the dogs blowing off chains of the past few days. MB is a long time local who's met many of the players on both teams as owner of yacht brokerage/sail and power charter company SportNautic.  And he's a true neutral, never disparaging either team and genuinely interested - even slightly obsessed - in watching some boat racing.  He sent in a report based on his observations today - the first real comparison anyone has been able to do between the two AC craft.  Meanwhile, MB still has some charter boats available for watching the Cup, so drop him a line... I am not a writer, but I will tell you my impressions, and of course it is subjective opinion as neither my mates nor I had instruments to judge truly speeds or wind perfectly.  We are all sailors since we are children though, and the RPM on the outboard is an accurate tool for some purposes.  The comments were unanimous that: In flat wind, some leftover swell, and 7-9 knots, USA 17 sails faster than A5. USA 17 doesn't gain much with the headsail - the wing's power is enormous. USA 17's maneuvering is astonishing compared to the size of the boat, while A5's tacking seems complicated for the crew (and the foredeck men on both teams have a risky job and do amazing work). A5 seemed close to her limits in gusts of 10 knots, while USA seemed at ease and comfortable in the same breeze, though both teams definitely will benefit from as much training time as they can get. Conclusions from today: While crews are not mastering the power in their boats yet, at the moment we believe that USA is faster in greater than 6 knots, and possibly below that as well. Weather will play a factor, but we cannot tell just what factor it will play yet. For two or our crew, today was the fourth time we've seen USA-17 on the water, but for my son and his two friends it was their first time, and they are very impressed.  We expect 11-15 knots tomorrow. More thoughts on today and pics are posted in the Valencia in motion thread. Cheers, MB 01/29/10

  What Is It? This one may be a bit perplexing, but then again, you fuckers are pretty clever. Let's see how clever 01/29/10

  Transatlantic Grilling Ask your questions here Most of you will have read that Brad Van Liew is back at the solo game, having just picked up the ex-ProForms Open 60 for the Eco60 class of the next Velux 5 Oceans. Brad's weather window is slim but it looks like he and his crew are going to leave La Rochelle on Saturday bound for Charleston. While we'll be getting short updates from the water, I have a chance to do a phone (Skype) interview with Brad tomorrow just before he leaves. I'll be recording it and posting the audio file when we're done. If any of you have questions for Brad about his upcoming winter crossing, his shore crew, his training plans, his sponsorship search, or anything else, post them here and I'll make sure to include them in my interview. Check out his Lazarus Project site or Lazarus Racing blog for more info and pics of the crew and boat, and thanks in advance for your good questions. The original thread in Ocean Racing Anarchy is here 01/29/10

  scotw Pretty In Pink Yes, we just had our SCOTW yesterday, but there is no such thing as too much of a good thing, right?Helena Scutt not only knows how to get around the course, she knows her way around the books too - was given early acceptance to Stanford. Nice... Post-OCR and post-cold freeze, hot pink sails are going to heat up Miami - next week is the 29erXX Seiko Superbowl! The 29erXX is a souped-up 29er: same hull and same foils, but a taller mast, a square-top main, a masthead kite, and a trapeze for the helm. To hike or to trapeze?... hmmm. I don't think that's a question. The 29erXX is exactly what women's skiff sailing needs. Fast-paced, physically demanding, and technical, the 29erXX is a challenge, no doubt. But seeing as the 29er is the most popular youth skiff in the world, I know there are a lot of girls looking for that challenge. In addition, the 29erXX will pull many older ex-29er sailors out of retirement. As a youth female sailor, both the 29er and the 29erXX have given me so many opportunities. Quite frankly, sailing was just another of the many sports I participated in until I started sailing the 29er and became addicted. I couldn't get enough of the skiff speed and haven't looked back. Little did I know, when I had my first sail in the XX, I was in for an even more exhilarating feeling. There was no question - after sailing the 29erXX Gold Cup in Lake Garda, Italy last July, I bought a rig then and there. The boat is durable - it is well-known that older 29er hulls are still competitive, something which cannot be said for most Olympic classes. This reduces costs. Plus, the 29erXX is a fleet that I am not going to outgrow or age out of. I hope that the 29erXX will be in the equipment lineup for the Rio Olympics in 2016. It makes perfect sense for women to have the 29erXX as their next step just as men have the 49er. The men have two double handed classes in the Olympics, and so should women. Female skiffies should be able to compete on an international level too. The 29erXX was nearly selected for the upcoming Olympics despite the fact that, at present, it is not widely sailed nor widely available. Both advisory committees that are meant to choose the Olympic boats chose the 29erXX, and it was only the executive committee that overruled them by merely one vote. This is impressive considering that the boat design has been final for less than half a year. Yet over 20 boats were sold before the rig was even finalized - in my opinion, this shows that someone can't wait to get their hands on it and more importantly, they believe in the class and its potential. Myself included. The sailors entered for the Seiko Superbowl regatta are both male and female, youth and adult, including Jen Morgan Glass (USA), Giulia Conti (ITA), Molly Carapiet (USA), Liz Rountree (USA), Kristen Lane (USA), Hannah Nattrass (AUS). I'll be having a blast on the wire next week - oh, and my skipper will be right next to me on the trapeze. Pink sails and all! For regatta updates, check out my 29er blog at: http://29erusa457.blogspot.com   Regatta details: http://www.29er.org/index.php/Seiko-Superbowl-Regatta-Miami.html Helena Scutt Seattle, WA 01/29/10

  Got Huevos? “One day,” you have probably said, “I’m pushing out of this comfort zone”. You’ve been around the buoys and you’ve won your share of trophies. You can handle a racing boat, you’ve proven that, but there are still challenges that draw you in. There is still stretching to do. Luckily, the PSSA has the solution. On March 26, 2010, single handed and double handed boats, spinnakers flying, will head south for Guadalupe Island, off the coast of Mexico, turn the island, and then climb north for home, in a non-stop race covering nearly six hundred miles. Just finishing is an achievement, and you will know the sense of satisfaction of completing the Guadalupe Island Race that is rumored to be tougher than the Single handed Transpac. Adventure calls. Only you know if you’re ready to answer 01/29/10

  Good Muse Renowned outdoors and sailing freelance journalist Chris Museler has been writing for publications like the New York Times and Outside Magazine for a long time, and we should all be grateful that he's finally joined the digital era!  Chris has only been writing his blog (god we hate that word) for a couple of weeks, and already it is better than pretty much any other sailing blog on the web, with features on the I-14, Michel Desjoyeaux, big wave riding, and Nick Scandone. He's even getting into YouTube, and if his first foray is an indicator of the kind of content we can expect in the future, we're stoked.  It's an educational and unique video from the Herreshoff Marine Museum in Bristol, Rhode Island.  And keep your eye out for more great stuff from one of the very few great sailing writers out there, and a long time reader of SA. 01/29/10

  Learning Lessons Rolex Miami OCR Day 4 Occasional Anarchy crew member Phil Toth (sailing with Paul Mckenzie and having a pretty decent regatta) checks in from Star land... It seems that just about everyone has learned their lesson over the last few days and have been leaving earlier and earlier to get out to the course on time for the 11:00 start. On top of that, most of the fleet has discovered a short cut that saves you about 15 minutes but requires you to play chicken with numerous mooring cans and channel markers as well as derelict live aboard boats, making getting out a very interesting affair.  After getting to the starting area and a short postponement later due to a wind shift at the top mark, the first race got under way in a light 8-10 kts with plenty of lump that we have not seen so far this week. Off the start it was a bit deceiving whether to go right or left since there was no visible difference to be seen on the waters surface. The right had been paying all day yesterday and off the start that was the side with better angle so we tacked and went off on port. Not long after and to our dismay we noticed that the boats on the left had more pressure allowing the helmsman and crew to be both fully hiking and powered up. Where as over on the right hand side, we were doing everything we could to just keep the crew drooped over the side from drowning . Needless to say when the fleet came back together at the top mark we found ourselves rounding only one spot better than DFL. Down wind we made did some good puff spotting and stayed in the pressure. By looking further up the course than just the top mark we were able see what was coming and that helped us to sail very smart down the runs. Watching the top Star sailors in the world event after event, you realize very quickly that when you have a bad start or sail to the wrong side of the shift and round dead last...that the only way to react is to pull your head out stop feeling sorry for yourself and get on with clawing your way back through the fleet. Mark Mendenblatt and John Von Schwarz got into this situation a bit when the went down the middle and the outsides of the run were paying with more breeze to be found outside. After some obligatory cussing and swearing like the proverbial sailor (pun intended) they put there heads down and made the best of it by getting a good bottom rounding and having solid tactics back up the course. Mark and John managed to work there way back up to 5th by the finish, which puts them back into the red jersey in 3rd for tomorrow. Results here 01/29/10

  One Love Against all economic odds, Devoti Sailing's all-carbon single handed rocket is selling well, with 50 boats sold thus far and expected sales of 100 boats in 2010.  The D-One dinghy continues to get great reviews everywhere, the most recent in Australian Sailing magazine authored by freelance writer, 5O5 rock star, and sometime SA contributor JFunk.  Read his comprehensive analysis of the boat right here The designers went back late last year and modified the foredeck molds to answer criticisms of the boat's lack of aesthetic balance up front, and the new look is definitely a good one as you can see in these pics.  As we've seen before, Devoti is responsive and proactive and seems truly committed to the future of this Class - even if he spends a fortune at it!  Want more evidence? A full marketing team at every event to create great videos, photos, and reports.  A redesigned web page launching soon.  The inclusion of the D-One in the Volvo Circuit.  A new 3,500 sq. m. factory.  A fleet of charter boats and a plan where you can deduct all charter fees you've paid if you buy a new boat.  And attendance at the London Boat Show next month, Amsterdam in March, Warsaw later in March... Keep up to date on Devoti-One.comD-One thread on Dinghy Anarchy. 01/29/10

  local knowledge Bubbly Day 1 of the Champagne Series is probably one of the "prettiest" race in Marina del Rey Why? Well, most of the time, Los Angeles gets hit by lots of rain, and if we are lucky, the sun comes out during the weekend and offers for the racers (us) a beautiful view of Los Angeles, surrounded by mountains covered with snow...and NO SMOG. I like it! Here is a little summary from Day 1 of the Champagne. We had 7 Open 5.70s registered to race. On the water, we were 6 (Team KOA, USA 274, although the first one to enter the race did not make it). Out of 11 Open 5.70s based in Marina Del Rey, CA, we were still happy to see that some chose to go out sailing versus skiing!! After 5 days of hard rain and storm (with some tornados south of LA), the sun was back with a little breeze that finally filled in around 12:30pm. We were on for 3 races, with some new boats on the line: USA 281, George, racing for the first time on his Open 5.70 in Marina Del Rey, USA 286 with the gray/orange/carbon look open 5.70 and black sails. USA 286 was sailed by two junior sailors from CYC and were definitely going to be tough to beat on the race course. Race 1: we (USA 275) had an awful start, ended up in bad air of 2 boats, Peter and Nik. My tactician, Doug, insisted to stay on the same tack anyway and suck it up. This was the longest tack and Doug knows that I cannot point well but I have speed. We stayed on starboard for a while and the fleet started to tack over to port. We decided to stay but we had fallen behind and after 2 tacks, we crossed the fleet behind. We kept focused and followed the shifts with attention, finding ourselves in great sync with the wind. We sailed our way to the weather mark and had passed one boat (USA 281 - sorry George) and rounded 5th. We had noticed a strong right shift going upwind and decided to set and gybe. The first 4 leading boats were already sailing downwind but on the starboard gybe. We got the boat in VMG mode: main eased out all the way, boom vang hard on, outhaul out, cunnigham out, weight forward and windward...VMG, VMG, pressure, no pressure, trying to catch some waves and always sail deeper and deeper. After 5 minutes, one boat gybed (USA 169 Tracey), but already, we were looking really good against the other ones. The shift persisted and we kept being headed to the leeward mark. Great! We are making huge ground on the fleet, and with a little more work, we could cross just ahead of Tracey. Loooong leg...and finally, as soon as the wind pressure went down and we could feel a little lift, we decided to gybe out. We are now pretty much in a "collision course" with Tracey...but that lift transfers into a header and we are now ahead, with Tracey a few boats length behind us. WOW! We went from 5th to 1st place in 2 gybes. At the leeward mark, we have about 5 boats length lead over Tracey (who passed Peter on the way). Unfortunately, my turn is too sharp and I touch the leeward mark as we round it...Doug is speechless ! ha ha ha! We decide to go upwind for another 30 seconds, get some speed and start our 360 penalty turn. Tracey is now right there. We finished our turn and get the boat back to speed. Tracey is only half a boat length away...that is the ultimate finish upwind. Tracey is pointing higher but we have more speed...we gain a little more and decide to tack to starboard. We cross ahead. Pressure is coming off. Tracey decides to push further on the port tack but gets headed, giving us more time to finish 1st place...man! Fun racing. Tracey crosses 2nd and Peter 3rd. Nice job! Race 2: the second race is interesting as we were the only one to go around the "right" course. The confusion was all over the course, in all the fleet, ours included...but Doug and I decided to stick to the flags we saw on the RC before the last minute of the starting sequence. The fleet was all over and we raced pretty much alone the entire race...As a result, we got 1st place and the other open 5.70 earned each a DNF (7 points - ouch) for running around the "wrong" marks. Great discussion were taken place after the race, and at the bar, and still on Sunday! CYC Junior sailor Tony Festa on his brand new USA 286 was the only one not racing: on the start, the shackle on the clew of his main sail came loose and he had to jury gig something and wait for the 3rd race. Race 3: for the last race, the wind picked up a bit more. Upwind, we now had to hike out hard and keep the boat flat. We had a goo start, choosing what seems to be the favor end of the line (the RC boat), with plenty of speed and room, windward and leeward. Peter was the only one by our side, with speed but not pointing as much as usually. I guess the two girls on his boat really provided some distraction! Tracey was leeward and with less weight on the rail was not as fast as we were. Peter, with 3 crew aboard was doing great but decided to tack to port tack. We decided to stay and separate from him. This paid off as we got into a great lift. We waited for the right time to tack which paid even more because we tacked in a huge header. Our tacking angle on the last tack was 50 degrees! Yeah !! Because of this (we did not see it coming that big), we over stood the layline, got some speed one and rounded the mark first, which is all we wanted. Peter was hot on our heels, followed by Tracey. Downwind, we just decided to play VMG again and cover the fleet. Tracey had amazing speed and passed Peter, who also lost another place against George who had great speed and VMG on that last leg. The course was shorten and we actually got the gun, rounding what was supposed to be our leeward mark. With 3 first place, we were really happy. It seems like we did the right thing, called the right shifts and got lucky as well ! the fleet seems really close, which is for this first warm up regatta very cool. The only thing I can really say about this race is that the leads changed multiple times during the races and make it very exciting! At last but not least, the Open 5.70 fleet was the largest fleet on the water and we can all be very proud of this! For Day 2 of the Champagne Series, we are expecting another 3 Open 5.70s on the race course: David (USA 274), Bryan (USA 209) and Michael (USA 186). With 9 boats on the water for Day 2, the race report should be even more fun. Kattack Photos Thanks for reading Jerome USA 275 "Semi-Aquatic" 01/29/10

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• 28 Jan 2010 17:10

  
  

  Beach Party III Wow, this is so cool to see you anarchists kicking in your beach party photos. Keep 'em coming! new style SA belts for the next ten! Here's the story behind today's submission: Talking about accidents... Here's a boat that had a lucky one. The rudder broke loose 200m before the finish line at a club regatta near Pirita harbour and ESS Kalev Yacht Club, Northern Estonia, 5km from the capital, Tallinn, and the boat beached 100m from rocks. If this had happened 20 minutes earlier when there was 44 knots of wind, they could have ended up in a much worse place than on a nice sandy beach. The boat itself is a 26ft racer and is currently under restoration. Will be as good as new for season 2010! - Anarchist Andres. 01/28/10

  Return Of The Jedi Since the announcement that solo ocean racer Brad Van Liew was entering the Velux 5 Oceans Race, we haven't heard much besides the few tidbits we've found at his very slick website.  But that's all about to change with a vengeance. Brad's in La Rochelle, France, aboard his new (to him) Open 60.  He just landed there, and now a few days of hard work are ahead before he crosses the Atlantic bound for Charleston, SC with three long-time crew.  It's one of the lightest Open 60s ever built, with one of the tallest masts -  this is Marc Thiercelin's Pro-Forms, formerly Tiscali, formerly Whirlpool, and it'll compete in the Eco60 Class of the next Velux, where it looks like most of the action will be. Brad has picked up where he left off with the stellar communication that won him numerous awards during every leg of the Around Alone, though the world has moved on from Quokka - his daily updates are now in blog form with pics, along with the obligatory Facebook and Twitter backup, and his Lazarus Project website just relaunched with all-new content tonight.  Given his track record, we expect to hear good stories from Van Liew frequently during his 5000 NM trip home from France, and of course we'll be aboard the minute he hits the dock. You can read about the snow-covered preparation party, a story about a tiny blue French car, and see a prototype of possibly the most revolutionary gadget in onboard power generation since the generator at the blog, and here's the report from Monday: Leaving On A Jet Plane Saying good night last night to the kids was more emotional than I would have expected.  I couldn’t hide my feelings and concerns from Tate - she picked up on my sadness and became very emotional herself, you just can't fool her for a minute!  5 year-old Wyatt doesn't quite grasp the enormity of the whole 'sailing across the North Atlantic in the dead  of winter' thing so was a bit less emotional. Time really buries the bad stuff - I'd forgotten so many of the feelings that have occurred in the past twenty-four hours, but they're familiar as well - leaving your family for the unknown is just not something that ever disappears from your heart.  Leaving like this is just so different than the days before I loved these creatures so much more than life itself, and I continue to promise myself to be cautious and make dammed sure to stay on the boat... The whole process of embarking on this next campaign is intended to be an epic journey not just for me and my shore crew, but for the entire family. I want it to be a hugely positive experience for the kids, and the lump in my throat and tears welling up in my eyes as I loaded Tate into her carpool this morning - well, no matter how exciting, anything can happen and it would be foolish to forget about that whenever any of us put to sea. Tate was all questions this morning, just as she has been for the past couple of months of living the circus that the startup of a major ocean race campaign like the Velux 5 Oceans is.  But today's questions were different than last week's; they've changed from "Daddy, when can I go to France?" to "Daddy, why can't Jeffrey and the crew bring the boat home without you?" Life is all about balancing how bad you want it, and great things take great sacrifice.  In some ways I feel alive again for the first time in years, and in others, the desk in a warm office and the associated life-treadmill seems an easy way to to stave off the lump in my throat. I guess if it was easy, everyone would do it.  And God knows I love it.  And now, I head to an airliner for my reunion with destiny.  The race has already started, and the rest of the world just doesn't know it yet. -BVL 01/28/10

  ac Disaster? Anarchist John is in Valencia offers this perspective on the Cup. Sounds great, doesn't it?... Today, we were in the Marina Juan Carlos office and happened to ask the office people what they thought would be happening with the marina for the event etc. Seems that only 10 yachts are reserved to come to the event, so not too many high profile guests. The discussion then moved to the event itself. The SI's state that races 1 and 3 will be a windward leeward course with 20 mile legs. Race 2 is a triangle with the windward leg the same length. What I haven't seen discussed is that the docs also state the course shall be sailed in water that is more than 20' deep. This means that the closest the course will be to land is..... 10 miles! If the wind blows westerly- which is often- the start line will be more than 30 miles offshore! Next consider the timing. The SI's state the start shall be at 10am. The race committee will decide whether or not to race each day at 9am. But if you want to be at the start line to watch the start, and the line is 30+ miles offshore, and you need to leave the dock pretty darn early. It is clear now that our boat will not even attempt to go and watch the starts. We won't even take our tender out due to the distance and the fact that our tender only does 18kts. We can't keep up. Now consider the sailing characteristics. The boats are using sophisticated wind prediction methods and are sailing 22+kts in 7kts true wind. On a 20 mile weather leg, if the boats split tacks the boats could be 10 miles! from each other. Not to much to see then. Frankly, this cup has shaped up to be the most unfriendly event for enthusiasts of our sport ever. Complete and udder bullshit. I think that EB and perhaps LE as well should be protested for Rule 69, unsportsman like conduct. I mean really, you wont see anything here. The only decent coverage will be print media, the web and hopefully TV. The real bummer occurs after look around the Darsena here in Valencia and see all of the syndicate bases from 2007. How cool it must have been here to have every team within a stone's throw. Then you have to ask yourself- will we ever have an AC like that again? Not if the cup moves to San Francisco, and who can possibly speculate on what EB will try to pull if he retains control. And I say it again- retains control- because I certainly don't feel like either one of them will have won an AC in 2010. Just my take. 01/28/10

  Youth of Today With the creation of the National Sailing Centre in 2005, The Cayman Islands has become one of the most attractive small boat sail training and racing destinations in the Caribbean.  A well funded development program sees thousands of kids learning to sail every school year (check out how they run a national school sailing championship here, which was featured in Sailing Anarchy last fall) in new, fully equipped sailing centre seconds from the warm Caribbean Sea. Now the Cayman Island Sailing Club is hosting the 2010 North American and Caribbean Youth Olympic Games Qualifying Regatta as part of its inaugural Race Cayman from March 10-15.  To learn more about the 2010 Youth Olympic Games in Singapore this August, check out this. Thirty sailors from thirteen countries including Canada, Bermuda, Guatemala, Venezuela, Jamaica, and Cuba have already registered for the Cayman qualifier.   Even if you don’t meet the 15 or 16 age requirements, the regatta is also an open event as the Byte North Americans and a J/22 regatta with charter boats still available.  Attending this regatta will be a perfect family vacation.  There are direct flights from many US cities, a wide variety of hotels close by, the water is warm, and there’s plenty of wind.  The regatta organizers are making this a perfect spring break vacation.  There’s plenty of other waterfront activities on Grand Cayman, including a great kiteboarding facility on the East End.  There is some of the best scuba diving on the world in and around Grand Cayman as well.  When was the last time you went to a regatta and also got to swim with stingrays? Currently, there are no entrants from the US for the Youth Olympic Games qualifier.  Cuba is attending, but the US isn’t.  Go figure.   A country can only qualify two entrants for the Youth Olympic Games.  There are two classes for the Youth Olympic Games, windsurfers and Bytes, with a male and female division in each.  If the US qualifies in both windsurfer classes, those two sailors will go on to the Youth Olympic Games.  There is also a provision to have a country be granted additional entries should other ISAF regions not fill their quotas.  It is too early to tell how all the qualifications will play out, but one thing is a given, this is going to be a great event for young sailors no matter how they place.  The US should be represented at this event. For full information on the Cayman Island Youth Olympic Games ISAF Regional Qualifer Check out www.sailing.ky or www.bytechamps.org for more information about Race Cayman and the North American and Caribbean Youth Olympic Games Qualifier. Or call Mike Weber, the Sailing Director at the Cayman Island Sailing Club Tel: 345.947.7913   Mobile: 345.926.7913 Facebook page here. - Peter Huston. 01/28/10

  SCOTW Here's this week's winner - Laura Linares of Italy--won the first flight of todays races at the Rolex Miami OCR 2010. Nice....Thanks to anarchist Kit 01/28/10

  cruising anarchy Quotable We've told you that we have admired solo sailor Webb Chiles for years - really since we were kids. So it thrills us that he takes time out of his life to send us stuff. We really like this one... Evanston: “I understand the sea.” The quote is not from me, but from a teen-age girl who is the latest child to set off in an attempt to become the youngest to sail around the world alone. I do not follow such voyages. A video clip appeared on the morning television news, including the above sound bite. I expect that these attempts will continue with ever younger participants until one of them is killed, or, considering that they are closely monitored puppets on a string, gets into serious trouble and has to be rescued, at which time I believe the parents should be prosecuted for child abuse. Of course that won’t happen to this girl because she understands the sea. Read on. 01/28/10

  big pimpin' Pink - The New Orange? We were recently engaged by Emma Creighton http://emmacreighton.net/ to ‘rush’ fabricate a new canard for her Mini 6.5.   The request was for the finish to be in orange, but that couldn’t happen in the timeframe we had. So we went for 2nd best – red – and without a great deal of thought poured a pot of red pigment into a mix of white epoxy paint.  Oops -  it turns out that red mixed with white gives hot pink.  I think its actually pretty cool, and will use the same formula on the rudder I recently built for my own SRMax.    Hot pink has got to be faster than orange, right? Shown here parked behind our shop, the boat probably wishes it was back in its native Florida (if it looks familiar, this was Glenn Henderson’s personal ride, but has changed hands a couple of times and been turbo’d in the interim). If we can build any carbon toys for you, no matter the color, don’t hesitate to call.  Competition Composites Inc (a.k.a. Phil’s Foils)  613 599 6951.  01/28/10

  race report Perrrfect Star man Phil Toth sends in this report... Rolex Miami OCR 2010 Day 3 Today getting to the start was very interesting to say the least...some boats found that getting there on time in the light air required rocking and pumping, dodging islands or skimming over shoals, and even breaking out the paddle, and in our case all 4. The 5 minute gun fired when we were 5 minutes and 45 seconds away from the start line. Things were looking pretty grim but 10 seconds after the start, as we were rounding the back of the committee boat to cross the start line, we were as deep in the fleet as a porn star taking it in the seat meat. Just then the sailing gods smiled upon us and the abandon race flag was hoisted due to a large wind shift. They say it is better to be lucky than good...it just seems that the good guys always seem to be able to make luck happen when they need it to... Today's conditions were about as perfect as you could ask for...temp in the 70s with 8-12kts and a few shifts to keep you on your toes. Most other sailing towns do not get it this nice at the best of times. This event is so popular since conditions are this nice in the middle of winter here in Miami. Many times through the day you often hear how horrible the weather is where ever that sailor is from, Boston 18F, Paris 32F and so on. Out on Biscayne Bay the wind tended to be a bit more stable throughout the day than yesterday with not as much of a persistent shift. The leaders stayed pretty much the same with the biggest move being Andy "Slump Buster" McDonald and crew Austin Sperry jumping up from 5th to 3rd over all, taking the red jersey from Mark Mendelblatt and John Von Schwarz who dropped down a spot into 4th. Coming into the finish of race 3 "Slump Buster" McDonald was well established on the port lay line coming in for a pin end finish when Mark "Splat" Mendelblatt came streaking across on starboard and took both boats into a dial up head to wind. Shortly after Mendelblatt tacked over onto port and crossed the line in second with Andy McDonald in 3rd. Mendelblatt probably wont be expecting to many waves through on port from Andy tomorrow after cleanly executing that little cute maneuver. Results. Photo Rolex / Dan Nerney. Pos Sail Skipper Crew Country 1 2 3 4 5 6 Total Points Pos 1 8156 Horton, Andy Lyne, James USA 2 1 3 1 4 [5] 11.00 1 2 8317 Melleby, Eivind Pedersen, Petter Morland NOR 1 11 2 [20] 1 1 16.00 2 3 8250 Macdonald, Andrew Sperry, Austin USA 3 5 12 [16] 5 3 28.00 3 4 8267 Mendelblatt, Mark Von Schwarz, John USA 8 8 1 11 [25/OCS] 2 30.00 4 5 8376 Smith, Jud Fatih, Brian USA 5 4 [19] 14 2 8 33.00 5 6 8273 Szabo, George peters, rick USA 6 3 9 [15] 7 10 35.00 6 7 8263 Jorissen, Sander veldhuizen, erik USA 9 [13] 10 4 10 4 37.00 7 8 8169 Zanetti, Alberto Warburg, Gustavo ARG 15 2 [18] 9 6 7 39.00 8 9 8235 Johansson, Oskar Hynes, James CAN 11 [14] 5 7 3 14 40.00 9 10 8278 Milner, Mike Cheer, Roger CAN 4 7 11 [13] 9 12 43.00 10 11 8404 Whipple, Larry wolfs, mike USA 17 9 7 3 11 [23] 47.00 11 12 8215 Allen, Bill Nichol, Mike USA 13 10 8 5 12 [15] 48.00 12 13 8107 Mckenzie, Paul toth, philip AUS [16] 16 14 6 8 6 50.00 13 14 8000 Anosov, Arthur Dolan, Mark USA 10 [20] 4 8 16 16 54.00 14 15 8285 Diaz, Augie prada, bruno USA 12 6 [25/DSQ] 2 25/OCS 11 56.00 15 16 8077 Jennings, Jack Sharp, Brian USA 7 12 15 22 [25/OCS] 13 69.00 16 17 8157 Rodriguez, Ernesto Giannini, Christian USA 18 [21] 21 12 13 9 73.00 17 18 8132 Kohlhas, Jock Gesing, Adam USA 19 15 6 [23] 17 21 78.00 18 19 8238 McCorkell, Joe Coleman, Ian USA 14 17 [20] 17 15 18 81.00 19 20 8271 Cullen, Allan Cullen, Rob CAN [23] 22 16 10 14 20 82.00 20 21 8217 Phinney, Mike Balmert, Brad USA [20] 18 13 18 18 19 86.00 21 22 8336 O'Donnell, John NGUYEN, HUY USA 22 [23] 17 19 21 17 96.00 22 23 7750 Burmester, Jens Mehlen, Markus GER 21 19 23 [24] 19 24 106.00 23 24 8084 Teitge, Robert Burgess, Rick USA [24] 24 22 21 20 22 109.00 24 01/28/10

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

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