A-Class Catamaran Worlds in Islamorada, Florida - Overall
by Tom Siders 17 Nov 2007 07:28 GMT
12-16 November 2007
Well the racing conditions for the last day of the 2007 Ronstan A-Cat World Championship turned out to be pretty severe. The event that was building up to be a “Clash of Champions” on the final day of racing has been decided by a blow out, the wind that is. Glenn Ashby, Lars Guck and Pete Melvin all had a shot at taking the title today in a heavy air event, but in the end the wind was too much. A frontal system passed over the Florida Keys last night and the breeze picked up to over 25 knots just after 0300EST. This strong breeze refused to abate throughout the morning.
Buoy and land station reports were coming in at 22-29 knots, with gusts in the 30+ range for most of the morning. The Organizing Authority requested a postponement at around 0900 and the PRO, Billy Richnow, flew the AP. The RC, International Jury and competitors closely monitored the wind strengths throughout the morning watching the winds with strong hopes of getting racing in today. Winds at water level continued in the 19-22 knot range with gusts to 28. There was also a fairly severe and square chop setting up with standard waves at 4 feet with frequent sets of 3 waves in the 6 foot range. In the end the decision was based upon keeping the racers and their boats safe. Even though this was a real blow to all of the competitors who had raced each other hard all week, keeping themselves in contention throughout the regatta, the OA made and outstanding call putting the safety of the sailors, their boats and all of the officials first and preventing the possible carnage that racing might have incurred.
Congratulations to Glenn Ashby, Lars Guck, Pete Melvin, Luc DuBois, Mitch Booth, Charlie Ogletree, Scotty Anderson, Murray Philpott, Andrew Landenberger, and Eugenio Calabria who were the Top 10 finishers in this event. Congratulations also to Carla Sheifer for her efforts on the course to rescue another competitor in Thursday’s racing.
Click here for final results
Throughout the regatta, Glenn Ashby and Lars Guck had been a back and forth battle with each taking the lead at different times during the regatta. Through seven races, the most they were separated was by two points and that is how the regatta ended. Glen Ashby took to straight bullets during Thursday’s races with Lars guck posting a 2nd & 3rd place in races 6 & 7. The race day on Thursday came down to choosing the right side of the course and committing amidst a dying breeze that was filled with big holes. The corners of the course upwind & downwind seemed to work better than the middle, you had to have the courage to commit to one side or the other. Glenn showed some real speed on Thursday, but Luc du Bois on his new Schuerer Generation 5 was the fastest boat on the course today. Luc had been showing a great deal of speed all week, but tactically he was not as sharp as Lars Guck, Pete Melvin or Glenn Ashby have been all week. Today could have been a real battle of “skills and wills”, each fighting for the championship. After four days of racing, Glenn would still have to sail both races to score the win. Glenn showed his competitiveness, the highly tuned skills and the smarts on the water that won the regatta
In the lead up to this event in a highly competitive development class, much has been made of the differences in the boats, masts and rigs. I personally have been at the forefront of publicizing much of this side of the event. To me, this was great, the A-cat Worlds each year is a great event, but all of these new platforms, sails, masts and design differences added another dimension and more depth to the story. While some of the boats were the next version or iteration of a previous design, two or three stood out for their ingenuity or audacity. Ben Hall’s by far was the most intriguing and beguiling of the bunch. While others focused on the platform, rudders or dagger boards, Ben went after the “engine” of the boat. Early in the year, Ben had a long conversation with C-class guru, A-cat sailor and man behind Vanguard sailboats, Steve Clark, about rigid wing sails. With this conversation behind him, he teamed up with a designer and developed his wing. Along with the wing, Ben also teamed with designer Peter Cogan, and built a new boat that is an evolution of the proven XJ platform. The boat and wing were launched in early September, leaving the critical training & tuning time short for the Worlds. Ben put as much time on the water in Bristol as well as attending the Lake Hopatcong Fall Classic regatta in hopes of getting up to speed with his new wing. While it is clear that this wing or an evolution of it show great promise, he was not fully dialed in to it during this regatta. Ben and the Rigid Wing were blisteringly fast off the wind and downwind with it, sometimes passing 3-4 boats between the windward and offset marks (approximately 150m). Going to weather is where he seems to have difficulty getting it tunes and performing well. Ben finished in the top third of the fleet, but one has to wonder where he would have finished if he had been sailing this for the last 12 months.
The radical departure in hull design was the LR2, designed by Richard Roake and built by John Lindahl. This platform features torpedo shaped bows with true wave-piercing characteristics. This platform was sailed at the regatta by randy Smyth, Ian Lindahl and Fred Smyth. Randy’s featured a boomless main that he designed for the regatta that featured a swept-up square-top that gave it more initial power, reduced the overall drag and had the ability to twist off easier at the top. In addition, he added a small sweeper to the base to straighten out the flow. There were 3-4 more new platforms at the regatta, the new Marström M5, the Tool, the Schuerer Generation 5 and then the proven platforms. The two that rose to the top were the Morreli & Melvin Nacra A3 and the Ashby Sailcraft Geltek MKII featuring the latest generation of Glaser and Ashby Sails respectively.
Throughout this regatta, one looked for a break through in design and performance, but in the end it came down to proven the proven winners, sailing on proven platforms with proven sails. Lars Guck, Pete Melvin and Pease Glaser were sailing on Morreli & Melvin Nacra A3’s with Glaser sails and Glenn Ashby on his Ashby Sailcraft-Geltek Flyer with Ashby sails. One only has to take a look at the top 20 to see that it matches very closely the list of those who are the top 20 in the class. These are by far the best, most competitive sailors from around the world in this class of catamarans. The competition was close, tight and sometimes even contentious, but in the end Glenn showed his mastery and confidence when it counted the most, taking both of Thursday’s races to win the regatta by two points.
This regatta featured some fine performances and great sailing throughout the regatta by many sailors. One of the finest moments of the regatta came with Pease Glaser’s light air win on Wednesday and Lars Guck’s last minute tack to catch a fresh shift moving him from a 5th place finish to 2nd. Pete Melvin sailed a great regatta all week struggling only in the 6th race with a 9th place finish. Charlie Ogletree also had a strong 6th place finish coming off his remarkable come-back at the US Olympic trials. Fifth place went to Mitch Booth who sailed a consistent regatta with a 12th place discard.
The competition off the water was stiff too. It began with the All Texan Bash thrown by the Texas contingent on Saturday. This featured a full on Texas BBQ with Shiner Beer, the New England and Annapolis came back with a dinner of Black Beans & Rice, Dry Rubbed Chicken and Rum Punch and on Thursday the Canadians responded with a Bar room style Deli with Molson Golden flowing freely. While all good sailors are swayed by rum and free flowing beer, the Texan Bash won the event, but a great time was enjoyed by all during each event.
This event truly was spectacular, well organized and had great attendance. Spectator boats moved up and down the course, keeping up with the fast paced action. So much has been said about the racers, but much thanks needs to go to the event organizers, the Organizing Authority, the RC and the International Jury who pulled this event together. Great racing takes a great Race Committee. Billy Richnow was the Principal Race Officer for the Worlds and he brought in a core crew of folks to staff the important positions on his RC. Billy and his crew have been working for over a year to bring make this event a success on the water. Betty Reeh was Billy’s right hand person on the Signal boat, assisted by Ann Apel. Leigh Ann Hawboldt commanded the Pin Boat and was also in charge of leeward roundings and finishes. Brian Hawboldt took care of the Weather end of the course. Every day of the event, the RC met with the OA to assign the pick-up crew of volunteers to staff all of the boats. Many were available for the entire week, and most required on the water and on the job training. Thanks to everyone who participated and gave of their time.
There was a group of International Judges here who made up the Jury for the Worlds. Thanks to Cor van Aanholt as the Chairman and International Judge from the Netherlands Antilles, Egil Wold an International Judge from Norway, Francisco Jauregui an International Judge from Mexico, Means Davis an International Judge from the USA, and Paul Ulibarri an International Judge from the USA. Theirs is frequently an underappreciated job and these gentlemen provided a World Class and valuable service to this event.
Finally, the drivers behind this event; Bob and Carol Webbon as well as John and Carla Schiefer were the group of folks who made this event possible. As the Organizing Authority and the core group of people who have been working for over a year to prepare, and working tirelessly and with little break for the past weeks to make this happen, these folks deserve thanks and appreciation from everyone. There is no way this event would have been possible without their efforts.
More racing pictures, as well as photos of the awards can be found in the gallery of photos credited to Betty Reeh on the Official A-Cat photo site. Betty’s gallery also includes the winners getting tossed into the Atlantic off of the end of the dock here at the Islander Resort in Islamorada who provided an absolutely beautiful and perfect venue for this event