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Steve411 View Drop Down
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Posts: 705 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Steve411 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Topic: ISAF Women’s Skiff Evaluation - Stop press...
    Posted: 12 May 12 at 10:49am
 
The Mackay FX in 25 knots. If you look closely you can see GRF's V-Twin appear in the background at 1:15.
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Posts: 615 		Post Options Post Options   Quote timeintheboat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 09 May 12 at 8:23pm
Originally posted by tickler

A lot of it must be what the World wants the Olympics to be.?

I suppose it is who you think the World is.......

I do sport. I go sailing, used to do a few other (olympic) sports and for me the olympics should be pinnacle event for your sport. Like athletics, like sailing. Not like football, tennis etc. Boxing is a different example it has managed to separate its olympic level from its (tainted) professional level. Good for them.

And then the there are the watchers - who make up the majority. They have low boredom thresholds, they want to be entertained. That is why we have football and tennis. It is good on the telly and familiar. Good on the tell and/or familiar brings in the sponsors. Is that why kite surfing has turned up?

I'm not a great watcher but I do invariably find myself growing into the olympics as they roll on. Syndey was memorable. Having them here though we get all the other baggage that comes with the olympics around the organisation that you are not aware/bothered about when it is elsewhere. This time it just seems a little grubby.
Like some other things - sailing is more enjoyable when you do it with someone else
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tickler View Drop Down
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Posts: 895 		Post Options Post Options   Quote tickler Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 09 May 12 at 1:33pm
A lot of it must be what the World wants the Olympics to be. Back in the 50's Beryl Burton was the most successfull female cyclist out there. She rode time trials with a fixed wheel and a front brake. I saw a picture of her racing on a sprint track, I believe in the Olympics. Her front brake had gone but the mafac brake hanger was still there. It was the same bike! F1 was the same. Brabham turning up at a Grand Prix in an old van and rolling the car down two planks. Those lovelly early Lotus racing cars used Triumph Herald  front uprights.

We are we all seduced by money and glamour which we seem to want perhaps more than sport its self. Why dont we give management rights to Bernie Ecclestone......or GRF ?
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Posts: 2202 		Post Options Post Options   Quote pondmonkey Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 09 May 12 at 11:46am
I guess if Son and Heir can pop his baby into the Olympics instead of the Finn, it wouldn't be such a tough decision.... it'd certainly 'look' more of spectacle and to be honest, I couldn't say it would be a bad thing.
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Posts: 6662 		Post Options Post Options   Quote JimC Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 09 May 12 at 11:45am
There certainly seems to be a lot of contradictory stuff talked about Sailing and the games. Every four years (I guess) there are new people on the IOC, so the goalposts change anyway. The last big report I studied in detail said that sailing wasn't one of the most expensive sports to put on. However that was a few years ago and I could be completely out of date.
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Chris 249 View Drop Down
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Posts: 2041 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Chris 249 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 09 May 12 at 11:34am
Fair point; I think Henderson also said that sailing, which is seen as a clean sport that has been in all the modern Games*, had no chance of getting dropped, especially since "History and Tradition" is one of the major criteria for the OPC. Actually given that history and gender equity are highly rated it seems to be a pity that we don't trumpet the fact that the first woman in the modern Games was a sailor and so (IIRC) was the first female medalist, but that's one of those things.

However, if sailing IS so secure for whatever reason, then the usual excuse given for getting the skiffs and kites in (i.e. they are a tiny part of the sport but we need them for the ratings and spectator appeal) has also gone by the board. A lot of the justification for them lies in sailing's supposed threatened position. 

By the way, a former Olympian and Olympic class chairman who worked with Rogge has said that he reckons Rogge WOULD dump the Finn, at least.....he never mentioned sailing. That is because if he dumped his own former class, he would demonstrate that he was willing to take tough decisions and that would cement his own position personally.

I have no idea if he was right or wrong about this, but I've known the guy for years and have never had any reason to think he's anything but truthful, and he has been on the inside a fair bit.

*sailing was scheduled to be in the first modern Olympics, but did not take place. Some sources say that there were weather issues, but I found a copy of de Coubertin's letters in an old bookshop that said the problem was that facilities were not ready...I never got a chance to jot it down.
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Posts: 2899 		Post Options Post Options   Quote alstorer Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 09 May 12 at 8:33am
Originally posted by Chris 249


And what about the realpolitik? Are we just going to say to small nations "f*&k you, come back when you can sail a skiff" and then run along every four years and say "Oh, by the way can the sport that has been ignoring you please get your national Olympic association's vote so we rich countries can keep playing with our expensive toys"????

realpolitik? Who is seriously going to agitate to dump sailing whilst former olympic level Finn sailor Jacques Rogge is head of the IOC.
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Chris 249 View Drop Down
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Posts: 2041 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Chris 249 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 09 May 12 at 12:14am
Clap
Originally posted by MartinWadhams

I've maintain a (hopefully) dignified silence so far on this topic since the Trials, through the results and recommendation period. I would just like to wrap up by putting the record straight on a few points.
 
The following are exerts from the "Invitation and Information for the Evaluation of the Women's Skiff and Mixed Gender Multihull" document sent out by ISAF to the manufacturers ahead of the Trials:
 
Clause 6 - Boats
Each participant may bring up to 2 boats ready to sail on the 17 March at the venue, with an optional additional boat as a spare..................... 
 
Clause 7 - Sailors
We expect some of the sailing to be with one of the National Authority sailors and one of the entrants on board. For this purpose we would expect that entrants will provide one experienced sailor for each boat brought...........................
 
 
I would also like to clarify that we did not intend to make any major changes to the RS900 following the Trials - there was no need. We would have added turnbuckle shroud adjusters to make rig adjustment afloat easier and continued with minor tweaks to the sails. When you're working with passionate people, development on that front tends to go on until you have to stop and go into production. 
 
Our aim for the RS900 was to create a boat that genuinely suited the weight range, offered real (but accessible) high performance and was affordable - to allow all nations (physically big and small people) to compete and grow a women's skiff class that would become a significant part of our sport. We believe we met our aims - and that we met ISAF's criteria the best - as evidenced by the fact that their Equipment Committee (the technical group) made the RS900 their first choice by a 5:1 majority vote.
 
I hope many of you will have seen the message I sent on Friday after the final vote, which gave our thanks to the many great sailors and suppliers whose support for the RS900 was incredibly rewarding and expressed our best wishes to the winner, the MacKay FX.
 
Onwards!
 
 

Thanks for the information, Martin. And (as I noted earlier here) that message you sent after losing the selection showed you and RS to be very impressive in the way you handled the decision. Clap Clap
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Chris 249 View Drop Down
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Posts: 2041 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Chris 249 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 09 May 12 at 12:09am
Originally posted by tickler

Perhaps some small nations are not (as yet) suited to enter a sailing Olympics. If we try to include everyone and lower the standard to cope then out rigger dugouts would be the boat of choice. No one ever says that the ski slalom should be run on grass to keep nations with no snow happy.

That's probably the best single way to have sailing dumped from the Games, according to the way I read the IOC's Olympic Programme Commission report.... I assume you have read it to place your remarks in context?

The OPC's criteria for keeping sports in the Games rates "universality" (which includes the number and geographic spread of nations in qualifying events, the number of other major Games in which the sport is included, the number and geographic spread of medallists) just as highly as viewer "popularity", which is the TV ratings and spectator appeal so many people keep talking about.

Sailing is already struggling for credibility in terms of being a "universal" sport according to the OPC report; i.e. we fail the criteria for being in the other Games as we are only in the Pan Am and Asian Games and not the All-African Games, Commonwealth Games or University Games. Sailing was almost dumped from the Pan Am Games because of attempts to impose the existing Olympic classes on that event. It was a major problem for the small nations - read the continental association's website on the matter. If they couldn't afford to use the existing Olympic classes then how in the world where they going to be able to afford to buy complete new fleets of more expensive boats?

If sailing is going to ignore the problems of the smaller nations we will surely score even worse on universality, WHICH THE IOC RATES AS IMPORTANT AS SPECTATOR APPEAL.  

And what about the realpolitik? Are we just going to say to small nations "f*&k you, come back when you can sail a skiff" and then run along every four years and say "Oh, by the way can the sport that has been ignoring you please get your national Olympic association's vote so we rich countries can keep playing with our expensive toys"???? 

How well is that going to play when the votes go in??? And we do all of this so some sailors can get a really, really, really fast boat to sail instead of having to "put up with" a really, really fast boat? 

If we ignore the wishes of the small sailing nations we can be pretty damn sure that those nations will ignore the wishes of our sport to remain in the Games, too. And who could blame them?
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Posts: 742 		Post Options Post Options   Quote rb_stretch Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 08 May 12 at 10:37pm
Originally posted by pondmonkey

I had exactly the same thought Jim regarding the mainsheet rule


Have to say that I quite like the mainsheet rule as it gives helms (who are often the owner) more crew flexibility. Soon as crews use the mainsheet, then you really have to have a properly steady crew. I would suggest that flexibility is possibly why the RS800 has had the success it has.
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