RS500 ...

Originally posted by Bumble Originally posted by JimC What confuses people is that no top sailor ever has a slow boat, but its not really cause and effect. They might be 5th instead of first with a slow boat, but not 50th instead of first. This last point though doesn't ring true. I think top sailors are top, as they are only too aware of the need to have a boat which is fastest. Even the minutest, 0.01 on the PY difference, would, over a long beat in a big fleet give you a tactical advantage over some boats..... working these advantages is how you get to, and stay at the front. If it confuses people, thats because even a 2 year old child could figure out - if your boat is fastest, you should win.

But the top sailors DON'T always have the fastest boat, do they?b

To use a few local examples (sorry I'm in the wrong country to make these totally relevant).

World Tasar champ (Laser Masters runner-up) was second in the national, 4th IIRC in the world behind Olympic gold, silver bronze medallists etc on a boat that was 5kg overweight and was named "Scribbel" because there were so many scratches in the bottom it looked like a kid had been scribbling with a crayon.

J/24 national champ (steered by 2 time world champ, trimmer was an America's Cup winner) that was the 2nd heaviest boat in the fleet but beat multiple world champs and America's Cup skippers.

Multi-millionaire who was on the Olympic team and (as a sideline) is the class manufacturer uses beaten-up scratch-bottomed SMOD, despite the fact that he could buy well over 3000 of this SMOD for what he spent on his house.

Runner-up in a national titles (beaten by a former Olympic team member) who got his hull from a rubbish tip alongside a road.

The fleet they use for our national "champion of champions" was a pretty mixed bunch - they varied from about 66 to 75kg. I remember one boat where I couldn't use the mainsheet (standard practise in that class in a big breeze) because the rig tension was set so the shrouds were about 50mm too long. Some sails were good, some old.

The organisers had a chart that demonstrated that there was effectively no difference at all, over the years, between the boats. Even in racing amongst the top dinghy sailors in the country, the boatspeed made stuff-all difference.

.01 of a PY is not very much, when even national champions sailors make mistakes worth many points of PY. It's only worth worrying about, IMHO, when you work EVERY wave just right, roll EVERY tack perfectly, get EVERY start in clear air within 2' of the line and going fast......OK, sometimes losing 3 lengths is a problem  - but normally our own stuff-ups cost us a lot more than that.

Originally posted by Chris 249 But the top sailors DON'T always have the fastest boat, do they?b

No they don't, but they are always fast.... I stand by my point -  if your boat is fastest, you should win. How its fastest is up to you, but a poor boat is a poor start. I still don't think many winning hopefulls would trade their sorted boat for a rubbish one in a competitive fleet....... you enjoy throwing titles of winners about, but how good was the fleet? In my experience some fleets are closer than others, and these are the one in which you need every once of speed.

Originally posted by Chris To use a few local examples (sorry I'm in the wrong country to make these totally relevant).

Do you mean me or you (where are you?)?

Getting way off topic but here goes

Originally posted by grimupnorth  'boatspeed makes you an instant tactical genius' or something like that.

Whoever said that has probably read  John Oakleys book WINNING. At the start of chapter one said   - "In this day and age, it is virtually impossible to win major races with a standard boat".

And - "No matter how good the helmsman the most brilliant tactics will look ridiculous if your boat is not moving fast through the water"

I agree with the earlier view that boat handling is vital, but in big fleets at championships or other big races boatspeed is crucial. Go off a start line with a boat 0.5% slower than a few others around you and very soon you're in dirty wind. Soon after that you're forced to tack away- if you can - probably ducking transoms. Those with boatspeed are still pulling away and you'll probably have more dirty wind and disturbed water to deal with as you're not 'on the pace'. So when you arrive at the windward mark that 0.5% speed difference can result in a deficit of about 200m or 15%.  

As Oakley said it doesn't matter how brilliant you are -- - you can't win the exception is of course if its really fluky etc but even then you have to be the best plus hope someone with a faster boat doesn't do at least as well as you 'tactically'.

As for weight not making a difference - don't make me laugh!

Edited by Hector

Originally posted by Hector Whoever said that has probably read  John Oakleys book WINNING. At the start of chapter one said   - "In this day and age, it is virtually impossible to win major races with a standard boat".

Well he's wildly exaggerating. Wouldn't be the first and won't be the last top sailor who doesn't actually understand what the relative importance of how fast the boat is and how fast the helm is. He doesn't really need to. But I would wager serious money that if you put me in a brand new Laser and Ben Ainsley in a scored, soft old dog with a clapped out sail and a bent mast that he would beat me by damn near as much as if the boats were reversed.

And remember I'm talking about mid fleet sailors. I said boatspeed was the difference between first and 5th, as opposed to the difference between first and 50th.

And never forget for the bottom end of the fleet sailor boatspeed is just a means of getting to the wrong side of the beat faster. To repeat. Virtually no-one who puts all the rest of the effort in that it takes to campaigh at the top of the class is going to sail with a badly prepared slow boat. But it still means that boatspeed is a tiny factor in the campaign. Sailors don't like to hear it because its such an easy excuse for losing. Doesn't mean its not true.

I know this has been said in a roundabout way before but as a former 'big lad' I would rather get average results in a comfortable boat than good results in an uncomfortable one and being too large for your class (in a general sense) is a sure way to be uncomfortable. Because of this at 15.5 stone there wasn't many classes open to me, sure I could sail a Laser but there's enough pain in my life already.

You can learn to depower a boat but you can't make an uncomfortable one comfortable. For me a Contender was far more tiring in a 2-3 than a 3-4.