Hardest nationals to win?

Re "If you've read Bethwaite's book he has an interesting story about top Laser Sailors doing badly in a Tasar champs because they lacked the appropriate skills."

I think the same paragraph says that Frank think the Laser worlds are the hardest to win, though. And Mark B (no dumbie and from a world-title winning development background) took a long while to become a top-class Laser sailor so it goes both ways.

We've found that those from a non-SMOD background (ie triple Fireball world champ) finish about the same place in their first Tasar series as Laser champs do. I know a Laser champ who was mortified by his lack of pace in his first Tasar regatta because he didn't know the tweaks - however he'd won the Youth World selections in 420s and been a Flying Ant winner before that, so he came from a non-SMOD background but still had the same problem. The current Tasar world champ came from a Laser and from the start (allowing for the fact that he was sailing with his then-young daughter) he and another Laser sailor were very competitive with the Tasar champs who came from winning OK worlds and in development classes.

I also know two two-time world champs, one in a development class and one in a "normal" OD, who disclaim any real technical knowledge - both say that they pretty much just get a fairly standard boat and train hard. So arguably you can perhaps win in a non-SMOD without a vast deal of tweaking knowledge, or perhaps with just the same sort of trial-and-error learning you get in some SMODs.

However, all my generation here came from a background of fairly tweaky junior classes, not junior SMODs, so we probably developed an understanding of chocks, tension, luff curve etc.

Personally, it seems that the sheer numbers in Lasers makes it so competitive that Ainslie etc train harder, so if they needed to know technical stuff they would learn it; most of the Laser guys I used to train against have tertiary qualifications they use for their sailing (ie PhD in hiking) so there's little doubt they could learn luff curves etc if it was relevant.

PS; I've only done 6 months serious Laser time and a season part time; about the same in Tasars, so I don't think I'm biased to Laser.

If you look at the endeavour results for 05, You'll see that second place went to a 4000 sailor! So they cant be all bad  . And indeed the class is very compettitive

Just to clear this up for Andy P's sake.

Andy didn't sail the Endeavour Trophy. Ben and I did having placed 2nd in
our Nationals. Andy didn't want to do it. But to be frank we didn't really
give it the respect it deserves.

We weren't able to attend the Friday tuning session due to work
commitments. Which meant we had to build the boat on the morning of
the race and miss the training / tuning day. We had gear failure in one of
the Saturday races and our boat seemed to leak quite a bit which didn't
help. Consequently we drained her overnight and made a very big school
boy error by not putting the bung back in. This error may of had
something to do with the Saturday evening entertainment. But I'm not
excusing ourselves. So we retired early with a very heavy boat. Hence
poor result. Not saying we would of done any better just stating the facts
as I know people like a football on here.

Well Pabsy baby. I would have thought that you would have nominated RS 300 since Mr cockerel is sitting in everyones way all the time. What about me boy Louis and his consecutive Lightning Championships? Red hot in that boat but how good in another? Only time will tell.

Originally posted by JimC The Laser Worlds seems to have been largely restricted to Ainslie and Scheidt for the last several years, presumably they don't find it as hard to win as every other Laser sailor does!

Doesn't follow at all. They win, at least in part, because they are full-time sailors and therefore can and do put in more in terms of practice time and fitness training. Talent comes in too but talent alone won't get you there.