Dinghy Sailing Project
Printed From: Yachts and Yachting Online
Category: Dinghy classes
Forum Name: Dinghy development
Forum Discription: The latest moves in the dinghy market
URL: http://www.yachtsandyachting.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=2959
Printed Date: 19 Aug 25 at 1:18am
Software Version: Web Wiz Forums 9.665y - http://www.webwizforums.com
Topic: Dinghy Sailing Project
Posted By: KateBT
Subject: Dinghy Sailing Project
Date Posted: 14 May 07 at 2:55pm
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Hi, i am doing a uni project and need info on Dinghy Sailing. What you want from your sport? Is it growing? how accessable is it? anything really. ------------- Spread your wings |
Replies:
Posted By: Splosh
Date Posted: 14 May 07 at 4:44pm
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Hi, they're very open questions you got there but anyway... What i want from sailing is the thrill and the buzz from the boat. It's not all about the winning of open meets (but that is an upside), you can still have great fun plodding about and constantly trying to go faster!! Is it growing?? tricky one... the sailing industry are constantly building new boats so it must be growing, but then again more and more classes of boats have stopped being produced (for example, the Vortex Hope this helps. mark. ------------- RS300 - 346 :D |
) and others are booming at the moment (for example,... lasers i think!).
Posted By: Prince Buster
Date Posted: 14 May 07 at 5:38pm
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Yeah I agree with Splosh. For me the pure competitiveness of sailing is on the way out and I way prefer going sailing for the adrenaline rush and for the thrill of speed. As for growth - I think that British skiff sailing is becoming massive and and churning out new designs and ideas even faster than the aussies these days. It's definitely got to the stage where England is well up there with australia and new zealand for pushing the boundaries of skiff sailing - eg, the two coolest boats at the women's olympic trials were British. I think the sport is growing in accesibility just seeing all the new members down at my club this year. But there still does seem to be a lot of stereotyping of sailing being some posh thing to do (not helped by media portrayal) and that seems to be stopping a lot of people getting involved. ------------- international moth - "what what?" |
Posted By: m_liddell
Date Posted: 14 May 07 at 6:00pm
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What is the title of your project? This might help us respond more specifically. 1) What you want from your sport? Dinghy sailing is different things to different people. Some people love the speed and challenge of racing skiffs, others like taking the family out and sailing to a beach for the afternoon. 2) Is it growing? The RYA might be able to help you with this. This is very difficult to answer since there is no easy measure of growth: new boat sales, open meeting/nationals attendance, courses run, club membership etc. are not necessarily accurate indicators of growth by themselves due to (1) and also the large variety of different classes involved. 3) How accessible is it? Possibly more than it was with low maintenance, indestructible and more refined training boats along with big improvements in clothing. There are also many sailing holiday companies. The RYA will give you an idea of just how many training centres there are in the UK. Some will argue with me on this but cost is still prohibitive, that is just a fact of life. Decent modern boats, good clothing and sailing club membership all don't come cheap when compared to say, buying a new tennis racquet and playing on a public court, or buying some boardies and heading to your local pool. Many young people really suffer with this without significant financial help. However, for some classes used boats often do not lose much of their value. Please remember that this forum (who are mostly skiff/high performance sailors) is not totally representative of the sailing world as a whole!! We do not all sail cherubs  |
Posted By: nathan
Date Posted: 14 May 07 at 7:17pm
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I would disagree. In the last 3 years I can see very little growth in skiff sailing in the UK. Without re-opening the can of worms regarding the skiff definition just look at a few; RS800- similar turnouts for a couple of years Cherubs- similar level of interest for years- but 2 new professional designs granted 29/49er- 29er is popular at the moment- but thats just the fluctuation due to it being picked as the ISAF boat- as it was in '02. 49er- lots of Olympic squad sailors- precious few else- s/h market appears flooded. musto- numbers on a steady rise- but I wouldn't call the growth rate astronomic... its been around for 7 years now. Chichester harbour 14s *International*- make the headlines every now and thnen for some new breakthrough/ make good magazine reading. Virtually no UK circuit.
Junior sailing has become huge with the RYAs strong involvement, but, questionably, to the detriment of having juniors in clubs.
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Posted By: Prince Buster
Date Posted: 14 May 07 at 8:11pm
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I don't mean that kind of growth, I don't care about turnouts for wanabee skiffs. I mean that the real pushing the boundaries, radical style of sailing has well and truly come to England. Like foiling moths, 12ft skiffs and cherubs. ------------- international moth - "what what?" |
Posted By: Splosh
Date Posted: 14 May 07 at 8:19pm
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I agree, most of the radical changes are coming from britian at the moment like the brand new GT60 etc. You could re-phase prince busters coments; the production and development is quickly growing not turnouts and amounts. mark ------------- RS300 - 346 :D |
Posted By: Hobbo
Date Posted: 14 May 07 at 9:44pm
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Think we're probably going down the wrong track here, just looking at the newer skiff classes completely writes off a large part of the sport. 1)Dinghy sailing is an incredibly diverse sport, (the most diverse?) with a huge variety of different classes to suit different needs/ desires. Lots of sailors want very different things from their sport hence the huge variety of boats sailed (over 113 listed by this website). 2) See m_liddel above, though if you are talking purely about racing, over 5181 boats travelled to their national championships last year compared to 4981 in 2003. In terms of competitors attending bear in mind that many of those will be double handers with a few triplehanders. The national championships attendance figures for the recent years are here : http://www.yachtsandyachting.com/classes/?s=44 - http://www.yachtsandyachting.com/classes/?s=44 RYA still best bet for guesses as to total amount sailing. 3) It is a sport that is relatively accessible as a youngster when there are many oppurtunities for cheap sailing and there are often club boats which the juniors can race for a very low cost. However as you get older what m_liddel says applies and the cost often starts to get prohibitive, though many people can crew cheaply for those with the money to buy a boat. Furthermore if the right class is bought into the second hand market can be strong and a boat can often be resold at a favourable value. Sailing compares favorably in terms of cost to golf, (based on what a couple of mates pay in terms of fees + clubs + events) not compared to Football or Rugby. ------------- Contender GBR 362 Osprey 1318 - IVplay SSC |
Posted By: Chas 505
Date Posted: 14 May 07 at 9:59pm
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Here's what i want to get from dinghy racing as a sport: tactics; physical challenge; intellectual challenge (max boatspeed VMG). I equate it to Rugby - power and stamina for about a 90 minute race Sprinting - managing the pressure of the start Gymnastics/Dance - balanced, controlled movements around the boat...although I am no gymnast..! Chess - tactics...thinking future....except that you are playing multi-opponents instead of 1 (so, less intense....more volume) Basic engineering - accuracy and comprehension around repeatable settings is essential. Clearly the skills are less than required for each other discipline on its own....it is in the blend of those skills that sailing (esp dinghy sailing) becomes unique. I remember discussing with a championship winning handglider (about 8yrs ago), the technical advances of our relative sports. He believed, that sailing could not be as advanced as his sport, they used carbon after all. When I asked if the wing section they used was adjustable in flight, his answer was....why? So I showed him the inside of our 505....he'd gone pretty quiet by the time we'd done the strut, and the jib cars..!! So, is the sport growing?.....not sure, and not actually sure that it matters, unless you happen to be selling boats for a living..(he, he,he)! Chas
------------- Life is too short. Work Hard; Play Hard; Sail a 505 |
Posted By: m_liddell
Date Posted: 14 May 07 at 10:31pm
Without throwing this thread off on a tangent, it is interesting to note that the trend for high performance dinghies is less adjustment and more 'automatic' adjusting rigs. Just take a look at a penultimate 14 with string everywhere (I can adjust the tension on the lowers from the wire!?) compared with a new one... |
Posted By: KateBT
Date Posted: 29 May 07 at 11:17am
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Hi Thanks guys for all your comments and opinions. I'm looking into the accessibility and growth of a variety of outdoor sports from Sailing to Mountain Biking. I am wanting to establish if they truly are accessible to everyone and what sort of people are attracted to which sports. Its interesting as each sport seems to hold its own cliché / stereotype on the surface but once you get past that everyone seems to be in it for the fun and the passion. Having said that there are a few exceptions! To an outsider it is often hard to muster the courage to start a new activity, the main obstacle does seem to be social acceptance and the worry of looking stupid. If only there was a way for everyone to get over this, i can assure you we would be a lot fitter nation if we could. Thanks again. ------------- Spread your wings |
Posted By: damp_freddie
Date Posted: 29 May 07 at 8:38pm
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Growth? - you can also compare the turn outs at events, as listed in the annual Y&Y guide to classes. Most pundits quote lower turn out. Under 16 sailing is attracting numbers, but there seems to be a big drop out rate as they get older...maybe when it is no longer parents money. O as I found there is a gap between RYA courses and the tight pyramid of coaching to get up those fleets- it is a struggle if you aren't through the youth squad. There is a lot of grey hair in some dinghy fleets and clubs- ask if it is an ageing sport?? Is there a demographic time bomb like in the labour market ? Do people have the leisure time? Do they have the money? Dinghy new prices are around the deposit on a flat! Also there is probably not enough one design racing at clubs - problem being that older designs don't appeal to many youths brought up on snowboards and full suspension MTBs! The plethora of designs, new and old, seems to have fragmented the sport and once people do all that blasting about they realise they need to sail OD (or expensive development classes) to progress in their sense of achievement. yachts are a different kettle of fish! |
Posted By: Ian99
Date Posted: 29 May 07 at 11:43pm
Considering only "competitive" outdoor sports, I think sailing fares pretty well when getting people into the sport. Most sailing clubs, even if you have just learnt to sail, and only have a very basic or old boat, people will encourage you to join in the race meaning there is a very good gradual transition between starting and "being good" whilst still fitting in. I know very little about mountain biking, but my impressions of it from outside are that there is a huge difference between riding a bike for a few miles along a dismantled railway track and taking part in competitions. To make the step between the two appears to be far more difficult. I think this is probably because, for the vast majority of people, before you go sailing the normal method is to join a club to get access to the water, particularly in inland areas. I think this leads to far greater proportion of "recreational sailors" (i.e. those who just go for a cruise around on a nice day) being members of clubs, and hence in my opinion officially participating in the sport than you get with other apparently "accessible" sports (mountain biking, football, tennis, and swimming come to mind). Very few people who "claim" to take part in these sports do so as a member of a club, and as such probably have a greater barrier to development within their sport than you get with sailing. |
Posted By: JimC
Date Posted: 30 May 07 at 9:07am
I believe there is not anything like such a plethora of designs now as there was at the height of the dinghy sailing boom in the 60s... Its just that the 70s and 80s were very quiet in that front and we forget. |
Posted By: damp_freddie
Date Posted: 30 May 07 at 9:49am
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Relative to other sports i found as a new adult sailor in dinghies 12 years ago that there was B' all help, advice and encouragement and this continued in several clubs I joined- happy enough to say hello and take your membership! but it's hard to break in and say crew on a boat you will really learn in- most good teams are inseperable! Adult courses at clubs are 99% for new beginners, so developing hits a wall !
I used to race mountain bikes before I got into sailing- it's actually a lot more accessible and basically it means riding for 6 hours a week as a teenager and 8 or more as an adult to be able to race and enjoy it! Back then a grand got you about as good a bike as you could possible need (lester Noble knew a bit about that for sure- best damn bikes IMHO). Clubs were far more relaxed meetings and teams or squads developed around a sponsor or from the more serious in a club. In the beginning bikers used to actually wait for each other at the top of hills DURING races, but that continued in training. There was always mechanical help at hand and lots of advice- a lot better than any sailing club I have been in!!
Clique-ish sailing is - but snobish it is not- I used to crew on a half million quid carbon boat owned by a pub electrician and a dentist both from 'working class back grounds' and also sailed on a well known IRC machine with a bunch of concreters from Brum' |