What prevents people from joining our sport?

We may be derided here as "wood bothers" but the cvrda events are the closest I know to this sportive ethos. It's about getting out and sailing the old boats and although racing is the main thing since we're about racing dinghies, there's always the encouragement and welcome for those who aren't racing seriously. All those old boats that are oddballs at clubs have a welcome too - the "Lost classes".

Edited by patj - 24 Dec 12 at 7:31am

If there is a market for a different style of sailing event, that does not mean you have to offer less competitive racing.
In our club, if they put anything that is not competitive racing in the calendar, less people turn up.
Some clubs run dinghy 'rallies' to neighbouring clubs or the beach, sometimes it works, but support from boat owners who don't race much seems to be low.
It's really irritating when there's some novelty event in the calendar and the wind turns out to be great for a normal race, too much for those the event was designed around.

There used to be things like the round Hayling Race, ideal for not taking seriously I'd have thought, like the yots do with the IoW. But I think it has just withered away.

What may be missing is an attitude that says it's an achievement just to get out and race, if you finish, that's a bonus, every person you beat is a bonus. Clubs can only nurture that way of thinking so much, the rest has to come from the competitors. Some clubs and classes are better than others at supporting and encouraging tail enders.

I got back into dinghies because a yacht was too much commitment, for the first year we were hoplelessly behind, but we enjoyed slowly improving. Now we are in the pack of the club fleet and still enjoying and learning. We go to a Nationals and look rubbish, but hopefully it makes us slightly better club sailors.

Sports like running, 95% of the people doing 10k's or whatever don't have the ghost of a chance of being anywhere near the leaders, but they still enjoy it.

Originally posted by iGRF Originally posted by bustinben You are aware that boardman bikes won two olympic medals, and even without that they have an excellent reputation as a quality bike manufacturer? But if you can't see past the fact that halfords stock them, so be it. Boardman is a name Halfords use on their own brand bike, like Tesco's own label. Hopefully they pay Boardman well for using his name. However, it doesn't make them good enough to take up a real mountain and expect the suspension to hold out or the brakes not to fade, or the frame not to crack when you take the kind of hits you jump and drop during a typical descent. A descent that can last over an hour of continuous stress. So riders that do that sort of big mountain free ride, build their own bikes and the last company they would trust to have anything to do with their bike would be Halfords. There is no sailing comparison really, were that there were a sailing Halfords, it would boost the entry level of the sport, but even if there were, I doubt that top end sailors would use the sort of craft they might sell.

Edited by bustinben - 13 Dec 12 at 6:40pm

As somebody who didn't start sailing until late in life, I would say that there are two things that prevent people joining the sport as adults.

Originally posted by johnreekie1980 Ahh Grumph is the distributor of a 160mm travel full suspension mount of which there are a lot more than ten companies in the world producing a similar spec machine. A truly innovative product:) Were do i sign.

FTFY

You don't we don't sell to dinghy sailors, they're not cool, not good for the image, Boardman, boardman is good, go to Halfords they'll look after you...

Edited by iGRF - 13 Dec 12 at 2:58pm