Weston Cat open, Nacra Nationals+20ft Championship

Lets look back at my post. I enjoyed the racing, but wished to state an opinion which I heard among many of the people at the event. What better way to do that than on an open forum.

Lindsay has had the chance to respond to the concerns that I put forward, and while I may not agree wholly with all of her points it is obvious that a lot more thought has gone into this than we, the sailor may know. 

I would thank you , however for signing up to the forum for the sole purpose of making a snide comment with no attempt to be constructive or even give your own opinion on the matter. 

 The event was moved forward due to the fact that there would be no water on the Sunday and that sailing would have been so late in the day that you would be derigging in the dark.No other reason!!! No discount was given to anybody be that a  local or club member £60 was paid by all even my Son and Husband and we sponsored the event.

 Food  I dont know if you have been to weston sailing club but our kitchen is about 10 X 12 we only have one fat fryer thus having to cook 100 portions of chips is never going to be an option. Good fresh ingredients from the local butchers have to be used as we have no freezers so the fish would have to go as well. we are voluntary  members running the club unlike Grafham whom have paid staff.

 We had an 2 hour gap between last boat in and the meal.

 Yes i would have hoped that you would have been out sailing a bit longer but we managed to get the club sailors (as there was club sailing on as well) fed and on their way to allow us to seat all of the cat sailors at one sitting. There seamed to be hardly any  sailors in the club house between the 2 hours as most were out side working on there boats, looking at the new ones and meeting old friends

Prizes:

 I had made the bags to go along side the glasses thought it funny to put some things inside them to encourage some of the younger sailors to use them if you sail the F18 then you will have heard some of the stories about the communal showers at the worlds and where one young man had 4 showers in one day.I feel that after 2 days good sailing that its nice to receive  a prize worthy of it a T shirt a glass and a bottle at Xmas drink  and trophy that you have to give back is not to dazzle but to show my appreiciation of hard work and  effort that some people have made to come to the event .

I will take on your point of maybe  trying to reduce the cost for next year but £15  per person per day for a days sailing and food does not seem to bad to me when i have just paid £16.35  for 1hour 43 min watching  TIN TIN and only a bottle of water.  Thanks for you thoughts hope that this has answered some of your questions      Lindsay Piggott 

I enjoyed the racing, I enjoyed the weekend as a whole. The race officer did a much better job than the one who officiated the regatta at the start of the year as that was a real disappointment.

 I feel that the price was a real stumbling block. It was not very obvious where the £60 entry fee gets swallowed up. 

1) The food

While it is nice having a communal meal with the rest of the sailors, it would also be nice to have an option to opt out. The club was put to shame by the spread put on by Grafham the week before, with different food options and to a much higher quality. The cost for the food at Grafham was £9. A bargain. I would be disappointed if the Weston food cost more than £5 budgeted/ head. I remember that they used to order takeaway but this has also disappeared.

The racing was finished before 3pm on both days and people who have a way to travel are effectively sacrificing their evening if they want to come back. There is nothing to do on a drizzly day in the vicinity in the hours between coming ashore and the food so many will simply do their own thing.

2) The Prizes

While there were a multitude of prizes of offer and they were very nice, I think if you had asked people when the weekend started if they would rather a reduction on entry fee than some hair gel you would have seen overwhelming support for even a £10 reduction. At the end of the day people are at the event for the sailing, not to be dazzled.

Many of the prizes were obviously from sponsors such as yourself, and while I understand that this is necessary for an event such as this, if you compare with classes such as the moths then their ideas are much more sailor oriented. They have a sponsor who undercuts the entry fee of the event, along with numerous others who add to the experience.

3) I understand that there are obviously costs relating to the hire of the additional field and safety boat support etc, but my concern is that this event will slowly go the way of the round the island event, with dwindling interest before finally fizzling out.

Please could you canvas the opinion of some of the sailors before next years event. We all know that in current times people are having to make sacrifices, lets not make Weston become one of them.

Cheers

 

Can't let you stand alone on that Asok... I have  reservations over attending due to the entry fee.

 

I am sure i shall end up going but feel that's the problem... that's what they're banking on.

 

Why does the double hander cost twice as much?  Must be some hell of a meal - Grafham was £28 + £9 for a meal on the Saturday but at least we had the option of not having the meal. 

 

Am i paying more because locals recieve a discount?

 

It's not like i dont mind spending money... i sail!

 

See you all there, no doubt!