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| Laser 28 - Excellent example of this great design Hamble le rice |
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| Laser 140101 Tynemouth |
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| Rossiter Pintail Mortagne sur Gironde, near Bordeaux |
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Dinghy popularity |
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sargesail 
Really should get out more 
Joined: 14 Jan 06 Location: United Kingdom Online Status: Offline Posts: 1459 |
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 Topic: Dinghy popularityPosted: 01 Jul 13 at 1:35pm |
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To draw a few threads of the recent debate together:
How long are you a newbie....and dissatisfaction....? Focussing on results misses the point. What motivates people is achieving a standard somewhere between competency and mastery. In many sports the standard for both has 'fallen' dramatically, and hence bikers being able to be improvers in 6 months. But sailing, in all its forms, is a complex sport....as I've responded to iGRF many times 'You canna change the laws of physics'. Clive's book has some great stuff about measuring your outputs against your inputs, not that of others. Class v Handicap And that's where its interesting. If you're results focussed and learning then Class racing can be a sharsh school - but you also get a better understanding of what the inputs you make whilst sailing make to your outputs. And as Nessa points out you have a source of rlevant advice. But I also note in my club that we are a small group of racers, with up to 5 in any fleet in the handicap racing we do (which is a good fleet for an RS300!). What we get out of the racing is shared experience and endeavour, and a course against which to measure our performance using our own competency/mastery benchmarks. Marvellous to hear a the helm and crew of a Topper Xenon (of all things) doing a really good and enthusiastic debrief after their race on Sunday: they practice too, and despite yachting round at the back they are getting that sense of achievement.
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iGRF
Really should get out more
Joined: 07 Mar 11 Location: Hythe Online Status: Offline Posts: 6499 |
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Posted: 01 Jul 13 at 2:56pm |
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Has yellow belly had some sort of road to damascus occurrence regarding the Laser? It's a nasty thing, it still is a nasty thing just the same as it was when it maimed you for life, I can't stop everyone sailing it, there are just not enough Phantoms, Eps or Blazes to go round.
As to my lot, we're quite a happy bunch, we have the odd moan about the sh*t courses they managed to cram us all into despite having the whole ocean to choose from, ramming twenty boats into a line 20 yards long with a 500 yard beat as they do from time to time. The essence of the fun bit is the team camaraderie of sailing together, one of those two is a race car instructor in real life and would expect to be on the path to improvement right now, as no doubt his pupils would be, trying to put it into context what he would be moving into using car analogy would be difficult, they don't make racing cars that will almost certainly fall over at the first bend... |
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yellowwelly
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Joined: 24 May 13 Online Status: Offline Posts: 2003 |
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Posted: 01 Jul 13 at 3:17pm |
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Unlike Paul I've not been blinded, I've just opened my eyes and realised that knocking one of the very few boats which seemingly can generate proper competitive sailing, is probably not a great idea for the future of our sport at club level. It's certainly not where things are moving- whether we endorse it or not.
Name me one other boat which is suitable for beginners and seasoned sailors, can be acquired 2nd hand for less than a decent road race bike (that's the competition) and has enough footprint to generate its own after market / replica products which drive the running cost down further? Can be roof topped... has smaller sails for family members....
Sure, it's still a dog and I'd rather sail my Solo, but I've been at this for 30 years, not 30 weeks... I'm ready for some a little more sophisticated and would go without other things to get it if needs be. A newbie won't and shouldn't be expected to. The Laser remains the feeder class to our future sailing. If you guys want some proper local racing, then you need to take what you've got back to ground zero first- building a Laser fleet should then be your first priority. I suspect that none of that will happen, you will simply be posting here in 4 years about how backward everything is, and in truth, exhausted whatever quirky and extinct classes are left from your own resume. If you want the truth of it, i reckon it's high time a sports distribution company starts importing those cheap boats from China into the EU. If local sailors, from local clubs want to set up an umbrella fleet that incorporates those boats into a grandfathered Laser/Torch fleet, then so be it.... Cheaper sailing will save dinghy sailing, (if it even needs saving). New fangled innovation for charging chariots around a limited wind range, won't. In fact it will splinter it further. Edited by yellowwelly - 01 Jul 13 at 3:24pm |
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yellowwelly
Really should get out more
Joined: 24 May 13 Online Status: Offline Posts: 2003 |
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Posted: 01 Jul 13 at 3:26pm |
'they' rarely make racing yachts that do either. You're on the wrong analogy for motorsport.... dinghy racing is MotoGP. We fall over when get it wrong. Some of us are quite happy on the 150cc local motoX derby, even if we like to think we could handle a Superbike, we understand the benefit of a rules cap on the equipment and you know what, we don't all have hand-swept tarmac either. Tell him to buy a Sonata... cheap moorings up the Medway and he can race it with his wife onboard.
Edited by yellowwelly - 01 Jul 13 at 3:34pm |
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Chris 249
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Joined: 10 May 04 Online Status: Offline Posts: 2041 |
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Posted: 02 Jul 13 at 1:42am |
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Grumpf, is the race car instructor getting lessons from a racing dinghy instructor?
If someone was racing an racing car and getting beaten because he hadn't learned how to drive one properly, would the race car instructor tell him to go and buy a Formula One car so he could hang in with the well driven "normal" cars and watch them in between crashes, or would he say learn how to drive the old car better, or get a popular car so he can learn from people in similar equipment?
I think the motor racing guy is an excellent example of why your rants about class rules are so off beam. Racing cars have strict speed-reducing rules, including minimum weights, and they race as classes almost all of the time. They don't just chuck in a F1 car with the ballast taken out and race it against a 2 Litre saloon with the lid cut off and a 2CV with a V8 shoehorned in. They accept speed-limiting class rules and enjoy the challenges and the strong racing they create. Edited by Chris 249 - 02 Jul 13 at 1:47am |
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iGRF
Really should get out more
Joined: 07 Mar 11 Location: Hythe Online Status: Offline Posts: 6499 |
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Posted: 02 Jul 13 at 8:47am |
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Racing Dinghy Instructor? I'd love to meet one of those, there are plenty of normal SI's at our club and some of them are now beginning to race well thanks to the instruction and example set by our windsurf racers, but no, no formal 'race instructors' just the rest of us setting up the normal sort of race training, start practises, elementary tactics that you'd get I guess at any club.
I've not been to a motor racing instruction set up, I drive pretty fast anyway so have no desire to further risk my license, but I guess there will be similar parallels with our sort of racing, taking the shortest line round a course lining yourself up for a good start and of course having a vehicle as fast if not faster than your competitors. They don't go in much for racing on handicap afaik. The key to getting better as I recall is to emulate the good guys at the front, but if you absolutely never get close to the front, how are you going to know what they do that is so different from what you're doing? Hence the logic of a boat faster than theirs to get a closer look, lets face it no one sets about trying to win a race by selecting a slower craft than the mean now do they? Edited by iGRF - 02 Jul 13 at 8:48am |
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tick
Far too distracted from work 
Joined: 16 Nov 12 Online Status: Offline Posts: 223 |
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Posted: 02 Jul 13 at 8:56am |
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What is all this instruction? My Dad knew a little about everything and he said (on the Serpentine) "pull it in to go that way and let it out to go the other way". What more instruction did I need? The rest I have picked up over the years. I am 'capable' but slow, if I wanted to be fast I would practice and experiment.
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RS400atC
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Joined: 04 Dec 08 Online Status: Offline Posts: 3011 |
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Posted: 02 Jul 13 at 9:22am |
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I agree with Chris 249.
You can only learn so much from trying and reading books. A few hours coaching makes a world of difference. An open meeting and some feedback from people in the class helps hugely. Some time spent doing RIB duty watching the fast guys is worthwhile too. Also clubs (and CA's) could do more 'practice days' where people are encouraged to swap crews and boats. But even with all the coaching training and practice in the world, some of us (e.g. me) have limted actual talent and will never win the nationals. But we can be better club sailors and have fun. Getting people from the bottom 10% of the fleet into the middle third is important.
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Rupert
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Joined: 11 Aug 04 Location: Whitefriars sc Online Status: Offline Posts: 8956 |
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Posted: 02 Jul 13 at 9:49am |
Whilst I agree with everything else you wrote, how is the above statement possible? Surely, even if the standard of the whole fleet improves, and the back gets closer to the front, you still have to have someone in every position... GRF, I suspect several of us on here are race coaches - I've spend the last few years doing race coaching for the teens who have been through the RYA junior stages system, and come out the end knowing how to sail but lacking any idea of how to make a boat go fast in the right direction. Some of those have gone on to race in successful team racing teams at Uni, or are enjoying their racing at club level wherever they ended up in the country after that. I'm pretty sure I'm just one of many people doing such things as a volunteer at clubs all over the country. What does seem to be lacking is a similar set up for adults, but when we've tried to run something, no one puts their name down. It seems that it is the CA's that take over (or ought to) at that level. Another reason to race a boat with a strong CA. However, there is no reason why you couldn't get a race coach in for a few sessions at your club over the summer. Bet you'd disagree with all he tried to teach, though. |
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Firefly 2324, Puffin 229, Minisail 3446 Mirror 70686
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yellowwelly
Really should get out more
Joined: 24 May 13 Online Status: Offline Posts: 2003 |
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Posted: 02 Jul 13 at 10:46am |
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coaching is useful.... it helps give kids a return on their £400 investment to get their DI and RI tickets....
Jimbo - former DI/RI who thoroughly loathed teaching others to sail, I opted to stack shelves in a CO-OP instead.
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