Open Bic

Originally posted by r2d2

Originally posted by r2d2

Hi Chris
well its an apparently  reasonable challenge that you set and, perhaps I am wrong, but I think you are assuming I am arguing the "higher and faster is better for all" argument - I am not.  What I see is no more than what has been pointed out by others on this thread already that the dinghy sailing world suffers from a sort of over conservatism (small c) caused by the dominance of a few old classes (e.g. Laser, Oppie) that at some point (soon I hope or it will be too late for me) will inevitably have to be replaced by newer and better things.  

Where is the evidence that dinghy sailing has more small-c conservatism than other areas? To use hard numbers as objective data, why not show us where the speed improvement in sailing dinghies (both popular and leading edge) has lagged behind improvement in sports that use gear of similar cost?

I can't find any such data and I can find a lot of data to show that other sports are NOT less conservative than sailing. 

The problem is that their huge numbers hold back development and improvement.  So I'm not quite sure what data could be used to measure this difference between the world we have and a conceptual world without such over-dominant classes.  It a bit like asking what would have happened if we had taken another wicket just before tea? we will never know.  

We can get a pretty good idea of whether classes are "over dominant".

For a start, why assume that such "over dominance" is artificial or bad in any way? What is wrong in a class that is popular and widespread? 

Secondly, if an "over dominant" class in some sectors (Laser and Oppie to use your example) holds back development and improvement then why didn't the "over dominant" classes in other sectors do the same?

In 1975, the peak year of the dinghy boom in many ways, the most popular classes in terms of UK nationals turnout were as follows; GP (226), Ent (200) 'Ball (175), Cadet (173), Mirror (148), Laser (147), Merlin (132), 505 (130), N12 (130), Scorp (121) and Solo (limited to 120).

If dominance leads to further dominance, why have the GP14 and Ent dropped so many places down the list? They seem to have been heavily promoted - I have counted ads in some Y&Ys of the time and the Laser 1 was NOT particularly heavily advertised and many heavily-advertised classes never took off. Opinion leaders of the day like Jack Knights and Eric Twiname regarded them as leading classes.

The same story has been repeated elsewhere in the sport. Why did the Windsurfer One Design's dominance fade? What about the Shearwater's long-lost dominance? Why has the Squib done so well against the formerly dominant FF recently? What happened to the Penguin in the USA and the VJ in Oz, formerly two of the biggest classes in the world?

The Laser 1 was followed by a string of boats by the same builders (in the UK and elsewhere) that struggled or failed; Surfsprint, M, 28, Tasar, Laser II, EPS, Megabyte, etc. The same thing happened with Topper. The fact that these builders had huge success with some classes and failures with others surely indicates that the successes were NOT down to the strength of the builder, but the strength of the design and factors such as timing.

So the trends seem pretty clear - being dominant does not, by itself, prevent newer and better things, or older and better things, from coming along. Nor does it guarantee that you can strangle better boats, whether they are older or newer. Surely the success of the "upstart" RS in a crowded market shows that you can succeed if the product is right.

And unless I have missed it, where is the data you have presented to support your argument (whatever that is??).  

My argument is that creating a successful class or "market" sector is extremely complex and that performance or gee-whiz factors are very low predictors of success. The main po9uint is that increasing performance of classes, or a sport, does not result in a significant increase in participation and, if it comes at the cost of reduced accessibility, will actually harm participation.

Secondly, that there is NO move towards higher performance and therefore assuming that such a shift is necessary or good has no basis. Sailing is NOT unusual in this respect and in fact IMHO it may be losing ground because it is promoting speed and not usability like comparable sports do.

This is in contrast to the widely held view that people are getting into faster boats and that such a move is inevitable and good. I also believe that proper research shows that successful classes cannot be 'forced' onto the marketplace by strong companies and that a successful class is one that offers true qualities to many people, even if others do not value those qualities.

People in this thread have already questioned whether the effects you claim are not more likely related to a divergence in the number of classes, rather than to simpler supposed relationships between any of boat age/ease of sailing/slowness and sailor numbers.

The question about a divergence of classes has already been answered. To put it in numerical terms, there were about 108 British dinghy classes that had a Yardstick in 1961. Now there are 81.
Have you seen a Royal Dart 16 1/2 foot OD, Jollyboat, Pembroke Dinghy, Daring dinghy, or International Tornado (the dinghy not the cat) lately?  Half of the Primary Yardstick classes from '61 are dead. 

To move onto the issue about whether popular classes are getting faster; as Jim says, putting this information out in a form that is easy to see is difficult. One really needs much more space and graphical work than I can put here.

However, look again at the top 10 adult's boats in 1975; GP (226), Ent (200) 'Ball (175), Mirror (148), Laser (147), Merlin (132), 505 (130), N12 (130), Scorp (121) and Solo (limited to 120).

Now look at the top 10 over the last 3 years; Radial, 200, Solo, GP, Phant, Merlin, Scorp, 400, Laser, Mirror. It's late and I'm not going to run the numbers again, but I think it's pretty obvious that there is no shift towards faster boats. The GP's numbers are inflated by the worlds, as is the next in line (Contender) but if you stick the N12 in instead there is little change.

To get another perspective; since 2000 the total number of dinghies in the Y&Y nationals attendance table has been like this;

  3425
  3456
  3338
  3633
  3687
  3815
  3805
  3913
  3882
  3682
  3929
  4033
  3582

The number of boats of 'Ball speed or faster has run like this in the same period, starting with 2000;

  918
  913
  859
  887
  868
  764
  835
  811
  854
  753
  712
  824
  681

So overall dinghy numbers are up by about 12%, high-performance dinghy numbers are down by about 20%.*

The big builders have heavily promoted fast boats (4000s, Buzz, etc) but they have not met with long-term success. The progressive alternative HAS been offered, but it has been turned down by most in the market. The same occurred in Oz and the USA.

The success in the current market is in the slower, more user-friendly classes which is a good thing IMHO (although personally my background is often in very quick stuff).

*'Scuse any dodgy %s, it's getting late here.

Edited by Chris 249 - 08 Aug 13 at 9:37pm