4000 Facelift by Rooster

Thank you.  Extending this further, our clubs are 'sailing clubs', not 'racing clubs'.  Mike is right, there is a circuit for purist class racing, and when numbers justify it, then results are extracted anyway- informally in the bar, or by a filter on the spreadsheet.  We all know how well we did against the other boat in our class- we make it a point of reference through a handicap race to assess how well we are doing.

The truth is we all should know who we are racing- it's the boats around us, the ones we swap places with- not the guy in the 49er who laps you and you may or may not beat them depending on whether the wind dies or not.  Keeping this mind, I think there's a very strong argument that diversity of boats actually sailing enhances the experience, especially if it compliments a few class opens every year.

However this experience, let's call it the competitive process (I think Holman first called it that and it made sense) is then subjected to some scrutiny.  The credibility for what has just taken place is lost, and the results become a mishmash, a jumble of the actual finishing positions.  Add in an unhealthy dose of misunderstanding and scepticism towards the whole system and you end up with what we are left with- neither one thing nor the other.   Which goes someway towards explaining my admittedly 'bi-polar' attitude towards dinghy racing.  Basically handicap racing is a classic example of paralysis by analysis- I guess that's what happens when a leisure activity is taken over by statisticians...  

The best race I did last year was on a freeride windsurf board.  In no wind.  With over 200 other competitors.  I'd forgotten how to tack it (no one tacks windsurf boards).  And I was utterly, utterly uncompetitive- the race was won by a skinny guy on a 1980's longboard.  However the atmosphere was electric... the balance between competition and cooperation was beautiful.  I got knocked off at the windward mark with a bunch of sailors and in the bundled mess of boards and sails, helped someone back up and going again before I got back on and up hauled away...  I made it my job to beat them to the finish.  It was the perfect point of reference.  And I did it, despite being dressed as a bottle of Heineken which added a further 15 kilos once wet.   It was truly an eye-opening experience, and it's the sort of experience that we could have at local sailing clubs... but maybe we should hold fire on the fancy dress.  It could get expensive for wardrobe changes.  

Turning the old winter handicap events- which were largely social sailing- into a full blown serious series in its own right, and the constant quest for making handicap racing more serious, more competitive and authoritative, might be done for seemingly the right reasons, I just don't know whether it's taken something away in the process...?  

There's nothing more demoralising that coming off the water thinking you've sailed well, only to find the spreadsheet says you've done sh*t, or your fellow sailors say your boat is a bandit in those conditions.  Although I guess it's nice when it goes in your favour too... the hollow small victory though it is.  It's this kind of thing that can kill someone's mojo- fairly instantly in my experience.  

yep- couldn't put it better.  Retirement (or semi retirement) needs to factor in 3 days on the water for an hour or two every week; except when on holiday, where I will be on the water every day.  

In the interim I've just been to the butchers to buy the meat for the friends that have been scheduled for weeks to descend on us this weekend. 

No doubt it will be sunny, 12 degrees and a nice force 4 from a consistent direction at Draycote.... enjoy your sailing this weekend.  Whereas next weekend will offer nothing more than a ghost's fart on a mirror...  

Currently forecasting rain & F5 gusting F7/8 for Sunday. 

I'll certainly enjoy the memory of it afterwards!

Hard work for you monomaran guys I guess.