Latest legal Laser tweaks????

Originally posted by kneewrecker

Originally posted by kneewrecker

Originally posted by GarethT

The laser bashers on here just can't seem to appreciate that we all choose boats for different reasons.  

au contraire, the laser 'apologists' are simply forgetting they are posting in a thread in the dinghy development section.  And no matter how conflicted, twisted and misguided the 'laser bashers' may come across, we are all only trying to fathom out what the hell 'dinghy development' really means and what the boats will look like in 20 years time.  It's a sorrowful inditement of the sport if the answer to that question is 'nothing, no need to move on from the 1970s for great dinghies' isn't it?

You are of course utterly right - it's totally illogical to look past the £400 Laser, it's access to proper racing and the cheap cost of ownership through replica kit and then go and spend over tens times that on something that to the uninitiated, looks pretty much the same.  One sail, two poles, one lump of off-white plastic to sit on and a wiggle thing at the back that steers in the wrong direction...  but sailing is a passion, not a SUV purchase, and if the Laser leaves you limp-dicked at the prospect of sailing, then it's time to find something else.  There's nothing new about being a former Laser sailor, Mike's suggestions were simply around how to generate a 'returning laser sailor'.  

FWIW I am under no illusion that either *ero will kill off the laser.  I find the concept a) a bit pointless (and unwanted) and b) utterly futile - dinghy sailing is far too conservative.  And despite some observations from the US in that direction, I don't think RS are under any misguidance either on that front either.  Martin has said as much.  But both *eros are nice beach boats, and I for one hope we can race together without necessarily deviating from the line honours.  Hell, bring the Lasers along too, but please leave your metal vs non metal fairleads discussions out of it; oh, and feel free use your Rooster 8.1s, it'll even it up a bit on paper at least.

For a start, it's not an indictment of the sport if the gear stays roughly the same - that's what it does in many other leisure pursuits doesn't it? Cricket bats, recorders, acoustic guitars, chess pieces, X One Designs.... not everyone gets caught up in the consumerist stuff that (as studies on happiness show) don't actually make people much happier. Hipsters around my city are still looking for old steel fixed-gear bikes, wearing tee shirts of '70s bands and playing SNES as much as the latest games. And the area of sailing that changed the most (windsurfing) also faded the most which hardly makes that a great model to follow.

I sail and love development classes but the fact is that change is NOT needed for survival. One proof of that is that the very first International dinghy class (the Int 12) has been looking to become an official International class once again; it's just got to sort out whether to allow fibreglass first! The fact that the ex-Int 12 is getting very strong and growing fleets despite being still gaff rigged and (in Holland) still made in mahogany shows pretty eloquently that major change is not vital. By the way, the oldest OD design of all (the North Haven Dinghy) is also still sailing.

Secondly, in some ways the Laser has developed vastly more than other classes. The adoption of the Radial and 4.7 were significant changes - how many other classes have changed their sail area, a basic parameter of design, so much? 

More importantly the Laser has lead the way in "user changes"; that is making fundamental changes in its audience rather than fiddling with trinkets. I think it was the first class to really get Masters racing going. It was one of the first classes to hold world titles for women, and it opened itself up from being mainly about young men to being about everyone from sub juniors to great grand masters. It's a major class when new countries are moving into the sport, and the most popular subject for scientific study into the physical side of sailing. All of those things are major areas of "software" development.

Arguably the enormous changes that the Laser has made in widening its appeal are more important, sweeping and better for the sport than the sort of fiddling with layups and controls that many "progressive" classes are making. In a way it's an echo of what occurred in the US in the '30s with the Snipe and in the UK in the '50s and '60s with the Beecher Moore boats - a huge change in users which is arguably a much bigger development than a change of sailcloth or cockpit.

Edited by Chris 249 - 19 Jun 14 at 6:24am