The Olympic Curse

Maybe the standard fleet should be split off from the Radials. But the trouble then is that you lose female participants, which is also bad for turnouts.

One solution might be no under 18s or under 21s, but that's a *horrible* precedent and I hate the idea. Glad I'm not on the Laser CA. I imagine the reason why they don't seem to have done much to address the problem is that they can't think of a satisfactory way of doing it. Neither can I!

Maybe they need to introduce, I dunno, a "trainee master" category to the master events so that its 25 and up?

Edited by JimC - 19 Aug 14 at 11:00am

IMO the Laser has suffered from the 'wannabe-Olympic' curse. I stopped going to the nationals/Q's about four years ago when it had become sufficiently apparent that they had turned into Radial events with a standard fleet start added on. You cant blame the UKLA, the Radials bring in the numbers and I have to say the events have always been very well organised, but when you drive half way across the country and spend £100 or more on entries/accom then find no-one is interested in talking to you (let alone socialising) after racing because you are over 21 and it is seen as a bit uncool, the appeal is lost.

I thought the  olympic curse was a term used to cover two developments.  Firstly, the pace of equipment development speeded up rapidly, causing problems for club sailors wanting some longevity from their kit.  The second was that the level of competition increased such that the average club sailor stopped going to open events becaue he felt he didn't stand a chance against the 'professionals'.

The ‘Olympic Curse’ seems to mean that, as a result of selection as an Olympic Class, a class’s long term development and growth is significantly impeded, or that it’s decay is accelerated.  Reasons for this may be:

·         Escalation of the level of competition in the class so that ‘ordinary’ competitors believe that they cannot succeed in competition against ‘full-time’, ‘professional’ or ‘sponsored’ competitors (who don’t stay in the class permanently);  and

·         Escalation of technical sophistication and cost of equipment, and rapid turnover of sails and equipment.

The Olympics certainly didn’t do the Star and the Finn, which lasted 70 and 50 years respectively as Olympic classes, any harm, but it’s not necessary that the Olympic Curse apply to every Olympic class for it to exist.

The existence or efficacy of the Olympic Curse is usually said to be demonstrated by comparing an Olympic class with highly similar non-Olympic Class, particularly where there were trials for Olympic class selection.

Based on (somewhat sketchy) Australian National Championship figures (Chris249 doubtless has better and broader figures):

Finn (handful, <10) v Contender (about 60)

FD (handful, <10) v 505 (about 50)

Soling (handful, <10) v Etchells (30 to 50)

470 (<20) v Fireball (about 20 in Victoria alone)

So you can at least conclude that in the medium to long term, the Olympics has not helped a fair proportion of classes in comparison with their near competitors.

Proponents of the competing non-Olympic classes will probably say that it is all a result of their class being a better boat.  Certainly the 505 and the Etchells guys will say that, but for opposite reasons:  the 505 guys will tout the flexibility and development options of their class rule, while the Etchells will emphasise the benefits of very strict class rules.

Probably the only purpose of contemplating the phenomenon of the Olympic Curse, other than for students of black magic, is to try to identify what factors might leave a class ‘exposed’ to the curse if the class was pitching for Olympic selection, and what factors, more generally, will affect the longevity, growth, development and decay of a class.

Personally, I think the ‘Olympic Curse’ idea was a catchy notion, cooked up by the 505 and Etchells folk.

While it seems to have some empirical validity, who is to say that classes which go downhill were either great in their day, but are now past their use by date, or were doomed to fail in any case (Tempest).

Fortunately, very few of us will ever be in a position to influence a Class Association whether or not to pitch for Olympic selection.

Off topic...but you have to love Toppers. Our ancient club boats get crashed about, beached and abused but they keep coming back for more! What I did notice today was that they started the race with controls all nice and tight but as the race proceeded it all slacked off until they flapped round the course. Next race began with everything pulled on tight but same thing happened.