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Is the Cadet finished?

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craiggo View Drop Down
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    Posted: 08 Sep 14 at 8:49pm
Nessa, you are so very right.

I see many parents chucking their kids at sailing courses without the children really being interested and as a result they don't try and hence don't stick at it.
I've taught my daughter how to crew for me over the last couple of years and SHE is the one who has asked me if she can do an Oppie course next year. I wouldn't dream of forcing a sailing course on my son either instead I will try and get him sailing with me prior to any course.
Both my kids go to swimming lessons, but not before they went and spent some time at the swimming pool with me and the wife first to get them vaguely used to it.
I suppose it follows all the way through our lives, as we made a concerted effort to help our children read and to love reading, before they even went to school.
I find it amazing that some people expect others to do absolutely everything for their children when surely the whole purpose of having children is to want to develop and nurture a human being to be the best they can be?

As for boats, my daughter was in tears tonight because I wouldn't let her crew in our midweek series tonight in our Graduate. She is constantly nagging me about letting her join Frampton on Sever SC so that she can do Optimist training. I love her enthusiasm, and much as I hate the idea of being an Oppie dad, I expect I'll have to buy her one in the new year!!!!
I would however like her to be able to get a boat that works at TSC so that she can start a fleet with her mates at our home club.

On chasing stages, a chap who works for me is a Judo instructor and senior referee, and is becoming increasingly frustrated with angry parents demanding that because their little angel has been brown belt for a whole term that she must now deserve the next colour belt. He has been sworn at and threatened after telling them that he will award Angel the next belt once she has exhibited the necessary skills as laid down in the Judo rules to get that belt. Its sad isn't it?

As for the Cadet, I once took part in an event in Spain with my cousin in one, as a 13yr old. I found it a strange boat but the competition was great and given that the other 80 boats were all the same I didn't much care that the boat looked like a coffin.

And finally, for me the thing that in recent years has really hurt some of these older classes, is the desire to try and nail down tolerances and effectively make the boats absolutely identical. Gone are the days of buying an Oppie kit or plans, now you have to have one of the half dozen approved supplier boats, which of course are not cheap.
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Jon Meadowcroft View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Quote Jon Meadowcroft Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 08 Sep 14 at 9:08pm
Originally posted by getafix

Perhaps one of the great ironies of a more organised approach to teaching sailing and coaching racing, is that more and more emphasis has gone on single handers.  Leaving us with lots of helms and not enough crews?  Great shame, the learn in a Mirror route was really great fun, as was the route I know many others experienced, to learn with parents in boats like N12, Ents and Larks

The traditional way is still alive!

I have been sailing my N12 with my son for the last year or so.  He is 10.  Around 20% of the Burton Week competitors were parent / child combinations, with a couple of 10 year olds amongst them.  He likes sailing anything.  Jib only makes life simple, the boat is exciting and technical for me as a helmsman.  Plenty of boats available to buy - how many classes can you spend under £5k and have a boat with carbon spars / T-foil rudder / all the toys etc that is capable of winning the Championships?

I don't think the Cadet is finished.  It just attracts fewer numbers in a crowded market place.
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Post Options Post Options   Quote getafix Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 08 Sep 14 at 9:25pm
Really must do some N12 sailing again soon, lovely boats, glad to hear they're going strong still
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Chris 249 View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Quote Chris 249 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 08 Sep 14 at 10:31pm
Originally posted by Assassin

Originally posted by MerlinMags

Originally posted by Assassin

...the graph kind of proves my point, those Cadet numbers are not very good....


Thinking back to my days in the Cadet has made me realise one important point: I wouldn't have wanted to go sailing if I was scared, or felt I couldn't control the boat. Giving me a faster/twitchier boat would have put me off.

I know some kids are gung-ho and brave, but there's plenty of wimps out there too, probably accounting for 75% or more of the fleet. A 54kg Cadet which doesn't wobble like crazy, and steers solidly, is a good option to keep the kids smiling (and not retiring) in a greater range of wind strengths.

We are really retarding young sailors opportunities by keeping them in such boats as Cadets and bloody Mirrors just to keep parents happy who make up stories about their children enjoying their sailing.
Chris has been pushing the notion that this segment isn't going anywhere, well it certainly won't go anywhere while we push youngsters into dinosaur boats thinking they are thriving.

Cheers.

MM, well said; the idea that all kids are adrenalin junkies who want to crash and burn is very wrong. 

Assassin; it seems that you are suggesting that the many posters here who have said that their kids DO enjoy Mirrors, Cadets etc are liars? That's pretty harsh.  Instead of claiming that other people are making up stories, why not listen to the stories? 

As someone who is part of a very different tradition I have to admit that I used to be totally against the "slow boat" stream like Optis, Cadets etc, until I actually noticed how much joy they actually give to kids and how valuable they can be, and started looking at the hard numbers of participation trends. On that note, it's interesting to see that here in Oz the places that stress skiff-type trainers and dinghies have lower levels of dinghy sailing than the ones that have boats like Cadets. The difference in participation rates is very small but yet another case where there is a lack of evidence for the "fast boats good, slow boats bad" school of thought.

And no, I have NOT said that "this segment" of junior sailing isn't going anywhere - it is clearly a major growth area by the stats I can find. It's the high performance doublehanded sector that's arguably not going anywhere (apart from down) which seems to indicate that such craft are NOT necessarily the way of the future.

When the slow and simple boats are doing well and the fast boats are dwindling (as gross generalisations) it's hard to see evidence that the slow and simple path is wrong and the high performance one is right.

It's also been demonstrated, in what are probably the two biggest market studies of sailing, that non-sailors don't think that sailing is boring, but that they do think it is expensive and inaccessible. Studies of participation in sport also show that most people do sport for "soft" reasons like relaxation, fitness and sociability, rather than for an adrenalin high. Boats like Mirrors and Cadets can arguably fit those desires pretty well.

It would be great to get a "universal" doublehander that would be as common as the Laser, like you say, but surely the way to make a boat that popular is by listening to people rather than telling them what to buy. On a practical front, is it likely to happen at the moment given the numbers of boats that would have to be purchased to create critical mass, which means international cooperation. promotion and sales? 

FWIW what "universal" classes do we have? The Opti, Laser, Hobie 16, 420, OK, Finn and 29er would probably have more active and widespread class racing than any other classes, and in each case the designer compromised a fair bit on performance to improve accessibility. *  The Feva, Mirror and Cadet all do the same thing in different ways so why not relish the fact that they have different strengths and weaknesses?

* The 505 may also be up there albiet in smaller numbers; it's a fast thoroughbred but one specifically designed to accommodate two different sailing cultures.



Edited by Chris 249 - 08 Sep 14 at 11:00pm
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Assassin View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Quote Assassin Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 08 Sep 14 at 11:10pm
Chris 249 says,

"Assassin; it seems that you are suggesting that the many posters here who have said that their kids DO enjoy Mirrors, Cadets etc are liars? That's pretty harsh.  Instead of claiming that other people are making up stories, why not listen to the stories? "

What a stupid, inflammatory way to start a post.

 Not even worth responding to.

You can keep doing the same things and enjoy getting the same results.

Cheers.

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Post Options Post Options   Quote ohFFsake Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 08 Sep 14 at 11:22pm
Assassin - I'm afraid I read it the same way as Chris! I've posted a couple of times relating the real experiences of my real kids who have sailed all sorts of boats up to and including 29ers, and you don't seem to believe me when I say that they still love sailing Mirrors!

Indeed, one switched from crewing in a state of the art Winder to an older Duffin and there isn't the slightest stigma attached to it amongst any the sailors, nor is the wooden boat seen as old-fashioned.

Eldest daughter loves the 29er to bits, aspires to one day moving up to a 49er FX, yet still wants to go and do the Mirror Nationals next year even if it means buying an old shed of a boat to do so. It's just a fun class to be involved in.

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Post Options Post Options   Quote ohFFsake Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 08 Sep 14 at 11:22pm
...and a very rewarding boat to sail well (he meant to type before posting the last reply!)
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Chris 249 View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Quote Chris 249 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 09 Sep 14 at 12:08am
Originally posted by Assassin

Chris 249 says,

"Assassin; it seems that you are suggesting that the many posters here who have said that their kids DO enjoy Mirrors, Cadets etc are liars? That's pretty harsh.  Instead of claiming that other people are making up stories, why not listen to the stories? "

What a stupid, inflammatory way to start a post.

 Not even worth responding to.

You can keep doing the same things and enjoy getting the same results.

Cheers.


Assassin, your post claimed that people "make up stories" and ignore what their kids want to keep classes like the "bloody Mirrors" around.  Surely it is much more inflammatory to make such claims than to query whether that was what you meant.

If we "keep on getting the same results" in junior classes then they will remain the major growth area of our sport and remain much more popular than high performance adult's boats. What's so bad about that?

EDITED TO BE MORE CONCISE


Edited by Chris 249 - 09 Sep 14 at 5:18am
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Post Options Post Options   Quote Rupert Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 09 Sep 14 at 8:32am
So, Ass-ass-in, are you a new troll, or an old one with a new forum name?
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Post Options Post Options   Quote about  a boat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 09 Sep 14 at 9:05am
Originally posted by winging it

It largely makes sense to teach kids in singlehanders.  The majority are much more fearless than their adult counterpart and want to be in control straight away.  By teaching them in single handers they get 100% 'tiller time' and so learn much more quickly.  There are some who will want another person in the boat with them, but that's usually a competent sailor rather than another child.What saddens me as an instructor is that most parents would rather place a complete novice on a course rather than teach them themselves by sailing with their child as crew.  The old way, in other words.  This method got the child confident in the boat, used to the tippiness and ready for the boom, before they then also need to focus on helming as well.  A child that has been out with a parent several times is far readier to be taught than a child who has never been afloat.



My daughter has very little interest in helming since the best part of the boat to her is what comes out of the front on a reach or down wind. She thinks that crewing is far more exciting than helming which only involves a stick and mainsheet. Hence why she crews for me. Unfortunately there is not a younger helm that I have found that wants to sail a double hander. May be I need to ask around more.

As for an a boat she aspires to there are two - from her point of view of crewing - Firstly a 420 but she would settle for a 29ner.
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