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The Foiling 101 |
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Oinks 
Far too distracted from work 
Joined: 24 Oct 14 Location: Bandol Online Status: Offline Posts: 267 |
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 Topic: The Foiling 101Posted: 18 Nov 16 at 10:39pm |
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Piglet...
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Oinks
Far too distracted from work
Joined: 24 Oct 14 Location: Bandol Online Status: Offline Posts: 267 |
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Posted: 18 Nov 16 at 10:40pm |
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Piglet..are we related
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Chris 249
Really should get out more 
Joined: 10 May 04 Online Status: Offline Posts: 2041 |
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Posted: 19 Nov 16 at 7:42am |
Not if the emphasis on foiling means that people start to believe that it is the only valid form of the sport, as happened with windsurfing when they started promoting high winds and shortboards as the only valid form of the sport. The most popular "equipment intensive" sport in the world is one where the legends use essentially the same kit as many weekend warriors, and the rules make that kit about 40% slower than the fastest gear but much cheaper and easier to use. Many other sports and disciplines have suffered when they tried to tell everyone that they needed to sail costly and difficult to use leading-edge kit.
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sailcraftblog.wordpress.com
The history and design of the racing dinghy. |
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Sam.Spoons
Really should get out more
Joined: 07 Mar 12 Location: Manchester UK Online Status: Offline Posts: 3401 |
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Posted: 19 Nov 16 at 9:04am |
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You're certainly right about windsurfing shooting itself in the foot Chris. It does seem to have come full circle though (all be it at a lower level) with Raceboard fleets on the increase though most windsurfers consider 10 kn to be 'light wind'
 Windsurfing has always been manufacturer driven though by, mostly, big players trying to get you to buy another new board or sail and many of the (supposed) innovations came into being for that reason alone. Dinghy is moving in that direction but, fortunately, has 100+ years of history behind it so there is a solid foundation. It also has the concept of 'One Design' which windsurfing has never really embraced (ok there are a couple outside of the Olympics), it has been hijacked by the SMOD 'revolution' but the majority of sailors sail the same boat for many years (unlike many windsurfers) who change kit relatively frequently. Even in windsurfing the more extreme trends usually die out or become very niche after a while (FW is a case in point). The market for expensive foiling trimarans will be small and I doubt it will impact on note conservative designs. What is causing the general public to perceive sailing as elitist and unattainable is stuff like the AC series. The Olympic kit is pretty moderate by comparison and similar to what your average pond sailor sails.
Edited by Sam.Spoons - 19 Nov 16 at 9:12am |
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turnturtle
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Joined: 05 Dec 14 Online Status: Offline Posts: 2538 |
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Posted: 19 Nov 16 at 9:17am |
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If it needs 10 knots to foil, then it's already ruled out at least 200 potential days a year around where I live.
I'd like a go sure, but I'd leave the cheque book at home. |
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RS400atC
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Joined: 04 Dec 08 Online Status: Offline Posts: 3011 |
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Posted: 19 Nov 16 at 12:36pm |
Not sure anyone is saying it's the only valid form of the sport? This is the dinghy development forum. So no surprise we are talking about new developments. I'm not sure the comparison with boards is much help, boards appealed to a lot of people who were never ever going to race lasers. They wanted a fashionable sport to splash their overtime on, they wanted excitement, street cred and to spend time with like-minded people. I think these people were the bulk of the market, not the serious types who raced. If they moved on to a different watersport it was probably jetskiing, but mostly they grew up and bought houses. Lasers (in the olympics) and the AC are part of the same problem, people trying to make money out of 'our' sport by flogging it as entertainment to the masses. TBH I don't think foiling needs to be fundamentally expensive. The Moth is expensive because it's built in small numbers and without compromise, and has to meet a restrictive set of rules. If you had a market for a product designed down to a price, and could sell batches of 200, it would be a lot different. |
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RS400atC
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Joined: 04 Dec 08 Online Status: Offline Posts: 3011 |
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Posted: 19 Nov 16 at 12:42pm |
I struggle to see it as an alternative to other dinghies to race in a PY fleet around the cans. Let alone inland. Maybe it needs a different branch of the sport, like racing from place to place in relaible wind? I've heard rumours of life beyond the English Channel..... |
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blueboy
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Joined: 27 Aug 10 Online Status: Offline Posts: 512 |
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Posted: 19 Nov 16 at 1:18pm |
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Plenty of people can afford to drop £15K on a nice toy if they want to. Not sure however how many of those people want to pull 80kg up the beach.
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Sam.Spoons
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Joined: 07 Mar 12 Location: Manchester UK Online Status: Offline Posts: 3401 |
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Posted: 19 Nov 16 at 5:42pm |
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TBF most of us pull at least 80kg up the beach (plus the trolly). I'll bet not many L@sers weigh less with all the bits and the inevitable few litres of water. And the L@ser is a fairly light boat, not many are more than 10kg lighter. I think they're claiming 80kg sailing weight so not a Moth but not all that heavy.
Edited by Sam.Spoons - 19 Nov 16 at 5:42pm |
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Chris 249
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Joined: 10 May 04 Online Status: Offline Posts: 2041 |
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Posted: 19 Nov 16 at 8:26pm |
We can talk development without just accepting that it will all be positive in all ways. People including manufacturers, leading sailors and commentators are saying thing like "foiling is the future for young sailors"; "this is the future"; "the best sailors only want to race on foils"; "it is the future of our sport at all levels....If you’re a young kid getting into sailing you want to be in the foiling generation." That's pretty much saying that the rest of the sport is invalid.
In the boom days of windsurfing the sport attracted lots of people who had the same emphasis on one-design racing as dinghy sailors. My incomplete figures indicate that in the USA in the early '80s, the Windsurfer One Design alone had about as many national title entrants as the Laser, Snipe, Opti and Hobie 16 did COMBINED. It was then largely taken over by the same sort of high-performance hype that small boat sailing is now facing, and (as people like the head of the largest windsurfer builder left say) it did huge harm to the sport. As I understand it, there are major problems in building a cheap foiler. The loads are very high and you can't add bulk. The guys involved in the foiling Laser kit, for example, are very bright and as a major dinghy builder down here said, they have done a beautiful job on their foils - but they still cost not too much less than a whole new Laser. You also need to be able to balance the requirements of getting enough power to foil, and having very low drag when foiling. That would seem to require a rather more expensive rig. It will be interesting to see the UFO going. However, if dinghy sailors really wanted to go faster by getting a little cat, they could have done so for the past 50 years. It's interesting to see that the committee that runs the SCHRS, who seem to keep very close tabs on performances, now say that foiling cats are only 4% quicker than non-foilers. That's significant, but not enormous - there's 20% rated difference between a Hobie Tiger and a Dart 18. It may underline that not many craft get the same speed advantage from foiling as Moths do. Foiling is fun and the Moths and AC boats are extraordinary, no doubt about it. Learning to sail a kitefoiler is on my bucket list (after all, if being new and fast is what it's all about then they are on top of the list) but many of the claims are over-hyped and may pose a hazard to the sport as a whole. The perception of being an elitist sport is a bad one for sailing. On a final note, after about 10 years of foiling frenzy among the hypesters, the number of foiling racers is very small and growth appears to be extremely slow, compared to past 'revolutions' in the sport. If foiler is "the future" and that future is a good one, then why are there so few of them and why are numbers dropping overall? Edited by Chris 249 - 19 Nov 16 at 8:40pm |
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The history and design of the racing dinghy. |
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