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turnturtle View Drop Down
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    Posted: 12 May 22 at 3:44pm
Originally posted by JimC

Well to my mind success is ordinary folks having fun on the water. I don't really give a flying f*** about millionaire toys or professional sailing.

Clap Clap Clap Clap

... and to add to that, easy accessible water sports like SUP are encouraged at some of the more progressive clubs out there.
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Sussex Lad View Drop Down
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Posts: 360 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Sussex Lad Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12 May 22 at 3:29pm
Originally posted by eric_c

 



Since about 1960, if not before, the wealthy and/or professional sailors have had a significant role in getting ordinary people interested in sailing. Chichester, Rose, Blyth and all those people inspired others. More recently, Ellen Macarthur, and a few others?
I disagree with elitism because it sets unattainable goals for 99%. Elitism is also invariably linked with Individualism which is one of the major follies of Human kind (and no I'm not a commie). I do get your point though and I like the phrase "ordinary people" although ordinary people come in all shapes, sizes, colours and genders, a diverse bunch........anyway it seems you are suggesting that promoting the sport to the general public is a good thing , that part I like. It's part of my clubs written constitution/objectives. It's also what this forum used to be about BTW. Marvellous. 
I'm not sure looking acceptable to the maximum number of people is what matters, maybe it's more important to deliver some 'value' to enough people who are likely to be interested?   There maybe no point in chasing the mass market like in the 60s, because the world has changed.
What group of people are they who are "likely to be interested"? How do I recognise them? How do you recognise them? How do they recognise themselves? They may really enjoy the activity but Why should they come forward when the image is unacceptable to them? You are suggesting a targeted approach when we have no idea what the target looks like.
In my view it's more viable to provide a good quality offering to people who want it, than to go chasing people who are not really interested. 
Now you're sounding like you prefer a more exclusive approach. A far cry from your initial statement where you suggest promoting it to ordinary people.


Edited by Sussex Lad - 12 May 22 at 3:49pm
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eric_c View Drop Down
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Posts: 382 		Post Options Post Options   Quote eric_c Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12 May 22 at 1:09pm
Originally posted by Sussex Lad

Originally posted by JimC

Well to my mind success is ordinary folks having fun on the water. I don't really give a flying f*** about millionaire toys or professional sailing.


Absolutely, utterly and completely agree.

Commercial pressure for those clubs renting and social pressures affecting folks desire to sail are real. We can all think of clubs that buck the trend but to deny that many sailing clubs are struggling and the overall trend is falling participation is to my mind living in denial. 

The image of sailing is the logical starting point when it comes to making the best of a bad situation.
White, middle class, male dominated, increasingly elderly, imperialist and vaguely military. Most of the folks in SC's ATM are ok with this image and may even be proud of it but I would say the majority of the population wouldn't be for one reason or another. The sport has got to look acceptable to as many folk as possible first and foremost.

Yes there are pressures but can the sport of sailing adapt in this way.....I don't think it can anymore


Since about 1960, if not before, the wealthy and/or professional sailors have had a significant role in getting ordinary people interested in sailing. Chichester, Rose, Blyth and all those people inspired others. More recently, Ellen Macarthur, and a few others?

I'm not sure looking acceptable to the maximum number of people is what matters, maybe it's more important to deliver some 'value' to enough people who are likely to be interested? It doesn't matter what football fans or cricketers think of us if they're busy doing football or cricket.  There maybe no point in chasing the mass market like in the 60s, because the world has changed. In a UK where 1.5 million people go skiing every year, just to pick one alterative way of spending cash on fun, 'sailing' might need to face the fact it will have a smaller market share. In my view it's more viable to provide a good quality offering to people who want it, than to go chasing people who are not really interested. These days there are a lot of alternatives to tacking around a small pond.Spread yourself thin, sell yourself short. It's inevitable that some clubs are unviable in a shrinking market and that people will shop around for clubs which offer them what they want, or question whether clubs serve them at all.
OTOH, some small clubs have had their ups and downs for 50 or 100 years, people come, people go, boats change a bit but sailing is still sailing.
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CT249 View Drop Down
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Posts: 399 		Post Options Post Options   Quote CT249 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12 May 22 at 12:42pm
Originally posted by eric_c

Originally posted by CT249

.

One could say that much of the sailing industry and World Sailing are driving the sport in that direction anyway. When one reads the sailing press of late 1800s to 1930s it appears to be quite similar to the sailing press of the 2020s in its concentration on the most expensive and elitist part of the sailing scene, and in the way it largely ignores local or cheap classes. The sailing authority decisions also concentrated largely on the elite, just as they do today.

It's a vast contrast to the situation in the sport's later growth periods, when at least some parts of the industry promoted classes like Snipes, or the real boomtime with its concentration on classes like Holt designs and cruiser/racers, rather than boats that almost no one can afford.

It's a long way from dinghy sailing, but the fact that in the '60s boomtime the New York Yacht Club thought that the America's Cup was too elitist because a winning campaign cost $800,000 (about $7 million in today's values) says a lot about how enormously our standards have changed.

To me one of the weirdest things is that no one today seems to use data to see what is succeeding and what is failing in the promotion of our sport, so bull***t reigns.

I'm lucky, our local club is booming as is my main class, but the overall situation is pretty poor.

This is full of errors.
Most of the 'elitist' events are not, and ever have been, drien byWS or its previous incarnations. The really expensive events like the Americas Cup, Sail GP are driven by media interests and M/B -illionaires.  WS meanwhile promotes the international classes like the Laser. Who's fault is it that the GrandPrix type events get the media coverage? Could it be that's what media viewers and readers want? I think it's time people STFU about the 1960 dinghy boom, it's never going to be the 1960s again, get over it. Using 'data' to measure success requires deciding what 'success' actually is. 'Success' for one mud-puddle club in one year might not be contributing to 'success' for the wider view of UK sailing looking forwards  to the next couple of decades.  

Wrong.


I didn't say that WS drove the "elitist" events like the AC. I used the AC as an example of "how enormously our standards have changed", not as an example of an event run or driven by WS.


In about 1969, for example, the NYYC had a committee consider the replacement of the 12s with a 62'-ish IOR boat because the 12s were seen as too separate from the "mainstream" of the sport, and too expensive in terms of lack of resale value. These days, it's accepted that an AC is at least five times as expensive (in inflation adjusted terms) and its accepted that an AC boat will be vastly different from the mainstream.


WS is not just promoting classes like the Laser, which is a member of one of the world's most popular types, the singlehanded hiking dinghy - rather, it has promoted far less popular foilers so much that they form majority of classes in the Olympics, the major event that WS controls. That is an example of the "elitist" (one may use other terms, perhaps) nature of WS' direction. They are NOT trying to reflect the sport's makeup as it actually is, like they did in earlier times.


The reports about adoption of earlier Olympic classes, like the Laser, 470, windsurfer etc make it clear that in those days, WS believed that the Olympics should represent the participant side of the sport to a large extent. These days, they basically ignore that in favour of promoting a bunch of classes that, with one or perhaps two exceptions, are very small niches compared to the "mainstream" types that are largely or entirely excluded.


When I left the industry it was apparent that a whole bunch of factors had caused a drift away from the sailing industry and media promoting the sailing that most sailors do and towards the sailing that very, very few of them do. I didn't say it was anyone's "fault" that events like the GP get the media coverage. However, given that last time anyone (AFAIK) tried to get data they found that potential sailors were turned off by the sport's image as elitist, expensive, difficult and dangerous it seems logical to note that the concentration on that sort of sailing would logically seem to be hurting the sport.


I have no idea why you apparently believe that I have only one vision of what "success" is. Don't claim I'm making errors merely because of conclusions you drew without evidence.


The point is that in the past, to use one example, people in the sailing media have regularly used and highlighted data to look at various indicators of "success". Even in the 1880s, Dixon Kemp would keep data on the number of active racing yachts from one year to the next, and he could therefore provide useful data on what types of boat were growing or fading and the general health of the racing side of the sport.


These days there is lots of that sort of data around but the sailing media and, from my conversations with some of them and their printed remarks, the sailing authorities ignore data such as the number of boats sailing in general, the types that are actually selling, etc.


I'm quite over the 60s but that doesn't mean I have to STFU about the reasons why clubs and classes are fading. I want to ensure that our sport remains strong enough that we can still get boats and races, and to do that I have studied lessons that I have used to grow my local club and to revive a class that I once ran and which is now the 2nd or 3rd top selling class in the world.


Sorry if actually trying to learn how to keep our sport vital annoys you for some reason, and for finding it intellectually interesting.



Edited by CT249 - 12 May 22 at 12:47pm
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Sussex Lad View Drop Down
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Posts: 360 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Sussex Lad Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12 May 22 at 12:23pm
Originally posted by JimC

Well to my mind success is ordinary folks having fun on the water. I don't really give a flying f*** about millionaire toys or professional sailing.


Absolutely, utterly and completely agree.

Commercial pressure for those clubs renting and social pressures affecting folks desire to sail are real. We can all think of clubs that buck the trend but to deny that many sailing clubs are struggling and the overall trend is falling participation is to my mind living in denial. 

The image of sailing is the logical starting point when it comes to making the best of a bad situation.
White, middle class, male dominated, increasingly elderly, imperialist and vaguely military. Most of the folks in SC's ATM are ok with this image and may even be proud of it but I would say the majority of the population wouldn't be for one reason or another. The sport has got to look acceptable to as many folk as possible first and foremost.

Yes there are pressures but can the sport of sailing adapt in this way.....I don't think it can anymore
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Late starter View Drop Down
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Posts: 481 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Late starter Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12 May 22 at 12:07pm
Originally posted by JimC

Well to my mind success is ordinary folks having fun on the water. I don't really give a flying f*** about millionaire toys or professional sailing.
Probably the best post in this entire thread !    Well said sir !
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JimC View Drop Down
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Posts: 6662 		Post Options Post Options   Quote JimC Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12 May 22 at 11:54am
Well to my mind success is ordinary folks having fun on the water. I don't really give a flying f*** about millionaire toys or professional sailing.
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Posts: 382 		Post Options Post Options   Quote eric_c Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12 May 22 at 9:20am
Originally posted by CT249

.

One could say that much of the sailing industry and World Sailing are driving the sport in that direction anyway. When one reads the sailing press of late 1800s to 1930s it appears to be quite similar to the sailing press of the 2020s in its concentration on the most expensive and elitist part of the sailing scene, and in the way it largely ignores local or cheap classes. The sailing authority decisions also concentrated largely on the elite, just as they do today.

It's a vast contrast to the situation in the sport's later growth periods, when at least some parts of the industry promoted classes like Snipes, or the real boomtime with its concentration on classes like Holt designs and cruiser/racers, rather than boats that almost no one can afford.

It's a long way from dinghy sailing, but the fact that in the '60s boomtime the New York Yacht Club thought that the America's Cup was too elitist because a winning campaign cost $800,000 (about $7 million in today's values) says a lot about how enormously our standards have changed.

To me one of the weirdest things is that no one today seems to use data to see what is succeeding and what is failing in the promotion of our sport, so bull***t reigns.

I'm lucky, our local club is booming as is my main class, but the overall situation is pretty poor.

This is full of errors.
Most of the 'elitist' events are not, and ever have been, drien byWS or its previous incarnations. The really expensive events like the Americas Cup, Sail GP are driven by media interests and M/B -illionaires.  WS meanwhile promotes the international classes like the Laser. Who's fault is it that the GrandPrix type events get the media coverage? Could it be that's what media viewers and readers want? I think it's time people STFU about the 1960 dinghy boom, it's never going to be the 1960s again, get over it. Using 'data' to measure success requires deciding what 'success' actually is. 'Success' for one mud-puddle club in one year might not be contributing to 'success' for the wider view of UK sailing looking forwards  to the next couple of decades.  
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Posts: 98 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Mark Aged 42 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12 May 22 at 7:11am
Judging a club by the age of its committee members is wrong. Most sports see a decline in participation in two age groups - when the 18 year olds head off to university, and when the 25-35 year olds have children. Committee members being in their late 50s to 60s is the norm, because they have the free time, experience and energy.
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The Q View Drop Down
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Posts: 126 		Post Options Post Options   Quote The Q Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12 May 22 at 6:29am
Originally posted by Do Different

Although I didn't sail until middle age my town living school mates were going to this Club. It has been going since 1907 so will have gone through several flushes of enthusiasm and appears to be going full bore to this day. 

https://www.becclesasc.co.uk/about
 
Beccles is a good club, I've sailed there a couple of times..

Up here on the northern Broads at Horning SC (originally formally founded 1910***), I think our current Commodore is in his 50's and the Commodore before that was in her early 30s.
Throughout  my 43 year membership of HSC, the majority of officers and workers at this entirely Amateur run and operated club has been mostly the retired. I retire at the end of the year and will be volunteering for many more duties.

We have all but run out of space in our Dinghy park, but we have lost a few out of the  keelboat classes (20-25ft no cabin) so have mooring spaces there..

*** there was racing / sailing at Horning many years before that there's a photo of 1895 racing  and there is film of the 1908 regatta here...  http://www.eafa.org.uk/catalogue/57 The current club house is on the same corner of the river and our racing is mostly on the same stretch of river.


Edited by The Q - 12 May 22 at 6:34am
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