49er medal race

Originally posted by Chris 249

Originally posted by Chris 249

Originally posted by Scooby_simon

Originally posted by Chris 249

Originally posted by Scooby_simon

Originally posted by JimC

I dunno, I reckon that 49er race was more of a lottery 
than the damn drifters... The number of medals that changed hands in 
the last gybe/bear away to the line was phenomenal. I thought they 
would have looked better on the box than they did. 
Disappointing

Jim, I greatly respect you, but this is just utter rubbish.  If we ever want 
sailing to be watched by non sailors, this is exactly what they will wat to 
see.  Fast boats in challenging conditions.

Will this race make the "general news" - maybe, will it be on the 
hilights tonight.

YES....

Perhaps we need two olympic regattas

1, Slow boring boats drifting around the course that will inspire no- 
one except some sailors

2, Fast exciting boats which make the general public go "Wow" that 
looks wild and challenging, I'd like to try that....

 Would you mind a bit less prejudice? Can you show us 
evidence that slow boats turn people off the sport? Can you show us 
evidence that fast boats turn people onto the sport? Once again, if fast 
boats turn people on and slow boats turn people off, why do the vast 
majority of people choose to sail slow boats? Why is the number of skiff 
types, in the UK and Australia, dropping at a time when slow boats like 
Lasers are getting record fleets in some places? Even the top selling 
board these days (Kona One) is slow in terms of top speed. Okay, you 
can't help yourself from throwing stones at others - but if you expect 
anyone to believe your line, you'll have to give them some evidence. BTW, 
I spent the day getting the F16 type cat ready for a regatta at a skiff club, 
so I'm not coming from just a slow boat perspective. But the one- eyed 
view has done a hell of a lot of damage to a great part of the sport 
(windsurfing) and we should try to make sure it doesn't infect the rest of 
sailing. Please, show us some evidence for your views. If you can't find 
objective evidence, maybe you are the one who is writing rubbish? 

Chris,

That fact my 7 year old son went off to play with his lego as Ben sailed 
around the course.

he was glued to the screen whith the 49ers and all the sailing he's seen 
he has been asking "where are the 49ers and the Tornado's"

Every time A tornado appeared on the first Star race he instantly started 
watching it, same when the 49ers were on other courses.

However he is the son of a cat sailor and Skiff liker.  But it shows what 
we need to keep the kids happy.

My mates who drive and race cars have a similar opinion.  They will 
watch the Skiff DVD's when at my house, they will comment on it looks 
fun and challenging.  Mate phoned me up last week to talk about a race 
car project and commented that all the sailing had been boring except 
the small snippits of the T he had seen.  

My parents are sailors, they watched Ben for a while and then went in 
the garden when it was certain he's won.  Tehy came back and whatched 
the whole 49er race.

Only anicdotal evidence, but these are the sorts of people we need to 
attract if we want it to be seen as something that should be in the ollies 
and an interesting sport to watch.

If we want people to take part, we need to make people interested in 
the sport first.  Many of my mates have seen sailing as fat gits in boats 
drinking G+T's; the wind in china has not helped, they all ask "what's the 
challenge in sailing in 4 kts of wind".  We KNOW it's difficult, but it does 
not LOOK difficult.  Sailing fast boats looks difficult because people think 
sailing fast is harder than sailing slow.

As people has said in advertsing - the facts do not matter, it's 
perception.....

As for getting more people to sail, we generally have a declining sport, 
we need to entice people to sail, how do we do that.  Opinions differ, by I 
believe it needs to look good, and IMO, slow boats don't LOOK good, 
however good the racing is.  

Would people watch F1 if they went around at 20 miles an hour and 
never crashed?  Nope, they would watch Touring cars that do crash.  
Would they watch Bike racing if they were doing 20mph and not leaning 
over in the corners nope. 

If I can summarise, My view is we need sailing to be seen as a "good 
sport to watch" that will then entice people to start, or even try sailing.  

I THINK your view is that this will not work and we just need to 
somehow get more people sailing.

My son is still talking about the 49er race this moring, and the first 
thing he said when we got to my parents was "did you watch the 49ers?", 
he said the same thing at the party I just took him to.

My next problem is how do I pursuade him to sail a Catamaran instead 
of a 29er.........

Yep, my view is that fast boats crashing is not the only, or best, way to 
sell the sport. 

The car racing analogy is flawed, IMHO, because some of the world's 
biggest cpmpanies spend vast sums (although they are tiny to suchj 
massive companies) on motorsport yet it attracts no more participants 
than sailing. 

Apocryphal tales are easy to counter - your kids may have got into 
watching 49ers, my stepkids first sailed with a national Tornado champ, 
one of them did two nationals on an F16 type cat. Their cousins came in 
from a fast-boat background, then went into fairly quick junior dinghies 
with success at club level. None of them sail boats now, despite all 
coming from families with Tornado experience. 

So while we could trade stories, it won't get as far and is perhaps not a 
good basis for cries of "rubbish". 

Interestingly, one of the 49er's creators (Peter Johnson of J-Boat fame, 
whose OD 14 was arguably the first SMOD skiff type) commissioned a 
large survey into why people don't sail small boats. North Sails were 
involved too. 

Performance was NOT an issue - people did not think sailing was boring, 
they thought it was expensive, elitist and difficult. Peter now sells carbon 
cats, but he still believes in the truth of what the survey revealed.

My son will have his first sail this summer on mf F16, I will also try and blag him a go on a 49er as well.
If he decides to sail (his Ski coach wants him to Ski race) he may crew for me for a while, but if/when he goes single handed he will start (if he want) down the RYA development route that starts in Mono's and then (Currently) they can split to 420's/29er's or Cats.  
He has been enticed ito sailing by being the son of a sailor and seeing the 49ers on TV;  Has the 49er race made any difference, Yes, I think so, he is even more keen on sailing.  
IMO the only way to get people interesting in sailing is to make it more appealing to TV, this means crash and burn.  
Of those people who watch it, perhaps 1% might think it was worth a try, and they will hopefully go to a sailing club of company that offers sailing holidays and sign up and have a try, we know they won't go out in a 49er or Tornado to start with, but they will remember what they watched of the 49er or Tornado and (Hopefully) want to progress to that.
How do you propose to attract people into sailing? 

Edit to add, perhaps we should start another thread on this.....

Edited by Scooby_simon