Doublehanded offshore keelboats in the Olympics

[Foolish Muse]

http://www.sailweb.co.uk/News/30956/offshore-race-gets-the-nod-for-2024-olympics

Very interesting. Will the sailors supply their own boats? This would be the most expensive equipment in any Olympic event. Or will the Olympics supply the boats? In which case there will be a fire sale as soon as the event ends.

All in all a very good thing for us sailors. I think the onboard TV coverage will be really good.

 

[flaming]

http://www.sailweb.co.uk/News/30956/offshore-race-gets-the-nod-for-2024-olympics

Very interesting. Will the sailors supply their own boats? This would be the most expensive equipment in any Olympic event. Or will the Olympics supply the boats? In which case there will be a fire sale as soon as the event ends.

All in all a very good thing for us sailors. I think the onboard TV coverage will be really good.

In principal I have long been in favour of this. But the execution absolutely stinks. For example...

https://www.sailingillustrated.com/...DZ99EZtO0ayE0_D0yBQEfxAiegrE1Cz_IxVe6cI5wl_nY

Rumours of "done deals" abound.

And come on YW, where's your journalism on this one?

 

[Motor_Sailor]

I have very little faith at the moment that World Sailing can advance the interest of sailing as a whole.

The olympics might be a great show case for sailing, but if we can't galvanised viewers with the skiffs and the like, simply a change of boats is not going to do it.

 

[Ingwe]

I can see this working, but probably not in the way that is currently being envisaged.

What could work quite well is say 4-5 inshore races followed by an "adventure" style offshore race worth double pints - I am thinking along the lines of something like the SIlver Rudder / Vegvisir races ie 2 days 150 to 200 miles along a coastal / archipelago route so that you only need the boat to meet Cat 3 and so that you can do nice video's showing off the scenery as opposed to just watching some boats on a tracker that could be anywhere. If you just do an offshore race then you will really struggle to engage the public to the competitors because it would just be a one off result where all the other sailing events have 10 or so results for everyone to follow and build up to a final race.

You could do this 2 handed on a pretty small boat eg something like a Seascape 18 or 24 which would keep the costs down and make it obvious on the long race that the competitors are having to work hard ie no auto pilots and can be specified with electric auxiliary engines - I am not sure that having a diesel auxiliary like you would have on anything larger is good promotion for what we are trying to promote as an environmentally friendly sport.

 

[flaming]

I was having a long chat about this with some sailing mates last night. One of whom went through a 49er campaign (didn't get selected, was the training crew) and we came up with one possible way of doing it.

The big issue with this event is that the world of offshore sailing is so completely different to the world of Olympic sailing. In Olympic sailing there is a well known calendar of events for the Olympic classes, and sailors travel around the globe sailing in these events with the aim of qualifying their country, and then themselves to the next games.
Offshore sailing has nothing like that, so the Olympics either need to set a completely different qualification method for this class, or it needs to get a worldwide 2 handed offshore series off the ground and ready to go in 2020 straight after the next games.
The first option is possible, I guess, but if you're suddenly making offshore doublehanded racing an Olympic qualification route, then you've got some serious issues with finding the level and especially finding the fleets in dispersed enough places.
I think a better bet would be to run a super, super strict regime in supplied boats. So you are using existing fleets chartered in for a week or so in a variety of venues around the world. Make the boats diverse, like the match racing tour of old - some displacement, some planing, some A-sail some symmetric etc. But crucially, have a rule that anyone sailing in the series is utterly banned from sailing any of those types of boat outside of a "tour" event or pre event practice days. So no getting an advantage by having a lot of money to go 2 boat testing for hundreds of hours. Just practice manoeuvres in whatever boat you can get your hands on and then turn up and sail the boats provided.
And then the boats supplied for the Olympics should be basically completely new to everyone. And the racing in each place is 4 days of long coastal races, followed by a double points 36-48 hour race.

Bill it as the marathon of the sailing events.

But they won't do this, as seemingly WS sees this as a money making opportunity....
That means the most rounded sailors

 

[dunedin]

As some observers have noted, even IF some very rich sponsor provided the fleet of boats for Olympic events (a very expensive if), any country wanting to be competitive would need one or better 2-3 boats to train in.

Other than a handful of rich and well funded countries, few of the Olympic nations will be able to afford to invest in these boats. Even moderately expensive boats like 49er have much fewer countries entering qualification events than the much more affordable Laser. Adding a few zeros to the boat prices may make this a very small event - which may be why some rich countries like it.
But if Sailing turns up to an Olympic event with only a few competitors due to costs the Olympic federation will quickly call foul and allocate the athlete places to other emerging sports instead.

PS. Even before the late slot in of the Keelboat event, proposals to change many of the event boats could be unaffordable by many countries who have existing fleets of Lasers, 470s, and now 49ers etc. Whilst modernising the boats might appeal to some, changing more than one boat per 4 year cycle is a financial risk too far for many

 

[Foolish Muse]

From my view, there is absolutely nothing in the L30 that says performance racing boat. I'd have a real hard time believing this is what they have in mind. Double wheels??? Double rudders on a trailerable boat??? A complete galley below???

 

[flaming]

From my view, there is absolutely nothing in the L30 that says performance racing boat. I'd have a real hard time believing this is what they have in mind. Double wheels??? Double rudders on a trailerable boat??? A complete galley below???

Welcome to the madhouse...

 

[dancrane]

No more Finn??? :mad-new:

No more interest in the Olympics.

 

[dunedin]

No more Finn??? :mad-new:

No more interest in the Olympics.

Why? Some good sailors in the Finn, but boat quite old, expensive and slow.
Lots of exciting racing in the foiling cat & 49er/FX, good tactical and spinnaker racing in the 470 (closest to Osprey sailing!) and the closest / hardest to win Laser fleets.

 

[dancrane]

Even a little squirt like me can sail a Laser, and a really able squirt can win a race in one...although I'd do better with the Radial rig.

The inclusion by the Olympics hitherto of the Finn as a heavyweight singlehander category, recognised the desperate unfairness of offering only one size of dinghy to suit all men, from squirts to giants. Should fellows of excellent fitness weighing well over 100 kilos henceforth be forced out of Olympic singlehanded dinghy racing, because on balance they'll rarely beat equally able lighter helms?

The fact that the Laser Radial is regarded as better suited to the average female physique than the standard Laser, recognises that ballast matters...so why is a generally lighter gender catered for with a different rig, if the diversity of weights of male helms, is not?

And what is the logic in the intention "To change the Mixed One Person Dinghy Event to Mixed Two Person Keelboat Offshore"? It makes no sense at all to replace chalk with cheese.

 

[bbg]

Even a little squirt like me can sail a Laser, and a really able squirt can win a race in one...although I'd do better with the Radial rig.

The inclusion by the Olympics hitherto of the Finn as a heavyweight singlehander category, recognised the desperate unfairness of offering only one size of dinghy to suit all men, from squirts to giants. Should fellows of excellent fitness weighing well over 100 kilos henceforth be forced out of Olympic singlehanded dinghy racing, because on balance they'll rarely beat equally able lighter helms?

The fact that the Laser Radial is regarded as better suited to the average female physique than the standard Laser, recognises that ballast matters...so why is a generally lighter gender catered for with a different rig, if the diversity of weights of male helms, is not?

And what is the logic in the intention "To change the Mixed One Person Dinghy Event to Mixed Two Person Keelboat Offshore"? It makes no sense at all to replace chalk with cheese.

Surely everyone who would be competitive in a Finn would be able to sail this new class, no? They may not be able to sail a singlehanded class, but they would still have a route to compete in the Olympics.
And not everyone's physique is catered for in every event. If you are a lightweight rower you will never be able to win an Olympic gold medal in 8s. Other events yes, but never in the 8.

 

[dancrane]

What you say is exactly right BBG (and I'd probably defer to your judgement if I disagreed).

But the daunting primitive power and demands of the Finn, and the dynamic performance of its ablest sailors in view of the necessity to pump the boat by sheer physical strength, separates it as a display of combined abilities from the lighter, 'universal' Laser.

I've always felt it creates a thrilling, easily-appreciated event by virtue of the una rig's simplicity and the huge pressure on each man alone, rather than the Laser's universality or the pressures on a team sharing the complicated balance of three sails and skiff pace.

Not saying I'm not glad to see a keelboat in the line-up...there should never have been any doubt of its inclusion.

But the fact that something new like the "mixed kite" is included should not, to my mind, exclude repetition of a classic contest.

 

[bbg]

Getting back to the meat of this thread, I would be interested to know what they consider to be an "offshore" race. How long? 2 hours? 6 hours? 24 hours including tidal gates?

 

[flaming]

Selection of the boat is confirmed.

So we are actually going to see a boat with twin bloody wheels being used as an offshore doublehander.

https://l30class.org/l30-one-dsign/

What a total and ridiculous joke.

 

[Ingwe]

I also think that it is a bit of a risk that they are using the Rolex Middle Sea race as the main inaugural event. They are going to be by far the smallest boats in the fleet, last year there were only a couple of boats under 35 feet and an l30 is about 2 tonnes lighter than anything that was entered last year, so if they do get a windy middle sea race (which often seams to happen) they are going to take a real pasting, it won't look good if in their first event half of the boats are DNF.

 

[flaming]

I also think that it is a bit of a risk that they are using the Rolex Middle Sea race as the main inaugural event. They are going to be by far the smallest boats in the fleet, last year there were only a couple of boats under 35 feet and an l30 is about 2 tonnes lighter than anything that was entered last year, so if they do get a windy middle sea race (which often seams to happen) they are going to take a real pasting, it won't look good if in their first event half of the boats are DNF.

As I understand it, it's worse than that. They can't actually compete in the event itself as the boats don't meet the stability requirement.

 

[Chris 249]

Even a little squirt like me can sail a Laser, and a really able squirt can win a race in one...although I'd do better with the Radial rig.

The inclusion by the Olympics hitherto of the Finn as a heavyweight singlehander category, recognised the desperate unfairness of offering only one size of dinghy to suit all men, from squirts to giants. Should fellows of excellent fitness weighing well over 100 kilos henceforth be forced out of Olympic singlehanded dinghy racing, because on balance they'll rarely beat equally able lighter helms?

.

I know it's an old post, but the fact is that the Finn class has been utterly hypocritical over the weight issue. For decades, they didn't give a damn about lightweight dinghy sailors. Until the 470 came in, the Olympics had no place for light sailors. I have old interviews where the issue was raised and the Finnsters basically said "bad luck, small sailors are not athletes".

The class only appears to have decided that OIympic sailing should be open to people of all weights when it suited the Finn's own interests. While it is a great class, its attitude towards weight equity is hypocritical, inconsistent and self serving and therefore not worthy of consideration.

 

[flaming]

They made a video.

Overall, quite a few of my objections to the execution have been answered. Just the issue of training for 4 years for one race in supplied kit... Break something and game over, and you don't even get to be responsible for the kit...

 

[sails_02]

Looks interesting. I wonder how teams go about getting access to one of these boats?