Messing About In Sailboats

Ensuring Sailing’s Future: A Conversation With Gary Jobson of US SAILING | Daily Sailing News from North American Sailor

Great article on NASailor.com with the great Gary Jobson on the future of the sport and what US Sailing is doing. There is common theme with Nicholas Hayes' Saving Sailing. We have a donut problem. There is little shortage of teens and college kids who are actively sailing. There is certainly no shortage of middle aged and older folks. The problem is that we have a hole in the middle as the sport loses people aged 25-35. From my own experience, there are too many competing demands. It's the time when you're getting married, having kids, buying houses and building your career. Sailing takes a lot of time. Even golf only takes half a day. Taking part in a regatta, maintaining a boat, improving your skills are huge time commitments at a stage of life when you have the least to spare. Read more →

Pirate murders spotlight spreading risks | Elaine Bunting's Blog | Yachting World

via www.yachtingworld.com Very good article in Yachtingworld on the dangers of piracy in the Indian Ocean. A friend today asked me why the navies of the world could not deal with the issue. When one realizes that the high risk area is 1.4 million square miles, the answer is pretty clear. The area is too big to control with the current deployed resources. It would take a massive coordinated effort between the navies of major nations and this would undermine anything else these navies are engaged in. Read more →

Rambler 100 breaks the RORC Caribbean 600 Monohull record | News 2011

George David's maxi yacht, Rambler 100, crossed the finish line in Antigua in the early hours of Wednesday morning in an elapsed time of 1 day 16 hours 20 minutes and 2 seconds. Subject to official confirmation, Rambler 100 has broken the monohull race record set by race rival, Mike Slade's ICAP Leopard by nearly four hours. Two of the world's most impressive racing yachts have been locking horns over 600 miles of high-speed action in a fight to the finish. Competing against each other for the first time and battling it out to snatch the record for the third edition of the RORC Caribbean 600. The Rambler crew contained the entire compliment of the Puma Ocean Racing team which will be competing in the 2011-12 Volvo Ocean Race, tired but elated, Puma skipper, Kenny Read commented dockside in Antigua: Continued on RORC's site and more here from YachtingWorld Read more →

An-Tiki Water Aid Poster

An-Tiki's voyage is a fundraiser for Water Aid the charity that provides safe and clean water to the world's poorest people. The crew back home created this rather nifty poster to commemorate the voyage and get the Water Aid message out. You can download it here. Read more →

Contrasting Perspectives on Ocean Sailing

I am following quite a bit of Ocean sailing at the moment. The differences between experiences couldn't be greater. At one end of the spectrum you have the guys and gals in the Barcelona World Race getting smashed around in the Indian Ocean “Descriptions do not do the Indian justice, and for rookies like us, the seastate and gusty wind of the last few days has been a baptism of fire,” says Breymaier. “We have learned a lot about what our boat wants, what it can take, and where redline is. It is going to make the coming weeks much easier; of that I am certain.” The Neutrogena is averaging between 17 and 19 knots en route to the Amsterdam gate. Not every boat survived the rough seas. Pre-race favorite Michel Desjoyeaux and co-skipper Francois Gabart retired from the event after high winds snapped their mast. Two weeks earlier, Jean... Read more →