Keith, That whole thread has nothing to do with rules, etiquette, or politeness. It's got to do with a couple of jerkoffs, who hate multis and really hate catsailors ,trolling for responses. If you're screwing with someone else's race you're probably screwing with your own too. That being said with the disparity in speeds it's almost a non-issue to begin with. Those twits just won't hear it. The AO boats go where it's fast for them,not someone else. Racing is Racing.
p.s. Figured out anything for the timeshare?
Todd - I understand the underlying nonsense in the SA thread. Just wondering where the nugget of truth might be that the BS is built upon. I'm with you that the relative speed and size of the boats make the whole thing meaningless. We're not talking jet ski style buzzing here. I have yet to come to any understanding about how this ruins somebody's race. If the speed were similar and you parked on top of somebody, maybe. If you can convince me that everything else about your race was exactly perfect, maybe. How about I fall off, pass to leeward, but then come back on starboard tack, would that be better than simply going by to windward. I wonder. But...
In the following clip around 1:17 we line up and set up to pass two monos to windward. ~35 mile distance race, lightish air, large boats, we're on the line to the next mark. I choose to go above them. Not showboating, not showing who's superior, not intentionally messing with somebody's race, I've just got a goal of running my race and getting to the finish as fast as possible.
OK, or am I a cat whacker?
The funny thing in this is that later we approach an A0 boat to windward, there's another that's to windward of us. Pretty large lane, but as we approach the leeward A0 starts coming up. Eventually we get squeezed between the two of them in a shadow we can't escape from (the boats weren't as close together as that makes it sound). Don't know if the boat was messing with us, or if we happened to be in the wrong place as they decided to go after the other A0. The boat behind us that we had passed for the lead in our class sees this, hardens up, and passes all of us to windward. We end up blowing the sheets, slowing down, crossing the windward boat's transom and then rolling both of them to windward. We loose a trophy spot as a result. My only feeling is that I should have passed them all to windward in the first place. But maybe I have two things to feel bad about - loosing the place and passing them to windward? By the way, to my knowledge there were no complaints about any of the above (I don't have any), just throwing out an example.
I've been passed to windward out sailing and racing, my response is usually "look at them go!" Not "you dirty SOB you passed me to windward".
So anyway, good discussion.
On the timeshare - the best scenarios I come up with are 1) you move up here to the land of pleasant living 2) I get one, you get one, we do some two boat testing... I've started to get the real desire for one of those things! Unfortunate money reality right now is I need to find a new trailer for the Corsair. But the thought is still there...
