Hi everyone. I'm one of the people Big Whoop races with. I'm can vouch for the fact that no-one on the Ottawa River has more cat sailing experience or knowledge of local (Voodoo) wind conditions than Big Whoop. He is dangerous man to be near at the start line. I sail with a standard Hobie mainsail and easy-lock rudders. I use a 30" tiller extension and am sure it is one of the reasons I seem to finish ahead. I (along with Big Whoop) attended Madcatter this year and managed to finish 4th (my first experience racing a Wave). My thoughts on the tiller extension are that since all future Waves will come with easy-lock rudders, if it is truly the desire to grow the number of Wave racers, something must be done to close the competitive advantage of those using the older rudder system. If nothing is done, eventually I suspect, Wave racing will become the domain of lightweight sailors with enough cash to buy competitive rudder systems and go-fast sails. So....I have a couple of of suggestions:

1) Allow easy-lock rudder users to have tiller extensions

2) Allow the use the bungee cord system I read about on this forum for easy-lock rudder users

3) Set up a handicap system for easy-lock rudder systems (I really hate this idea)

BTW Mimi, we had an *awesome* time at Madcatter and I suspect there will be at least 3 Waves from LDSC at next year's regatta.

NorthernWave