Mary:
General response to this whole nightmare of a thread.
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Thanks for the Nigel Pitt Letter. Makes sense out of a lot of this, no matter what spin Matt Miller tries to put on this. I don't pretend to know all the high end politics of this. However, that was my first year as a catsailor. I showed up to Spring Fever for my very first ever race, barely having a clue what a racecourse was about. I do remember Nigel Pitt taking the time out of his extremely busy schedule to explain what the NAHCA was to me, a greenhorn with a 21 year old battered Hobie 16, & why it was well worth my hard earned $20 to join. Nigel even went out of his way to make sure Alex Shafer gave me a forgotten part that day cause I wasn't going to be able to race without it. Sounds like a real bad man to me. Helping out a lost newbie and guide him on the road to an excellent sport he has come to love, Yep, Nigel's a really bad guy. Wish we had a lot more like him, the world would be a far better place.
Nigel explained to me who knew nothing about nothing. Introduced me to the concept of belonging and supporting your NAHCA class organization. He told me what he was trying to do for the class, & made me believe. That's not the same guy Matt Miller is trying to paint some picture of, making some implication about mismanagement of funds. They're just trying to discredit a good and decent man whom they have a point of contention with. Casting blame here is irrelevent. They're just blowing smoke to hide the real issues.

While all you critics are at it, leave Sam Evans the hell alone. You can't find a better guy more dedicated to catamaran racing, and he does a fine job of promoting the sport at every level. Got something bad to say about Sam, come to my house & I'll straighten you out. Be glad to bandage you up afterwards, too.

The real issue is that they aren't selling as many Hobies as they want. They think they can make some damn ruling and pull all the diehards back together. They don't seem to have a clue that the Hobie owning Diehards are in extremely short supply, not enough to make up a class or regatta big enough to be worthwhile. But they're just screwing up and making everyone angry about their shenanigans. Sailors have already made up their minds. If Hobie thinks they control the local fleets, they're crazy. No one to my knowledge has ever seen anyone from Hobie show up at the local fleet races. I don't think they could legitimately stop anyone from advertising a regatta with the Hobie name on it. They can stop publishing our races on Division Websites, or allowing Hobie Points regattas or maybe disallow a Fleet as a Hobie Fleet, but that will be cutting their own throats, the regattas will go on regardless. The only loss will be the gradual disappearance of the Hobie name recognition, and the only ones who will lose in that will be Hobie America. The real racers just want to race. I love Hobie Products. Although I don't own one at present, I sail Hobies with my other Brand-H catsailing friends regularly. Hobie just doesn't make a multihull that meets my wants at present. But if I had to make a choice between buying a Hobie Boat and another manufacturer's product at present, Mr. Miller's attitude, misdirection, and blaming has sure talked me out of buying another. And many others. People are looking at dumping their Tigers in the wake of the F-18 controversy, and that is the only thing Hobie has going for them in the USA right now. People bought their Tigers to finally be able to have a class where they could race their friends on a Brand X boats and still be class legal.
Hobie is trying to screw that up, and it's the first smart move they've made in years. The whole of Division 9 is in an uproar, we are not about to give up our regattas, nor our friends who sail multihulls of many flavors. We would all like to be able to work out something amicably, but to do things under the new Hobie rules would dissolve the racing fleets. There just aren't that many Hobies around to be able to hold a one design event of any magnitude. We have a large & growing local fleet in terms of participation. The local fleets have worked their collective butts off to promote catsailing, and we're not letting Hobie Cat or anyone else's misguided micromanagement stop our racing fun. Racing doesn't happen at the Hobie Cat Factory, they just build boats. Maybe they should just mind their own damn business, stick to building good and decent boats, and leave local fleet racing to the people who do it.
Cary Palmer
Hobie Fleet 141 www.seacats.org