Interesting how some kind of attack on folks who do not agree %100 keeps creeping in.
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<br>"This apparently shocks some entrenched on their mission to keep all the same no matter what by all means available . What is there to loose here , Hobie racing , formula would be the best thing for Hobie cat Co. Porthmouth ,-no one likes racing it except a very few who benifit by exploiting rules loopholes and gaps."
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<br>To get this thing off the ground, start simple. Just adopt the EU rules with some minor tweaks. Adjust the rules as the years go by to contain whatever the class membership deems necessary to contain.
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<br>The utopian vision that all cats designed and built to this or any other rule will magically perform exactly the same just isn't going to happen unless you really tightly constrain a lot of design elements. I think you will find that some design or designs will bubble to the top, some will fall by the wayside. You can look anywhere in the sailboat racing world and see this. You can look at automobile racing and see this. If a manufacturer cares they will put out a new design that might be better. If people care enough to want to win they will have to buy that boat. Hopefully more than one competitive design will continue to exist, otherwise it will end up one-design anyway (Tornado). How will people feel if one year they bought the hot deal, then the next year a new hot deal comes out. Won't happen? If it does often enough this may not stay a popular concept for long with the general sailing public. But this is the nature of forumal racing, with both its good and not so good sides.
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<br>I'm not saying this to bad mouth the concept, I think formula-style racing has a lot of promise, especially for those that want to tinker with their boats (who doesn't?). But, I also believe that these are some realities to face. I personally want to see it succeed, for some reasons you mention as well as others. Some day I'd like to join in.
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<br>So, stop bad mouthing folks who'd like to find a way to support what they do that also maybe would like to find a way to do both. You want them to join in? Show them how, don't insult them. That will lead to the very "decline of partisipation in the sport" that you seek to avoid. If there's a way to include these boats and or sailors, great. If not, don't tell them they're bad people because they don't choose to play with you today. They may never with that attitude. Swallow some words, they may join the circus later when they see how cool it is. Then it's your job to make it cool.
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<br>For the record, I race Portsmouth. And I'm actively trying to build up a Fleet that currently features Portsmouth racing. And I see that it is a great way to get people on the water and into a sport they wouldn't participate in otherwise. It would be great if we all sat down one day and decided to all go out and buy boats that fit a particular class or formula. And then tell anybody who wanted to join in they had to buy the same. This can work in some places, I suspect. But I'd hate to turn anybody away that showed with an AquaCat that wanted to find out about the sport. So I'll fight to have something like this available. Absolutely fair racing? Maybe not. Problematic? Yep. To turn your words a bit, maybe the only ones I found that really hate Portsmouth are the ones that can't win a Portsmouth race, or don't even like loosing the occasional one.
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<br>I guess that makes me a wanna-be-a-big-fish-in-a-small-pond-loophole-and-gap-exploiter. So be it. But, I also believe that out of the small ponds come some big fish that then go on to the bigger pond. Without the small ponds an important grass-roots support for the sport goes away. Look at the sailing world. A lot of sailors invariably hail from a yacht club somewhere. That club probably has beer-can races in rag-tag Fleets of handicap racing classes and one-designs. From that group comes some who participate at the high level. If someone in our Fleet shows up one day with a Formula-20 boat, they'll be welcome to race each week in Portsmouth and tune their skills, and then go out and join in with the rest of F20s on the big event days.
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<br>In the monohull world, you have one-design, measurement formula, and handicap racing. All are well supported. Some provide excellent stepping-stones to the others. Nobody claims one has to eliminate the other in order to exist.
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<br>Anyway, perhaps I'm ranting, and I apologize. It would be nice to see this develop without some of the attitudes.
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<br>Rant mode off.<br><br>Keith, Annapolis
<br>H-18, Northstar 500
<br>WRCRA