Hi Kevin.



John Burnham's editorial is certainly thought provoking. How relevent is his point of view to cat racers? I don't know of many weeknight cat racing series around the country. I don't think they are very common. For instance I know of WRCRA at Galesville on Tuesday evenings on the Chesapekae Bay. Sailing World has reported that the majority of racers are competing in weeknight series and many sailors are not competing in the weekend racing. Just the opposite of the cat racing scene.

So, Does cat racing need to emphasise the fun/ lowkey aspects at weekend events and not one design competition?



Cat Racers should ask the question. Is an emphasis on one design racing for regional weekend events the solution for the future or an echo of the past?



John Burnham would argue one design is an echo of the past and that fleets and clubs should be careful to not turn off sailors by stressing the highly competitive, one design nature of sailboat racing. These events are better off at national level or major championship level events. On the other hand... the one design highly competitive aspect of the sport is what keeps the core group of sailors participating and running many of the events.



Seems to me that the solution is to emphasize B fleets where competitve one design racing exists on weekend regattas, Race one designs within portsmouth starts to ensure that every one is competing against somebody, and to NOT pressure sailors into getting X boat ... just so we can call it a one design fleet because we have a magic number of boats.



Take Care

Mark