This isn't April 1st. <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

The problem is not with the Tornado...the problem is with the PC Mentality...it ignores one of the most basic principals of life..."WE ARE NOT ALL CREATED EQUAL"

If you are 5 feet tall the odds are will never be a successful NBA All Star. If you are 6'-6" and 280# it is highly unlikely you will ever be a successful Jockey. If you are blind don't be surprised if you plan a career as a golf pro and it doesn't work out.

What is being discussed here is the myth that everyone should have an equal chance of winning at a game when the very rules of the game (from its inception) have favored a certain body type. Add to that the fact that the tools used to win the game are locked to fixed parameters, and you will never have a competition that allows all players to compete on a level playing field. The whole concept of one design racing is a farce. All other things being equal, one body type/size is going to dominate every sport. If the equipment is changed to suit one group it will do so at the exclusion of others...it is a cat chasing its tail.

I am sure there are many men who are discouraged from competing on the Tornado feeling that they are too small/light or heavy to effectively campaign against the optimum sailor at the Olympic level...it's not a gender thing its a height/weight/strength issue...that’s life, get over it...

"Political Correctness is a doctrine fostered by a delusional, illogical
liberal minority, and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous media, which
holds that it is entirely possible to pick up a turd by the clean end."


Regards,
Bob

I was sorta serious.

I was thinking about how to use our most popular class without damaging the class by picking one boat as the Olympic boat.

It doesn't have to be as complicated as I had. An alternative would be.

* Special mast and sail with the sail area proportional to crew weight

* Wings/hiking bar with the overall width of the boat inversely proportional to the crew weight.

There are a lot of things you could do to derive a unique 1 design from a stock boat that you could provide to the Olympics.

I agree with your premise about one design constraints. Physics determines the optimums for any one design class... the range at the elite level will be quite small. Stay away from class politics etc etc.

Your assertion that its all about PC is just wrong.

Goal: Gender equity... Absolutely... so you must have men and women's divisions of a type of boat. Is this PC.... or Fairness.
I vote fair! (perphaps you want to debate Title IX and football scholarships in the USA)

Types of sailing. I proposed 5 basic classes.. Do you have a counter propopsal and why? (In your language which 5 turds do you want to float around in the circus) How is this choice PC?

So... The Olympic Sailing effort must afford opportunity for all of humans to SAIL... perhaps not your boat of choice... but afford the opportunity to compete in sailing. Is this goal PC... or Fair.... I vote Fair.

This means that the equipment selection must cover the range of humans when you view it as an agragate. This is not PC.... This is just a fairness issue. Notice... Basketball is not played with a team of 7 footers.

You get screwed when you stray from the core principles...

Once you stray... It will then be a matter of Political Correcness (Finn vs Laser) and just plain ol Politics... (it's hard to defend the USA when their proposal is... we only send up classes when we have a winner in that class.)

This is not PC... its just P.... and the politics is unseemly!

Remember... the Olympics are a nationalistic.. for better or worse... but that is what they are.. So... finding a cheap boat that poor countries can play with is not PC... in my opinion... it is just a matter of fairnes..



Take Care

When Bruce Far was asked what was a boat he would like to have designed he answered the Laser! Because as the most purchased one man Olympic boat it is worth a fortune. money money money...damn money!
We need two boats. a twin and a single and should hold out for that and until then hang with the T.

Forget the boat. What other Olympic class uses one-manufacturer sails? Even the Laser has two sources. Does anyone think this is viable? Does anyone think that no competitor at any level ever "adjusts" their class-supplied sails?

Why should the entirety of the sailing world be forced to make up for the struggling economy of one or another countries??

??

Your personal humanitarian ideologies have no place in a discussion of sports, no place in a discussion of sailing, no relevance to the issue of Tornado as Olympic material.

Not everyone has the "right" to sail. No one has a right to anything that they haven't earned, on a separate note. Olympic competitors in the US are less funded than European Olympic hopefuls, Canadian sailors, Puerto Rican sailors, etc. etc. . Almost all American campaigners spend a good deal of time and energy funding their careers through sponsorship or with their own money. You see that there is no advantage, even to the sailors in the wealthiest and most powerful country in the world. Sailors from other nations still manage to continue in competition, if poor countries want to develop sailing programs it isn't the obligation of other nations (at the disadvantage of their own constituents) to provide for this. This HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THE SPORT. It should have no reflection on the Olympic classes.

Additionally, US Sailing (and the Olympic Sailing effort) has no duty to provide anything to it's members based solely on their "right" to certain things, it's duty is only to the consensus of it's members and only additionally, to accurately represent the interests (as so expressed) of it's majority. This is where US Sailing has gone wrong. Massively wrong.

Why has the 'open' classification of the Tornado contributed to its being a male dominated class?

It hasn't. I'd be willing to bet that if one looked at the numbers, sailing would be a predominately male sport (perhaps not by much).

If you don't believe that, as a cat sailor you should realize that multihull sailing IS a predominately male sport. There are more male skippers than female skippers in general, and outside classes like the hobie 16, women become more scarce, even as crews. The hardest Olympic classes to get women involved in are 1. Multihull; 2. Skiff (though this has a better youth base: the 29er).

Resolved: women in multihull sailing are few. This is reason number one why there are not many women sailing Tornados. Also, consider the fact that youth sailing has a few basic manifestations: opti, laser, 420 (29er and sl16/h16 are MUCH MUCH smaller classes, MUCH less popular, MUCH more obscure in youth sailing [ and yes, I realize that this is a situation to which many people are making an effort to find a solution, me included] )

To jump from intense training in a 420 to a 470 is easier for someone than making that same jump into a Tornado. It's all about accessability. And that is essentially reason number two why women are few in Tornado sailing. It isn't readily accessable to anyone, much less women.

Three: the Tornado (and god knows I love this boat) is not an ideal design for an all women crew. BUT, the reason why this is less of an issue than it appears to be, is that in some ways it allows (potentially) the class to fulfill it’s title as "open". It is more likely that there will be mixed gender teams because a) it isn’t ideal to have two women sail together, and b) if there were successful mixed gender teams they would most likely be lighter than the all male teams, which would be the disadvantage to an all male team. (Overwhelmingly, the reason I believe that there are not mixed gender crews is specifically because the lack of development of the class (or multihulls in general) on the youth/beginner levels. By the way: in terms of any sort of gender equity the Tornado class is shooting itself in the foot with the minimum weight limit proposal. There is no room for mixed gender in the class with that rule.

Just some thoughts. Have at them.

AND:

A boat that can't be sailed outside of the Olympics???
What? Okay, so, the speed skaters should all use the same exact skates, ones that they can't use outside olympic competition. The cyclists must all use the same one-design bike: but not outside the olympics. This is a ridiculous idea. Ridiculous. Have you ever seen how advanced the rigging and sails and techniques of these Olympic sailors has become? Why should they be disadvantaged at the expense of someone who feels that they cannot afford to learn these things. Let's knock down the level of olympic sailing a little so that eveyone can play. This is the stupidest thing I've ever heard.

Sorry for posting again, but I agree with Bob. Gender equality doesn't exist. If you conform classes to the athletes and make the mistake of preventing the athletes form conforming to a class (or a sport) than this denies the whole purpose of competition. There will always be people who manage to defy the norm, women who sail Tornados, basketball players who aren't seven feet tall. etc. etc.

Sarah, I don't think gender equity has anything to do with gender equality.

Are there any classes anywhere that require a two person crew to be made up of one male and one female? Certainly in Australia, getting girls involved in a class assures male support.

Thanks Mary.

Why not? You are talking strict one design with a setup like the the Alter Cup, supplied boats.

If it were being done today, what would the boat look like, most likely a Hobie Tiger, with a Fiberfoam mast, Marstrom carbon rigging, and the best sails a one of the big lofts can put togather. For fairness, the running rigging and the tweaking would be done by the F18 Class.

We are moving away from one-design toward formula classes. None of the Formula Classes in their right mind would allow one of their boats to be selected as the Olympic One- Design. So, what are we left with, no multihull, the Tornado, or every 4 years let a Formula Class Association put togather their dream boat.

I cant recall all the details but the 49er is a SMOD "box boat". Had only one sail maker. When they changed makers the old sails were given a limited time before becoming non class legal. this may have changed..

But the box idea.. SMOD class open one box idea, main lobby guy was Bethwaite.. Its now a Olympic ideal...


As for females in Ts.. Didnt Elvstrom sail with his daughter in one olympics?

who said a T cant be sailed outside the Olympics?
My club has a fleet of Ts that sail every weekend.

As well as another 2 clubs with very healthy numbers in Oz........ And non of them with Olympic aspirations...... Just a love for the boat.

The USA scene for catamaran racers is quite twisted compared to what you guys have going...

None of the Tornado sailors actively racing the boat in the USA are members of an active local fleet of Tornado's. Reason... No active fleets of any size (greater then two boats) exist in the USA.

Likewise... I don't know of any Nacra 20 fleets sailing out of a club in the USA either. (West River Sailing will start up this season with 5 boats).

Perhaps, there is a club in the USA that has an F18 fleet going (Syracuse may be the best bet with 5 or 6 tigers) but I would not bet on it.

For better or worse... we do this the hard way... we trailer in all directions up to 500 miles for a two day regatta which gives you about 7 to 8 hours on the water.

The Tornado circuit is matched to the off periods in Europe. So... they have two regattas in Miami back to back (OCR and North Americans). They try to have one or two regattas at another venue around about November or December. (US Nationals and Pre Olympic class San Diego)
8

When their was more non olympic interest in the boat... They could get a regatta in Kingston, Canada, in August. However, the EU circuit and boat shipping durations has killed this event for the most part.

Healthy? Cat sailing is NOT healthy in Australia, especially Tornado's. It is not the classes fault but the sailors, Association, our sailing Federation and the manufacturers, Cat sailing is dead in this country there is a small number of Hobie 16's which could be called a class, sailing out of a club far north side Sydney, which is a difficult 1 hour drive from Sydney Central, a city with over 5 million people surrounded by perfect sailing waters you would not have to be too smart to figure out that we are doing something wrong. Now I am Finished with the Worlds I have lost all interest and faith in the sailors and the associations here in Australia, if I continue sailing i will be concentrating to compete in Europe as it is a waste of time and money here in Australia <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/mad.gif" alt="" />
Mark

Think we have 5 or so I-20's now out of www.tcdyc.com now. Just got one form Calf.

Doug

We have a fleet of 4 Nacra 20's sailing at Lake Carlyle in So. IL (St. Louis). Most of them travel occasionally as well...(Mine has been in Florida all winter....will be back home in a month for summer fleet racing)