Rolf,

That is not the situation we have here in NL.

The official Royal Dutch Watersport Assocation (KNWV) argued that sailing fragile catamarans on the North sea was insane and wouldn't have anything to do with it. So cat sailors formed a rival organisation together with 2 other brances of sport that used the north sea. The organisation is called the NFB (Dutch surf sports association) and it pretty much became the association for cat sailors.

I think as good as all 40 beach clubs are members of the NFB and I think only 1 or 2 cat clubs are members of the official Dutch Watersport Association. The KNWV has been trying to muscle in for years now only recently have been succesful to some extend by forcing every catsailor who wants to do the Round Texel to own (= pay for) a certified KNWV racing license. Did went down too well and it is still not sure whether they are going to win this.

The cat clubs still aren't considering becoming members of the rival KNWV and none are willing to enforce the "KNWV racing license". At least we have a good chance of starring this KNWV plan down as we have our own organisation unifying us. I think every nation should have such a organisation empowering the cat sailors as only then you can stand up to these tactics and have a chance at winning. I'm very thankful that we have one here in NL

Wouter

It gives me no pleasure to say this to you Simon, as I know you've put alot of work into it, but there is always the Texel handicap.

But, we can also just take the mathematical models of SCHRS, modify a few factors by a negligiable 0.1% and republish it under a different name. Will be very hard for ISAF to claim proporty rights to the new handicap system.

Wouter

I am not talking about the costs for an olympic campaign.. I am talking about the cost of a Tornado for the average club racer..Why buy a Tornado when there is no fleet and the N20 is the 20 foot boat of choice? (for a 1 design 20 footer) Why have a boat in the Olympics that almost nobody at the grass roots level is sailing?

oh PLEASE. the 16 is not the future of cat sailing, it is the past and it has a lot of momentum to carry it forward, but that is all.

For years I have been pushing folks in our club to join organizations such as US Sailing. "Why?" They have asked, and I have pointed out that they manage the Portsmouth ratings, and that if more multi sailors joined they would eventually see our worth.

This whole affair, however, has done it for me. There is no other way to interpret their actions at the ISAF council than to believe that after proposing no multi classes and catching a whole lot of flack that their subsequent proposal of two multi classes was nothing more than a cynical move to shut us up and stop the emails. Their votes are proof of this. They got what they originally wanted but can point to their proposal as "proof" they care. All I can say to that is %$*& off.

I'll probably drop my membership, and I will no longer try to get people to join. However, I won't be peeling off my US Sailing stickers. A lack of stickers on cars won't show how we feel. Instead, I will get some thin red tape and make the international "No" symbol around it. I will display that right next to my WRCRA decal.

I propose that everybody else do the same. Whether you stay a member or not, display your distaste by modifying your US Sailing sticker. Have it right next to your multi club decal. I think it would also be great to create a t-shirt sized logo that folks can print out and iron to a t-shirt. Wear it to every sailing event.

Olympic sailing has just become far less interesting. Now, there is even less reason to watch, and less reason to be involved with US Sailing.

I have devoted over 50 years of my life to catamaran sailing as well as towards the recognition of catamarans as legitimate racing sailing craft.
I have sat on YA committees at most levels and I have been elected to the position of vice commodore and commodore at different yacht clubs. I have served on protest committees too many to count, so I have gained a little experience of the ways in which ideas and bias interact with the decisions that are made behind closed doors of the yachting hierarchy.
When I first started sailing cats we couldn’t gain membership to any yacht club. As catamaran sailers, we couldn’t compete on any course set by any club. For many years we took the vitriolic abuse by virtually 100% of the “established” mono hull sailing community and slowly grew our numbers to the stage that it was better for the finances and club numbers to allow the cat sailers to become “legitimate” members of clubs than it was to turn them away. The abuse and undisguised antagonism both in the club rooms and on the water still persisted and still does persist today, albeit to a much lesser degree and more veiled today than in times past, but it is still there. Scratch the surface of many mono sailers and you can still find an anti, even hateful multi hull sentiment. While actively involved on various YA committees, whenever the opportunity arose, I always tried to promote the cause of multi hulls. This was usually disappointing and, even when a slight victory was achieved, all benefits obtained for multihulls were always greatly compromised and placed a distant third or fourth to similar benefits accorded to any mono hull class. When, after many years, it became painfully obvious that no matter how much work that I and many other multihull sailers did from WITHIN the sailing administration, there was never going to be the justice due to us, the recognition that we deserved, or even the financial benefits pro rata relative to the income that we supplied to the YA. If and when we put forward proposals for any benefit for multihulls on the same basis that were already “automatically” accepted as “rights” by mono classes (particularly for funding and youth training) that to any reasonable person were undeniable, all we would get in reply was grudging admission of our “proposals” then when put to the vote have every mono class represented vote overwhelmingly against. To cut a long story short, from personal experience I can say unequivocally that for multihulls to achieve equal rights from working within the established yachting administrations is a delusional dream. The only way for multi’s to achieve anything in sailing is to do it by ourselves for ourselves without the dead weight of the YA hanging from our necks like the mill stone that they are as far as multihulls are concerned. They want our money, they want to control us, and they want us to shut up, and hopefully not be seen or heard. The ISAF treat us like a corrupt politician treats his electorate. They promise us the world to get our vote and money but after they have their perceived power, treat us with total disdain or completely ignore us and then have the unmitigated gall to tell us (over a sumptuous dinner paid for by us) that “we may not like what they have done, BUT it has been done solely in OUR best interests” Does any one really believe that?
They want our money, THEY DON’T WANT US. We can never get the results due to us from working WITHIN the system, we are just too out numbered by self interests that are NOT multi hull interests, so why are we there? Why keep trying to bang our heads against the proverbial brick wall? Just how long does it take for us too see just how the land lays? It has been this way for over half a century, what makes any of you think that there is going to be a “C” changes over the next half century?
In the words spoken in a great Australian movie “Tell em their dreaming’”

And some other points of sail:

http://www.sail-world.com/australia/The-Death-Of-ISAF-and-the-Olympics?/39015

>Personally I have nothing against the Finn or the Laser, but what annoys me is that there are two boats extremely similar, so similar that a skipper can easily jump between boats and do well in both. <

http://www.sail-world.com/australia/Double-Silver-medalist-against-Olympic-events-card/39000

>Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. 24 hours ago I thought the ISAF Events Committee had sobered up from their night on the tiles by deciding to axe the 2 keelboat classes - at last they have seen some sense.

Get rid of the 2 most expensive boats to campaign that hardly anybody sails - obvious! They have now perfected a U turn faster than any modern political party. If ISAF cannot see that high performance dinghies are the way of the future and that the obvious way to increase female participation in the Olympics (and the sport) was the women’s high performance dinghy then there is little hope. <

http://www.sail-world.com/australia/ISAF---Not-Fit-For-Purpose/38974

With Qingdao looking to be a foggy, drifting washout, the 2012 events at Weymouth have a chance to restore some sanity to sailing as an Olympic event. By their inbred and blinkered decisions in Portugal last week, the ISAF Council showed themselves to be Not Fit For Purpose.

Interesting.. here no lightings, no snipes no stars handfull of etchells or solings.. I14s, javelins, Cherubs thrive however..
In cats.. Ts still have a fleet.. not sure about H16s.. Growing is F16 and As..

There seems to be some confusion that this was about the Tornado. This vote had NOTHING to do with Tornado and/or any of it's costs associated with it. This wsa a vote against an open multihull class. Next vote would have had to do with equipment.

In fact, the Star is by far the most expensive boat in the Olympics. You can fit 10 Ts in a container and what - two of the 6 knot beasts.

This was an anti multihull vote advocated by US Sailing from the get go. What makes it worse is their smoke and mirrors proposal of two multhull classes fully knowing that their delegates were not going to vote for them.

Whether you like the T or not (personally I20 doesn't come even close buy anyway) this has a huge effect on all catamaran sailing everywhere. The level of competition in the Ts is unrivaled by any other class and those sailors raise the level of competition in other classes like the F18s and A cats.

I would love to hear PUs take on this and whether this would be a good time for IHCA to separate from ISAF. Hobie has a chance here to step up and take the lead.

I guess that depends on the locality.. Local club here has a fleet of Ts sailing weekly no N20s...
Fact there is a mold for a T hanging in a local shed.. Before your say the mold isn't quick.. Boats from that have won heat in world championships.. just a few thoughts..

Wouter,

that is simply appalling! Sailing cats is dangerous in the North sea, while sailing a Laser or a Yngling is safe enough? What a great logic.. Now I understand why the dutch representative voted as he did. Good that you have been able to set up your own structure under those incredible conditions! Many have expressed concern that clubs will be closed to multihulls now that we are out of the olympics..

There has been quite some talk about setting up "our own" organization from Bundy, Veal, Darryl and others. Who is going to have at it, do an analysis, set up the structure and get into it if it is worthwhile? I dont think that is the way to go, but if it is to be tried "someone" better get started.

from the ISAF website, a few "Objektives"

To promote the sport of sailing in all its branches regardless of race, religion, gender or political affiliation

To examine, study, investigate, consider and report on all matters affecting the sport of sailing and any persons interested therein or associated therewith and to collect, analyse and distribute information, statistics, opinions and reports thereon

To represent and protect the interests of any member of the Federation

These fellows could make a hot air ballon lift off without gas.

I must say that if Hobie did that then they would actually proof to be the catamaran scene leaders that they always claim to be. This could well be the deciding move on their part.

Hell, we could even tell Hobie to be with us or against us !

Wouter

The Dutch problems originated some 30-35 years ago. Of course since then the KNWV has learned that they made a serious mistake back then and try to regain some portion of the action. That was a different time back then and volunteer work was still highly regarded, much more then now. However I'm sure we can do it again. Afterall with guys like Darren Bundock and Rohan Veal pushing in that direction I feel we have a great shot at this. Make these guys ambassadors and find a few volunteers (others call then "tools") to organise the new structure on the background. I'm convinced it can be done.

I'm also convinced that if we take up Rohan Veal on his idea to combined the Moth/Bladerider class with the racing cats and in a true high performance class that we will succeed internationally and probably even be able to extend this organisation later to include womens HP skiff and mens HP skiffs.

A while back an idea was floated in NL to combined the formula classes (+A's)into one single cirquit, combine all our resources and volunteer man power. I feel this is the time to make that happen. Again with ambassadors like Bundock and Veal, we got a great shot !

Lets do it !

Wouter

And another thing.

"Amateurs" like Rocklegde Engineering are now producing better quality video reports of catamaran racing then the professionals. Surely we can expand this and usage of the internet to televise our sport !

Guys, the more I think about it, the more I feel this is an excellent time to make the jump. We got all we need to make this work. We don't need ISAF or mainstream centralized TV anymore. The internet and our common sense are enough now.

Also take a look at Aestela's tacticat, completely developped outside of ISAF and hugely popular. Even attracting sponsorship money right now.

Wouter

I noticed on the ISAF website that "Hobie Cat Europe is the latest sponsor to partner with ISAF in the Connect to Sailing programme". Perhaps we should all suggest to Hobie Cat Europe, Hobie Cat USA, and all other multi-hull manufacturers that since the ISAF doesn't wish to support the multi-hull segment of sailing that perhaps the multi-hull segment should no longer support the ISAF.

From today's The Dailysail

Women and cats get poor deal ISAF make the 'wrong' decision again

On Wednesday last week, things were looking good at the ISAF Annual Conference in Estoril, Portugal. The Events Committee had met and made their recommendations to the ISAF Council as to which events they thought should be included in the 2012 Olympic Games. Essentially they voted in favour of removing the two keelboat classes and adding a high performance double handed dinghy for women. Although by no means a radical step it seemed as though ISAF were finally looking to the future and taking the appropriate steps to keep sailing in the Olympics.
It was, then, with a heavy heart we reported on Friday, 9 November, the ISAF Council had chosen to ignore totally these recommendations. Instead they opted to keep the two keelboat events in – changing the women’s keelboat event from fleet racing to match racing – at the expense of the multihull and women’s high performance double hander. At best this can be seen as a conservative move, at worst a huge step backwards and the beginning of the end of sailing’s inclusion in the Olympic Games.

The first question that must be asked is exactly what is the point of the Events Committee and others existing? This group the ISAF itself claims to comprise experts, who were flown into Estoril and put up there in hotels. These experts were then asked to discuss the situation, share their informed views and to make their recommendations to the ISAF Council – who are not stated as experts in the ISAF press releases unlike the Events Committee. But then the expert recommendations are totally ignored. If this is the way ISAF are going to make major decisions, why bother having expert advisers at all? Why not just sit a group of aged blazers in a room and ask them to make all the decisions based on what they think is right, irrespective of the views of the rest of the international sailing community – for judging by Friday’s decision this seems to have been the case with the entourage of committees flown in to make the Council’s decision appear fair and even handed.

One of the best things we felt ISAF had done in recent years was to introduce two separate guidelines for a class to be included in the Olympics. Essentially these set out that events should either increase nation participation (cheap and accessible classes) or increase media interest (fast and exciting to watch). Although no one would question the strength of the Star as the men’s doublehanded keelboat it is difficult to see how it, or many other two person keelboats, would fit in with the above criteria.


Above: One of the contenders for the women's double handed high performance dinghy.

Perhaps you could argue that match racing for the women will be exciting, but when you consider it is at the expense of a high performance women’s dinghy it is clear which should have won. The removal of the multihull seems nothing short of idiotic. Here is an area of the sport that is arguably growing quicker than almost anything else - look at the F18s or even the more exotic A Class Worlds being held at the moment. It is fast, competitive and exciting to watch, but has now been removed.

It comes as a shock to be writing this article as we felt sure we would instead be contemplating which skiff would be best for the women’s high performance slot. As it turns out we are far from alone as the sailing world is in uproar about ISAF’s decision. A quick glance around other websites, blogs and forums and we struggle to find anyone who thought this to be a remotely positive move.

However, it is not just the writing community who are struggling to see the sense in this move. Cat sailing legend, Mitch Booth spoke to us from the A-Cat World Championships in Florida about the decision. “It has nothing to do with what is good or bad or right or wrong, it is just the politicians and their decisions,” he said. “That is why I have completely lost faith with the ISAF process and their management of the sport. I was heavily involved as a sailing advisor for the multihull re-evaluations about six or seven years ago. I have seen the sport from the administration view, from inside ISAF, and I have lost faith completely with their whole structure, hence why I do not go to the ISAF meetings anymore.”

Surely when an administration for a sport is getting this kind of reaction from their top sportsmen something has gone drastically wrong. Booth is not alone in his view. Many other sailors we have spoken to expressed their anger at the lack of vision shown by ISAF.

It is perhaps not surprising that the cat sailing community is currently the most angered by the events selection. “When you look at the council they are all older people and as a rule have all sailed Stars at some point,” commented GBR Olympic Tornado representative, Will Howden. “They don’t really want to break with tradition and I think that is a shame as it could well be the death of the sport.”


So what result is this likely to have on the catamaran community? Here is where debate begins to go in different directions, some saying it will not effect the community in any way, while others believe the loss of faith could be devastating. Howden believes the multihull fraternity will probably remain reasonably unaffected by the choice saying that only a handful of Olympic sailors are in the F18 class regularly so numbers should stay high. He does wonder, though, whether this might be the effective death of the Tornado. “When you look at most of the non-Olympians who have Tornados a lot of the reason they have them is because they want to go and race them internationally. That is probably not going to be all that popular now, certainly for the next few years,” he comments.

Others have a slightly different view. In his excellent blog (here) Rohan Veal wonders whether the lack of faith in ISAF will see the multihull community pulling away and setting up their own administration. This is certainly a possibility if ill feeling remains at this level as one has to ask exactly what is cat sailing getting from ISAF now it is out of the Olympics? This would be a dangerous thing to happen as suddenly there would be a clear route for any factions irritated by ISAF to splinter away causing the whole federation to fall apart.

Although the multihull’s exclusion from the Games is a shock what is perhaps worse is the severe blow that had been dealt to female sailing at this meeting. With equality between female and male events supposedly being important at the Olympics, why have we not seen a vote to overthrow the mid year meeting’s decision to have six male events and four female events? Surely five events each is the obvious way to go if increased female participation is a serious goal. “As I understood it, [ISAF] wanted to get as near as possible to a 50/50 split,” comments two time Olympic Gold medallist, Shirley Robertson. “To make a decision to have two men’s doubles and two men’s singles is not really progressing the sport in any way.”

Certainly if giving the women less events than the men was going to irritate them then so too was the exclusion of a women’s high performance double hander. We simply cannot understand this when clearly it would have been such a good thing for the sport. We were trying to think of a fair and balanced view to put across regarding this decision but the only reason we can see for such a choice is a general feeling within the ISAF Council that women are not up to sailing such a class. Perhaps it could be argued that getting a new class into the games is too difficult, although it really shouldn’t be.

The choice of swapping women’s fleet racing for match racing is, simply, ludicrous. Even women’s fleet racing in keelboats has had small numbers in the Olympics and on the international circuit, but female match racers represent an even smaller subset of this. Certainly if you are one of them life must be looking pretty good at the moment.

But numbers are not the only problem. “To think that they have gone back to match racing is crazy,” exclaims Robertson. “We have already seen match racing is very difficult to work for women, not just in terms of the Olympics where you can sort of see it working, but in terms of the whole circuit, it does not really fit in. We saw that it did not work for the men in Sydney. It was supposed to bring the media in and it did not. The final in 2000 was the most boring thing that I have seen on TV and that is not just my view, it is shared by a lot of people.”



Some might say that match racing will be good for the sport as it can reduce costs dramatically with boats being supplied for events, but Robertson maintains this is simply not the case. “It would be interesting to know how [ISAF] see it working. Are they going to select a boat or are they to be supplied? If the reason is to lower price then I do not think that they have really thought it through. If you are going to be match racing in different boats then you end up buying two of each for training. Then the rich countries just get better and better because they can buy more and more boats,” she points out.

This is not the only problem either. Robertson adds that with fleet racing in theory anyone can give it a go, but with match racing it is much more difficult as entry to regattas often involves invitations based on each individual sailor’s ISAF ranking.

Robertson also says that although the Yngling was a bit of a funny looking boat and was, to some extent brought to the Olympics out of blind panic - due to match racing being rejected the last time around and no other women’s keelboats existing in any sort of numbers at the time – it was still a good and technical class to sail. At least the Yngling had some sailors in it and many countries had spent money building up technical data and doing research and development. To swap this for match racing and effectively start again with a very similar discipline just feels like a badly judged short term solution. “I think you are making a decision about something that is not just six years in advance but much more. You can’t keep changing classes every four years. It is actually a long term decision that needs to be made and that has not happened,” Robertson concludes.

So once again ISAF have made all the right noises in the build up to Olympic event selection and once again they have managed to totally mess it up when it comes to crunch time. Still, perhaps all is not lost as two time Olympian, Simon Hiscocks, optimistically wrote in our feedback article (here) “There is hope....... the Laser could be the one person dinghy heavy, the Moth the one person dinghy, the 49er men and woman the two person dinghy…” Given the recent decisions ISAF have made, we are not holding our breath.

While PU certainly has his opinions on this (I spent an hour on the phone with him Saturday), he is not involved with the IHCA anymore. David Brookes is the paid IHCA Executive Director who was at the ISAF Meeting. David was the one quoted saying that the USA delgates had made a deal with the 470 class.

It's unlikely that Hobie USA will get involved too much. After all, they are a kayak company that makes recreational catamarans - and a few Hobie 16's.

HCE is a different matter. Only John Dinsdale can say how they will respond.

I would like to know the following:

1, Why was the usual voting system changed - It is usally a vote on all options. Option with lowest number of votes gets dropped, re-vote on remaining options; repeat until results fit the imposed boat limits?

2, Who prompted this change?

3, Why was this change proposed ?

4, How can this be done (one assumes in some sort of seedy back room deal)?