Skip is anything but an ****.

No doubt poor form was displayed, but the reference to this incident damaging the status of multihulls in the US Sailing world is a little over the top. I’m confident US Sailing has no interest in any event that doesn't put $$ into the US Sailing coffers, our status will remain unchanged.

I'm not disagreeing with your logic. The US sailing part is a little dramatic ( I think you've been reading too many Ben Ainslie threads on SA). How does the process go for hearing a protest when there is no protest committee and who would you file it with?

day 1.....off to a slow start, got pinched out at the start and had to loop around at start about 30 seconds late. A nice reach in about 12-15 knots to card sound bridge. Tripp did a great job on strings and by the time we reached the bridge, we were right behind the other F-18's (Ingram, Jake Kohl, and Jim Zellmer). Then a nice upwind to the entrance to Angelfish creek. We were second into the creek (of the F18's) right on the tail of Jake, once in the ocean it was a double trap "death reach" south. After a short period, we decided to try the kite, it was a much smoother ride with the kite, but we were being constantly knocked towards shore, we had to douse and reach back out and found ourselves a bit ahead of jake. The spin runs got longer and the reaches shorter as we moved south until we could run with the kite and not have to worry about getting knocked to the shore. Behind us, it looked like Dave had passed Jake (later found out the Jake broke a spin halyard cleat and had to stop to regroup). appeard to have 4th (behind the 3 carbon boats) comfortably locked up with some time in our pockets. Until.........the spin bridle broke and the pole folded. Crap....20 miles from the finish and no kite. While we were stopped to work out options and Dave passed us and checked to make sure we were ok. Our jury rig consisted of passing the spin tack line through the spin bridle tang on the windward hull and tying it off to the beam. We were able to do 14-16knots this way but both Jake and Jim passed us as our progress slowed considerably. Each time we needed to jibe, Tripp would douse the kite, scurry out the bow, untie the tack line, throw it around the forestay, we'd jibe the boat, then he'd scurry out the other bow and retie to the new windward hull, rehoist the kite and off again. Once we got back to the beach, Mike Krantz, Dave Lennard, and Brett Moss immediatly dove in and started working out how to get us fixed in time for the morning start. Dave and Mike rode with us back to Gilberts and spent about an hour building a patch section for the pole and putting it back together. Aren't cat sailer friends great!


Now day two.......short spin run down to the channel 5 bridge, the pole lasted about half way there before it broke again. Crap......last under the bridge with our competition out in the distance. At least it would be upwind the rest of the day. Tripp, the animal that he is, worked his tail off and before long we had passed Jim and were crossing tacks with Jake and Dave. Trying to navigate one of the really narrow channels, we were clumped in with 3 other boats and I got pushed too far outside the channel, we hit bottom and capsized. Damn......competition sails away. Again Tripp grinds them down again, Just as we catch up, our mainsheet blocks break. **insert explatives here** We stop the boat and Tripp goes about jury rigging the blocks and after about 5 minutes, were off again. Jim is still behind us, Jake is way out in front, and Dave is about half way between. The rest of the leg is spent again catching up, but we ran out of room and finished a couple minutes behind Dave.

I suspect when the video hits the web there will be an ad-hoc protest hearing right here where every rule and nuisance will be discussed in great detail. It will also have a greater impact on behavior than any rule 69 hearing could ever hope to have. Correct me if I'm wrong but a rule 69 judgment has absolutely no teeth unless you're an Olympic hopeful.

It could go straight to an appeals committee of the regional sailing association, which in this case is probably the Florida Sailing Association. But the paper flows through US Sailing first (protest sent to USSA, then they forward it to FSA). FSA could punt it back to US Sailing since there's no member club involved. US Sailing would probably appoint a judge to hear the protest via conference call / e-mail.

I don't think the reference to US Sailing is "over the top" or dramatic. You would be surprised at how many people there lurk on this forum. There are pictures and a story on the front page for everyone to see. And don't forget - this is the same group running Tradewinds - that US Sailing has a strong vested interest in now (Youth Multihull Championship / Olympic Development / ISAF Youth Qualifier).

Damn Karl,
Sounds like your boat is living up to it's name. Congrats on you and Tripp's perseverance.

The worst case scenario under Rule 69 (a ban) means you can't race in anything that invokes ISAF Regulation 19 - which is any level of competition in an International Class - F18, A-Class, etc.

If you ignore the ban, your ban gets extended - ISAF just did that for a couple of Australians (http://www.sailing.org/sailors/suspended-sailors.php)

I'm not saying this would happen here. Bans are for egregious offenses and repeat offenders. A Rule 69 hearing is serious business. I've been on the judges' side of the table in one - in a lawyer's office. Serious as a heart attack.

Matt,

Come on now, you and I both know US Sailing pays very little attention and to say different will have to be backed with some evidence. Secondly, crap like this happens regardless of the platform and for someone to sit back and say multihulls don't have the act together because of it is simply stupid and probably being driven by an agenda!

I also think you are inaccurately and maybe with a little prejudice making some comments that really have no foundation. You well know or you should know there are a lot of folks involved in the ISAF event and to jump to the conclusion that the Steeplechase and the Tradewinds (ISAF regatta) will be conducted in a similar fashion is unfair and uneducated. We have all had our issues with Rick but knowing the folks currently involved with the ISAF event (and you should too Matt) the event will not disappoint.

This sort of thing happened to me once. The guy that hit us did the only thing he was allowed in the rules when there's significant damage; he retired. Then he showed us he was a true sailor and competitor; he offered us his boat so we could continue to race.

Let all the facts and video come out before anyone gets BBQ'd.

I broke my spin pole long ago, a knot came undone and the pole was bent badly. During the straightening process, it broke (second bend, same place) finding a replacement locally proved impossible. But a local marine hardware dealer sold me a piece of very thick alu tubing to use as an insert. It is maybe twelve inches long. No trouble since, about three years.

Come on now John, where's the fun in that??! ;^)

And for Karl, what exactly is breaking on your spin pole bridle, and where?

And are you using the factory wires, dyneem lines or something else? I've not heard of many failures of bridle wires, but you've had two in a row? What's causing it?

Pole failure has been due to the synthetic bridles either breaking or the stopper knots pulling out of the fitting at the end of the pole. New pole will have the bridles spliced at both ends. No more stopper knots!

Reminds me of my trials with vectran. Stuff has been used in space because of its light weight and high strength but is crap for any application that is dynamic like running through blocks because it has zero stretch qualities.

Took a couple broken trap lines and a conversation with an engineer to understand what was happening.

Wow, lots of interesting stuff going on here...

Without taking sides, or having been there, it's pretty obvious that there is no shortage of varying opinions on what transpired at this event, and what should have happened next.

I am trying to keep an open mind about this; for all I know, the sailors may have requested no protest committee (it does happen).

All I would say is that this is a perfect example of why disallowing protests is highly frowned upon. Disallowing appeals (within the specific guidelines of RRS) is one thing; I fail to see how disallowing protests serves the sailors one iota.

There is always more to the story, and the proper place for that to be heard is the protest room. Everything else is speculation.

And, don't kid yourself. This is an online forum. You never know who is watching...

Mike

Vectran sucks

Yeah I've thought of the splicing too, vs. knots, but I have trouble measuring exactly how long the splice will be, before and after doing it. I've been using knots and lots of white tape over knots and the tails, both for streemlining and to keep them from pulling out. I thought the Nacra's had fixed length, wire stays for the pole bridals?

What a great weekend of sailing! For me, we had some new found upwind speed that put us in the mix. Most of that speed came specifically due to a training clinic I had on the A-cat earlier this year.

The start was interesting and a lot of aggression was being displayed at the start. The line was set on a bit of a reach leaving the right side of the line heavily favored. I wanted to start there but with a couple of minutes to go, it was clear that the fleet aggression level was high so we laid back a little and started 5 or 10 seconds late (it was too late to reposition down the line where Ding wisely started).

From there, we worked up to Card Sound Bridge and held pace with all Ding/Bing, Karl/Tripp, and Zelmer with Zelmer taking point through the bridge. Once through (after avoiding the SC22 just ahead with the downed rig - a chase boat was already on the scene so no assistance was needed), a drag race to Angel Fish Creek ensued and we swapped the lead with Ding and Karl several times. We nailed the last tack to the creek and had a slight lead when we entered. Frank and I were tacking really well and managed to stretch out a little as we came through the creek. I'm not terribly familiar with the F18's ability to sail high with the kite and we were a little unsure about what angle to go for. We felt that the wind angle would have put us running toward the beach so after getting clear of the shallows to the south of the creek (probably a little later than we should have) we turned and single trapped on a deep reach in some pretty choppy stuff. We saw Ding turn much sooner (wise) and Karl set their kite letting it draw them down to the beach. We didn't want to be left out so we set our kite but immediately, the halyard cleat ripped off the mast. We fiddled with it for a few minutes while sailing low and slow but I decided that we should take advantage of the sharper wind angle now and go back to reaching while we figured out a plan. After about 20 to 30 minutes, the wind was clocking for a deeper run and we were really getting drawn out to sea making the separation from the other boats more and more risky. I had come up with an idea for the spinnaker halyard. We took a few more minutes to gut the mast rotation limiter, flipped the bar up on the mast, and fed the spin halyard through the end of the bar and onto the cleat located there (normally used for quickly changing the rotation between upwind and downwind). We didn't need the rotation limiter with the kite up...and to my amazement, it held just fine. Game on! We sailed hard trying to make up some of the lost time but didn't have much, if any, advantage on either of the two lead F18s in those conditions. The water was choppy with TONS of seagrass being blown out of the Gulf Stream. We must have cleared the boards and rudders 50 times. Occasionally we we find a set of waves we could surf but most of the time we're trying to keep the boat speed up while avoiding punching the bows and slowing down (so we were keeping the speed limited a little to avoid the slow down). All of a sudden, Karl came zooming into the field of view and we could see that his spinnaker was down. We sailed our course close enough to them to make sure we could see both people on the boat and in active condition (we could see that Tripp was on the bow working frantically on something and it looked like Karl had another spinnaker pole purchase in his near future)

From there, we weren't catching Ding so we tried to just keep him from stretching on us. We couldn't quite get the spinnaker hoisted 100% with our jury rig but I don't think it would have made much difference. We finished about 5 minutes behind Ding and about an hour behind the super boats.


Day 2. The start here usually kicks my butt and I haven't done this race in several years...so I studied the chart pretty hard for this one. There are shallows, a cut (going through a short bridge to the north of the Channel 5 Bridge) and then another oddly shaped shallow just prior to the channel 5 bridge. Avoiding the shallows altogether results in a lot more distance. Not taking some measure to avoid them results in really slow sailing (or damage). We found a pretty decent average through and got to the channel 5 bridge in good shape with the other F18s after having brushed ground only once. It was now an upwind drag race to the first cut. It seemed like the other F18s were sailing some different angles to weather and, in hindsight, I was starting to focus on that to much. There were probably lanes of breeze and I should have focused more on speed...but, we got to the first cut hot on the heels of Ding and with Karl right behind us. This cut is a marked channel through a very long shallow sandbar and it was upwind straight through it with an opposing current. The edges are poorly defined and hard to see so it was a real game of figuring out when to tack in the 10 yard width of the channel with decent depth. We brushed bottom a couple of times but managed to quickly tack and get through it. We got past Ding in the channel and saw that Karl had flipped. A couple more tacks and we were free of the channel with only the two Marstroms and the Nacra carbon 20 ahead...time to go! Frank and I sailed hard running from Ricky on the Nacra 20 while Ding and Karl struggeled to get out of the cut. I thought Ding was hanging around Karl to provide assistance if he needed it (and set my watch timer to make sure he received "adequate" time adjustment! ;-)). The yellow Marstrom 20, piloted by Lohmeyer, seemed to be off pace and showed a lot of twist in their main. We were able to keep up with them the entire way back and let Steve show us the way back to Key Largo (there's not many more familiar with this route than Steve). We had a really tough time getting through the creeks in and out of Tarpin Basin - I'm not sure what happened to us there. Ricky passed us in the last creek after getting a huge gust that we never saw. We seemed to lose a lot of ground to the boats behind us and in front of us there too. I haven't been able to figure out if it was just a random lack of breeze (bad luck) or if we were spending too much time on the windward side of the creek...or something else entirely. None the less, we popped out into Blackwater Sound with Ricky just ahead and Gilberts on the radar. It was a great two days of sailing in perfect weather and different water conditions and incredibly tight competition from the other F18s. I think the difference between Ding and us in 4th and 5th respectively was a minute or less overall.

Nice to have Matt viciously attacking me again. He does love me, you know!
And don't worry.., the Tradewinds is totally under control with three paid Judges from US Sailing.

I was right there on the line and saw the entire incident, and Craig Van Eaton filmed the entire thing. I am hoping he will put that on the forum sometime soon.

There were no protests filed, and had there been, it would have been heard. We simply try to avoid nit-picky crap. This wasn't one of those.., when there is damage you have a problem and it needs to be addressed.

With about 30 seconds left it appeared Skip (ARC22) and Todd (Damaged N20) were approaching slowly to the starboard end of the line. (OH, and by the way, Jake, I set a very heavily favored port end, knowing if I didn't set it that way everyone would be at the windward end, and even so, they still were for some reason. The hot boats did start down the line and most of jumped out to nice leads)
It appeared Skip thought he might get in between Todd and the mark, but when Todd sheeted in the boat obviously pointed higher and closed the gap.
There was a boat above skip, so he could not go up (although in hindsight it would been just a bump, not a piercing of a hull). It appeared to me he tried to drive behind Todd's stern. As you all know with the amount of purchase on an ARC22 Mainsheet System, that sail is not going to go flying out to allow such a dramatic turn.
So, you had a mainsail trying to take the boat to windward, and hulls trying unsuccessfully to head down.
The result was the rudders coming out and up and becoming useless, the bow going down, and the sprit just a foot or so off the water just before the spearing.

At any rate, that was what I saw. Perhaps the video will show something a bit different.

It is amazing that someone like Matt would be ready to jail, lynch Skip and wanting to take it to the Supreme Court not knowing a damn thing about it. Of course, Matt loves to blatantly jump on my case at every chance. By the way, the damage was above the waterline and nothing was structural. We suggested Todd duct tape it and sail on. I know I would have. Hell, it keeps ducks floating.