Flounder gave me the idea for this thread when he said, in another thread, "The majority of cat sailors aren't interested in any type of racing. They just want the social benefits of the fleet/club."

So, I am curious as to how many fleets have members who sail recreationally but do not race? It has been my experience that most non-racers are not interested in joining fleets; and it is hard for me to imagine a fleet where non-racers are in the majority.

sandy hook bay cat club

Sorry, I should have excepted Sandy Hook, which has a lot of both racing and non-racing sailors.

If I were looking into a club, the racing would be my major interest. Thats the reason I like CABB, nothing but monthly races!

i wish i lived closer to the club. they race every other weekend,and don t forget the statue of liberty race every 4th of july.some of the best hobie sailors in the world have evolved from there.

At most clubs that I have sailed at throughout Australia, there has always been a large percentage of "social" sailors who are members of those clubs. That is not to say that they don't sail at most of their club races, as they do, they are just not sailing for the same reasons as the 10% or so club members who are out there every race day with the sole object of "winning". The so called "social" sailors sail in races to improve their sailing abilities, enjoy the water, wind, waves, and company, and to be able to socialise on the same "wave length" back at the club before and after the races. They know that they will never be "the best" sailors in their class, and that is not important to them, they sail/race simply for the envolvement and enjoyment that they get from this experience that we call "sailing". If you took away the "social" sailors from all the clubs in Australia it would be a very lonely place out there at the start line.

Mary, how do you define 'racing sailor?'

I would hazard most of the Coast Cat club isn't 'racing' sailors, but folks who attend 1-3 regattas a year. The Ocean Springs Yacht Club is comprised at least 3/4 if not a larger percentage, of people who don't even own a boat or sail at all

sea ya
tami

Hi Mary

Perhaps your question would be... How many clubs organize sailing events of any sort that do not involve racing.

For CRAC... the answer would be no active social sailors... the only events we organize are races.

Mark

PS Matt Bounds club in Michigan would fit this picture.

Mark's right - While John Bauldry (TigerBoy), Paul Krutty and myself will drive 12 hrs (each way) to race on a weekend, the rest of our fleet is pretty much strictly social.

If you go to our web site www.fleet276.com you'll see that we only put on only one regatta (Regata de Gatos in Port Burwell, Ontario) in conjunction with HCA Division 16.

What we do otherwise is:
* Get together nearly every Thursday night for a couple of pints
* Skiing this weekend (although with the temp not projected to get out of the teens, there's liable to be more drinking in the lodge than skiing)
* Help put on a display at the Strictly Sail Show in Chicago
* Bowling in Feb.
* Fun Sails - early ones are just to shake the cobwebs off, later ones we go out to an island in Lk. St. Clair & have a barbeque. John, Paul & I dispense free advice and assistance.
* A "Swing & Sail" event, where we golf & sail the same day and try to come up with some method of combined scoring / handicapping

Bottom line is we have fun. I used to never take my boat out pleasure sailing - I thought it was boring. The key is to do it with somebody who still has that "WOW - THIS IS NEAT STUFF" look on their face that we had 30 years ago when we started. Look at that photo of the Tiger on our fleet's homepage - that's me scaring the crap out of a couple of novice 16 sailors - and having a blast doing it! (And they had fun, too - I let him drive later - but not downwind )

I have to give credit to Jeff Rabidoux (Rabs) for getting us off our collective a$$es two years ago and re-invigorating the fleet.

I'll save you the trip:


Whitmore Lake, MI - August 7, 2004

(Nice bend in the mast, no?)

Tami, I think a racing sailor is someone who participates in races. If most of your cat fleet's sailors participate in 1-3 races a year, I would call them racing sailors. Only caveat is I don't think the Round the Island Race (and a few other events of that type in other parts of the country) should count, because for lots of sailors it is more of a "happening," an adventure, a fun cruise; and people will do a once-a-year event like that even though they never "race" otherwise.

And yacht clubs don't count. Most of them have turned into social clubs, unfortunately.

I'd say the percentage of racing sailors is higher than non-racing in our fleet (Hobie Fleet 61, Denver), but we have more social events than racing and all are equally well attended. Our board even has one non-sailor - the treasurer - who just likes the beach, the life and hanging out with the people.

Matt hit the nail on the head regarding our fleet. We are a social club and cater to the recreational sailor. The enthusiasm and experiences the racers have rubs off on our non-racing sailors. This is where the growth of catamaran sailing/racing is. Not by clubs who strictly cater to racers. The racers in our fleet take care of their racing needs by going to the weekend regattas, national and world championships. We bring back our stories of fun and adventure and we share that love and enthusiasm for racing with our non-racing members in events that are non racing in nature. We emphasize building confidence, learning and improving your sailing skills. Doesn't hurt to have a little fun along the way either. Our club has been very successful in converting several non-racing members into racing skippers and crews. Again IMHO the growth of the sport lies within the non-racing catamaran community. Build it and they will come.

John Bauldry
Commodore, Hobie Fleet 276
Hobie Tiger 1317
Detroit, USA

Jeff Rabidoux' leadership in reviving the Detroit fleet should be an inspiration to fleets everywhere. I have been rooting for him to succeed in his goal of reviving all of Hobie Division 10. But he can't do it alone -- every fleet needs a catalyst to make it happen.

Thanks Mary, Matt, and John for all the kudos! While I was the catalyst, the continued success of our fleet is due to what we call the "core group." This core group consists of those of us willing to travel great distances to race. Add to Matt's list of guys, a few more...like Gregg Kittinger and myself and there you have the "core group".

Through career and life changes, the amount of time that we have been able to put into the fleet has been constantly changing. The fact that the fleet is "run" by a group of individuals, as opposed to one person, guarantees its longevity. John took the commodore reigns when I ran short of time. All of the beforementioned guys have picked up the ball when necessary, making certain that at least some of us are at every fleet function.

Last year, at the Strictly Sail Show, we had over 100 sailors interested in a Chicago area fleet. Unfortunately, I was unsuccessful in finding a leader to take those names and go with it. This year, we have a leader going in, and we have chosen a weekend when the entire core group, and hopefully quite a few others, will go to Chicago for a fun sail event. That may be the jump start they need.

Fleet sailing is the future. You will always have racers...but there are too many people intimidated by racing. Once we help them with their skills and confidence, we may turn a few recreational sailors into racers. But if we don't, that's O.K. You don't just measure the fun of sailing by a finishing time, you measure it by the size of the smiles on the sailor's faces.

Jeff

Ah

Let me give you our numbers:

Total members 250
Social members (without a boat) 70
Regular racers 20
Occasional racers 15

Racing has increased substantially these last three years.
I will add this: I consider Fleet racing as the backbone of the club activity. If Racing disappear, my bet we will end as a "Beer drinker club"


Jacques Pierret
SHBCC Race Officer

Just like what has happened to the yacht clubs.

Rabs - Bucket o' Beer night tonight @ CK Diggs? We got lots o' stuff to go over for Chicago.

I made this response to a thread about OD racing but part of it belongs in here.....

With the Seacats in Columbia, SC we have (and I'm guessing) about 30 members. I live about 90 miles away from most of the group so I'm a little out of touch with the day to day activities and details. However, I believe that of those thirty we see about 6 to 8 at two local regattas a year. Only two boats from this club (David M and myself) regularly travel to regattas around the eastern coast. The club has camping / sailing events and used to do a lot of Kayaking and Mountain Biking excursions - there is still some of that but it's gone down some. I think that the 'racers' came to power and those events didn't get the focus that they used to - which brings up an interesting point.

Racers are passionate about their sport and I think they tend to rise to the top of these kinds of organization because of their strong and very dedicated personalities. But I think that that hurts some of these organizations like the Seacats because in reality only a few of the members share the same interest in racing. I could be wrong (again, because I've been pretty out of touch with the group this past year), but I sense that the group is in a bit of a decline in activity.