That won't help: the Tornado design already is from Reg White from the UK. That is, if I am not mistaken.

Well, wasn't Rodney Marsh an Englishman as well? And if I remember correctly the Tornado dusted the Shark, the dart and many others during the trials.

Is there some reason that the Hobie Wave is not a suitable training boat? I have seen them, looked at them up close, but have not sailed upon one. If I were a kid and you put an opti or a Wave in front of me, I would reach for the wave, no question about it. I know that with Rick and Mary's efforts, it is also a growing racing class. So what is the deal with this as a trainer? Personally, if I were young and with Olympic dreams, I would love a more technical cat such as an F12. But I also at that age would have love to have scaled down Tornado that had a simplified rig. Reduced or no downhaul, fixed jib points, mast limiter instead of positive and negative rotation controls. 12" LOA and 6" beam and I would be loving life.

I have not sailed them. I've only seen one over here ones and that was at a boatshow in 1997 I believe. That was it.

I'm afraid that I can only intepretate the specs as given at : http://www.hobie-cat.net/site_gb/?produits,hobie_wave and what were are told on this forum.

The things that concern me are :

- Its 118 kg ready to sail weigth as specified by hobie. The SCHRS handicap system measurements even put it at 122 kg. http://www.schrs.com/index.php?page=class&id=60 That is almost twice the weight of the laser/F12 which are about 65 kg and the wave is not garanteed to be car-toppable by most small car and/or roof rack builders (max 50 kg is pretty standard on European and Asian cars). Having a trailer will add both cost and complexity. Like that it starts to add up as you'll need a spot to park/store your trailer etc.

- Its very rudimentary fitting-out and sail control.

- Hobie marketing and class building for the wave. It says "recreational resort boat" in everything.

- It very much closed Single-Manufactorer-One-Design class setup. As such any introduction program may well be hampered as the youth program will be so dependent on a single party. I found that such dependency is always best avoided.

- At 4399 USD it is not the most inexpensively priced boat compared to the opti, splash and imitation lasers like the Toppper etc. It is not even that much cheaper then a laser (5100 USD)

- The international presence of the Wave is very modest at best. Rick and Mary have gotten a modest Wave circuit going on in South-East USA but this is not reflected anywhere else in the world and Hobie really doesn't seem interested in marketing the boat as Rick did/does. I think Rick has got the right angle on promoting the Wave but he is not converting Hobie cat or getting any younger.



For these reasons I wonder on what the youngsters are trained upon and what the chances of succes with this baot are. It is not sail trim as in the way as it is required on larger racing catamarans. I seriously doubt any 40 kg young teenager righting the Wave unaided as well. Add to this that the Wave is not the best small catamaran design by a long shot. It may be for resorts and their needs but not for youth training or racing. We must also consider the fact that the youth cat, which ever is chosen, will be business card of all cats. As such we better get it absolutely right or risk never seeing the kids again, because if they are turned off by the youth cat then they will reflect that disapproved off imagine to all futher cats as well. I would personally have no trouble in finding points on which to diss the Wave in a comparison to say the laser. There are too many inferiour specs in comparison to not be succesful at this. If I can do it then so can half of the rest of the world.

Basically, the wave in my view is not best suited to the job nor the most attractively priced. That is two drawbacks already that I think we best do without.

F12 as it stands now has a simplied rig without a seperate downhaul (its integrated into the mainsheet setup), no jib at all, no mast rotation limiter as it has a sleeved sail. It is a tad over 12 foot in length (by 3.5 inches) and will be just under 7 feet wide; 3.75 mtr x 2 mtr

Its rig is controlled while sailing by a single line mainsheet setup (both leech and luff tension) and a simplified traveller setup. The other hand takes the tiller extension (no tiller extension present on the wave by the way).

On the beach tuning allows leech twist control, outhaul control and adjusting the ratio between letting the boom out, leech twist and reducing the leech tension (draft in top) when sheeting out.

Basically the kids are intended to be trained in looking at the conditions before the race and choose the right optimal sail trim out of 4 presettings.

These include :

-1- Medium flat sails and small amount of leech twist for medium winds and flat water (fast+pointing)
-2- Very flat sails with small amount of twist for strong stable winds and flat water (fast+pointing)
-3- Very flat sails with alot of leech twist for light winds (fast + less pointing)
-4- Very flat top with fuller bottom and alot of twist for strong winds with rough seas. (fast+footing)


The limited amount of presettings make the choice simpler and don't distract the kids from the tactics when on the water. That way it keeps both their heads out of the boat while racing and keeps things simple while sailing. For very young sailors the coach or racing-committee can just prescribe the settings for all participants and only focus on tactics and sailing skills. In effect the F12 will allow a staged step up in training.

I think that the young sailors will only be able to get this type of rig trim/tuning training at their age of 12 - 16 on the F12 and not on any other singlehanded monohull available to them. This training is of course also important for the 29-er and 49-er follow-ups in the mono track. I'm banking on them having learn tactics and sailing basics to a small art in the preceding opti class. As such the F12 may even become a better pathway from the opti to both the 29er/420 monohulls and nacra500/SL16 multihulls then the laser or other cats like the Wave.

I'm hoping to increase the F12 attractiveness this way to even monohull oriented clubs and programs. I'm hoping to make it a better trainer for both youth tracks, mono and multi. This may greatly improof its chances at getting accepted.

Wouter


p.s. the designing of the F12 goes down to this level and I'm convinced that it has to go that deep to have any serious shot at succes. I want coaches wispering to overbaring parents that if their opti sailin kid is really to rise through the ranks rapidly and get succesful at 29er/49er that then the F12 may well be the better route even though the laser is the official sanctioned follow up class by the club and national organisation.

Guys we are at 1948 names on the petition, please help us to 2000 before our important RYA meeting tomorrow.

http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/CatamaranSubmission/index.html

Thanks JR

Here is a thread that I began on boatdesign.net about a development cat. Hopefully it will get some of the design minds into the game. I still like the boat that Wouter is proposing and would like to see the complete package for it.

http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/showthread.php?p=163926#post163926

Thanks to Grob (catsailor poster) we will be getting a 3-D Acad model of it. Everybody can download a viewer for it and rotate it around and about on zoom in and out.

Wouter

Please focus, this thread is about bringing attention to the ISAF submission made by the RYA which threatens the future of catamarans at the olympics.

The important part is getting as many names on the petition:
http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/CatamaranSubmission/signatures.html

Your ideas are valuable, put completely irelevant if we fail to stop the RYA. Because catamarans will get dropped from the highest arena for sailing!

Please help us get the first step, then we can address the issue of the youth cat path.

This would be better suited on a new and important thread. Called 'Youth cat process'

Thanks for your valuable support.

not good.....


From Y+Y http://www.yachtsandyachting.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=3418&TPN=39

Stop Press

Read here: Today's UKCRA meeting with the RYA



I attended this afternoon's meeting with the RYA. Multihull classes were well respresented and our delegation was led by UKCRA chairman Nick Dewhirst.



Also present were: Catherlne Howland (Shearwater CA); John Alani (F16); Lee Davies (UKIDA); Graham Eeles (Tornado builder); Grant Piggott (F18); David Scarfe (Hobie); Chris Laming (Hobie parent); Brian Phipps (Windsport); Rob White and Reg White.

The RYA was represented by Eddie Ramsden (Council Chairman); John Derbyshire (Racing Manager/Performance Director) and Jon White (Sport Development Manager).

Observers included representatives of the 29er and 420s CAs.

Summary of main points:

1 RYA weclomes further input from UKCRA to put the case for cats to ISAF committee.

2 RYA proposed working group of staffers and cat sailors to consider development of sport of cat racing from the grass roots upwards.

3. RYA is unwilling to commit its vote at either ISAF senior or junior events in favour of multihulls despite doing so for dinghies. UKCRA warned of PR disaster if RYA failed to respresent cat racing.

4. Despite requests they were unwilling to withdraw either of their submissions.

UKCRA is planning to lobby ISAF directly to try to ensure a satisfactory outcome for catamaran sailing worldwide.

The representatives at today's meeting urge all cat sailors and supporters to maintain the vocal campaign to ensure that multihull sailing remains an olympic sport and receives its fair share of properly funded youth development.

Please continue signing the petition until 1 November.

Wizard





Work got in the way of me attending with my SCHRS hat on.

Appalling! You already got norways representative in the Tornado for the LA games on the petition (Per Ferskaug). More will come as we begin to beat the bushes.

And even better news it appears the RYA are retracting the revised submission made on Oct 4th about putting cats back in the Youth Worlds........ THEY ARE absolutely screwing cat sailors and playing a dangerous PR game.

Did we expect anything different ?

Cat sailors have no powerbase and as such organisations like RYA can just ignore us if they want too. The rest is all politicking, trying to do what they want and NOT look bad.

But I fear that when given a choice between doing what they want and look bad or coming across the bridge towards the multi's then they will still choose the first, hoping the bad feelings are isolated and will subside eventually.

Basically we multihull sailors go nothing.

It is like Stalin said when he was informed that the Vatican was rallying support against him, he replied :"How many divisions does the Pope have ?"

We will be getting nowhere, or get at max a delay of execution, unless we start forming some powerstructures related to multihull sailing (divisions).

Wouter

Fortunately UK catsailors don't see it that way. These boats are sailed with passion.
Watch this space..

Christ I find myself agreeing with wouter !!!! <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/ooo.gif" alt="" />

Cat sailors need to unite and form coherant credible bodies couple with large membership to represent them selves against the beauracracy .

In the uk we have UKCRA and nows their change to enroll every uk cat sailor , hopefully UKCRA will take this golden opportunity and come of age , otherwise the RYA will continue to walk all over cat sailing as they please , they seem pretty unphased by the petition to date , continuing in their beligerent way.

Why not join RYA and vote as a block?

From what I have seen of most sailing orgainizations, it does not take that many people voting as a block to make a change. Does RYA allow proxy votes?

Vote on what ? Nothingh has been put to the vote !

And now the canadians have submitted the following suggestion for classes in the 2012 games:



I dont know what it has looked like before the other games, but this begins to look like a major trend.

In light of the canadian submission, i wrote the norwegian sailing federation an e-mail asking wether my federation was going to support a multihull in the games.

I got an answer from the president 10 minutes later, at 2230 in the evening, saying the norwegian federation tought multihulls was to important for sailing and media exposure to drop. It seemed clear that group G (scandinavia and Estonia) would support a multihull in the games.

Rolf,

Could you send me an email to simon (at) SCHRS.com please I need to ask you a question or 2.

Cheers

Simon