new round the world record

Gerd, I agree with much of what you said, apart from "Every single sailor out there on these machines is the best sailor you will ever meet."

Do you really mean that the guy or woman who runs at the back of the Mini Transat fleet is better than Robert Schiedt at sailing?

If these guys are so incredibly good, all of them, how come McKee could come so close to success with such a short programme and so little experience in the field?

By the way, I have HUGE respect for McKee who is IMHO one of the world's best; you don't get a full set of Olympic medals in the family across three classes without being someone very special. But he doesn't get to the front that quickly in other classes so how can ALL the mini guys be the best?

 

just my point ... must be another one of the best ;-)

 

Yes, but to get those medals, the McKees trained hard for years. It took them a lot of training and experience to get to the top in some of those classes. In some classes (like 49ers and 18' skiffs) they were full-time sailors but never made it right to the top. In others (Tasars) where they sail full time, even part-time sailors can knock Jonothan off in about half the races.

In contrast, Jonothan had very little experience in Minis or shorthanded ocean racing and yet he was dominating the race. He doesn't dominate like that in other classes.

It just seems a bit strange that you're implying that a class in which Jonothan was winning by a long way, despite a huge lack of experience, is stronger than classes in which he has enormous experience yet gets beaten half the time.

 

One must remember that there are natural abilities that play strong in the MT. You can practice sailing a Mini till you are blue and if you can't tough out the lack of sleep, poor food, cold wet nights, making repairs under way etc. you aren't going to do well. Occasionally a natural talent shows up in OD racing and kicks butt when they aren't practiced enought to "deserve it" but that does not detract from the quality of the racing or the level of skill required. The MT is damn tough and many a dinghy sailor has underestimated it and suffered. That did not make the MT a greater or a lesser type of racing---just suited for some.
I think Jonathan is just tough as an old boot.

 

Ellen vs Joyon's achievement

I ran across this analysis that I thought had merit.

From Don Watson:
I can get on to the second part of the letter I wanted to send yesterday which is that impressive as Ellen's achievement is, I am still amazed at Francois Joyon's previous voyage. He sailed an old boat with old sails around the world one day slower than it had been sailed with a full crew. He did the refit himself and had no website, no shore team, no sponsor and no weather routers. He broke the record by 21 days.

Ellen had Joyon's target to aim at, a brand new boat, new sails and a professional support team. Ellen is amazing and given any kind of reasonable weather in the Atlantic might well have taken five days off the record, but, for me, Joyon's seamanship and pure sailing talent are unmatched.

Brian added: Now I think the weather routing item is particularly important. There certainly is an advantage there. And think of how extra hard you drive yourself when you are chasing a recently established record. Granted a single-handed sail around the world, and at this speed average is phenomenal, but I still think Joyon's acomplishment was greater.

 

These sorts of discussions somehow remind me of the old "Ford is better than Chevy" discussions from High School.

 

or worse

Go Ellen! You're the greatest!

 

I agree with much of that, in that I'm not saying the MT is a lesser type of racing; I just can't find any evidence it's a greater type of racing as Gerd said.

I'm not much up on the MT, who were the top dinghy sailors who underestimated it and suffered?

I always think it's almost impossible to work out the "toughest" or "best" class.....apart from everything else, I can't work out how well I sail from class to class and I can't rate the standards of the classes I sail in, so how can people from outside a class know how well people in it sail????

 

People who belittle Ellen's achievement because of high tech or big sponsors should read her book. She started out way behind most of us a few years ago and lived in a shipping container on a dock while working her way up. Her knowledge of boat systems is amazing as well as her tactical and weather abilities. I think she has the stuff that would have enabled her to be one of the 1960's circumnavigators

 

Ellen

Ellen, is one of the greatest ever-without a doubt....

 

I think a classic example of the sponsorship spiral was the Transat OSTAR when the Frenchman Alain Colas turned up in Plymouth aboard a 236 foot alloy 4 master equiped with everything from state of the art Nav aids to electric furling. He was physicaly disabled at the time (with a crushed foot from a prior accident) but the boat (ship) had a high level of automation.

The Royal Western Yacht club reacted quickly to put a stop to what they described as "such madness" overall lengths were restricted and in a knee jerk reaction, electronic navaids were banned!

They were trying to keep the big sponsership Francs away from the event so it could still be competed by the likes of Hasler, Lewis, Chichester, and others who did not have the advantage of Millions of Dollars for massive fast boat development and production. Colas was essentially buying victory with massive sponsership. Sportsmanship was dead .

Many French companies and even Governement wanted to kick stupendous amounts of money into National-pride by producing the fastest boats. Denied subseqent OSTARs they set up their own races starting the first essentially open classes. Sizes and technologies quickly moved into giant mono and multihulls and designs which were downright dangerous but very fast.

There followed what can only be described as an explosion of commercial sponsorship. The money flowed freely and quickly the boast became high technology beds with hitec autopilots, shore based team support, weather routing, radar collision monitoring ,and tactical team decisions for the "SOLO" sailer .

This is the world in which Ellen has just had her success.

 

So what you are implying is: If Ellen were limited to a budget that more people could afford she would not do as well? Are you saying that out there somewhere is a down-on-his-luck sailing genius that could stomp her record if he just had the chance. Or are you saying that it is folly to spend money to ratchet up the technology? Sorry I am confused as to what you are trying to say here.

 

Exactly. Great. Fantastic.

 

unbeautiful losers

I think he is saying that our entire lives are so dominated by money that everywhere we look, the pound, the dollar, the euro, seem to be the determining factor in the out come of EVERYTHING. I solute Ellen and her great accomplishment, but somehow it just does'nt inspire me the way the old pioneers did. Although it is true that yacht racing in the past was just as expensive back when as it is today, few people remember the great yachts men of yore in the way they remember Slocum, Pigeon, Dumas and Montesuir.
Why is that?
I have a theory.
Those four and their accomplishments seemed to imbue me with the 'I can do' spirit, where as Ellen and her peers tend to remind me of an 'expert class' that is unapproachable on its pedestal. Such an 'expert class' now dominates practically EVERY aspect of our lives. It seems that most of us have reached the point of being of being mere watchers rather than doers. Since most of us have no hope of EVER comming near their level of talent, luck, and accomplishment of these 'experts'. Everytime I think of them, the same six words come to mind: Ican't, I can't, I can't.
I can't match their talent (and that's a given).
I can't match their luck (being at the right place at the right time and being noticed by the RIGHT people).
And I probably can't even match their dedication.
In a world where pure competition is the highest value, Addicts and fanatics tend to rule.
Such a world can be rich in progress and achievement for some, but may, in its own way, be quite spiritually poor for everyone else.
In closing, I'll ask this one question:

Were Slocum, Pigeon, Dumas, and Montesuir the best sailors of their day?

I'll bet they weren't.

And maybe that's the BIG part of thier charm.

Bob

 

From Mike

"There followed what can only be described as an explosion of commercial sponsorship. The money flowed freely and quickly the boast became high technology beds with hitec autopilots, shore based team support, weather routing, radar collision monitoring ,and tactical team decisions for the "SOLO" sailer ."

Interestingly, the fleets in the big-boat shorthanded races haven't grown, though. Biggest OSTAR was 125 boats, the last was about 25% of that.

So it's great and fantastic to watch, but in terms of keeping a strong sport the technological advances seem to result in little advantage.

I think Bob/Sharpii has it right, personally. Isn't that part of Ellen's appeal, perhaps? As a small women, maybe there's an (incorrect) assumption in the mass mind that if she can do it, anyone could given the guts and gear??? Does she therefore connect better to the rest of the population than if she was 6'3" Viking type of guy? I don't know, but maybe people think that way- IIRC it was supposedly part of the very strong appeal Nigel Mansell had to the British public, the fact that in some ways he was one of them. That was part of Alec Rose's appeal; he was the common man to the sponsored Chichester.
If that's true, the technology, sponsorship and hype may actually be dis-connecting sailors from the public.

And I'm NOT, repeat NOT, saying the "if she can do it so can I" idea is correct in any way. Hell, Ellen did her round Britian sail at what, 17? In a 20' cruiser she found 50 miles inland and bought for a thousand pounds or something like that. True grit.