Wild Oats XI(CBTF) WINS 2008 Sydney Hobart(Well,I hope!)

You are factually incorrect. If the rating rule and club allows you to, you can use electric winches. Manual power is often/generally slower in large boats.

 

and I thought I was loosing my touch....

In motor-racing I used to like hillclimb events. - - - and anything goes for outright speed records sail, power wheel or jet just the motivation source is defined...?
I used to like the Bathurst 1000 when it was open to a lot of categories now it is booring,,, with identical cars with different paint and trim and nothing like any of the production cars purported to be represented except slight similarity in silhouette - how dull....
One does not use a dragster in an F1 race because the vehicle would not be very competitive and many of your other "comparisons" likewise BUT multihulls would be very competitive in almost any other race for monos.... so why not?

 

Why not? Because it is not a multi race!

You don't have to have multis in the Hobart because it is not an event that wants multis. Simple as that.

Would you play chinese checkers in the world chess championships?
Would you go to the country music festival and play punk rock or medieval opera?

No, you would not - because they are events held for a specific activity. If you let all the other activities in, they just become a formless mish-mash.

Sure, you could beat the monos with a big multi in the Hobart. Big deal! A fat man in a wheelchair can beat Lance Armstrong on his Tour de France gear if the fat man gets into a car. Many people could probably beat Lance if they used a recumbent bike, or perhaps a tri bike. But the rules don't allow it because the Tour is for conventional road bikes, so no one is unsporting enough to whine about it.

Our cat could beat the Hobie 16s, but we didn't pout about the fact that they didn't let us race in the Hobie events.

Of course a Rowing 8 would be competitive in a kayak race.
Of course a foiler Moth would be competitive in many Texel cat races, as would a FW board.
Of course a shortboard would (depending on the scoring and conditions) be very competitive in a mal event.
Going on times, a F1 car would annihilate a Supercar field.

But most people are sporting enough to allow certain people, who wish to have a competition for certain sorts of equipment, to do so.




Okay, so you happen to like multis. So do I. Since when did multi sailors have to force our own preferences onto everyone else?

Monos are not fast, but they are brilliant to race and great to sail. If you let multis in, the fleet would become even more stretched out than it is now. There would no longer be anything like a meaningful overall CT winner.

How many Hobarts have you done? How many have you watched? To what extent should the race be changed and distorted by trying to play to the people who have never done it and never will?

 

Of course not the avon descent which includes motorboats and other paddled boats in different divisions, and the motor racing that used to support a broader range of vehicles is now restricted to "super v8's" and no other cars any more is my point, and I did mention earlier that a return race would add to my interest using handicap at the start line so all aspire to finish together for spectacle at both ends and as it IS a handicap event and includes some older monohulls there is no technical reason to exclude multihulls and apply their handicap, - may need the handicap formulae changed to measure performance as opposed to any linea area or volumetric evaluation...

All I am doing is presenting a case for inclusion where it fits and can be accommodated. I have never desired to participate, enjoy the event, but feel it is heading for elitism and loosing the intensity of public interest...

Read the rest of this thread and ease the sheets a little and you may see what I am driving at?

 

You're not going to make the event LESS elitist by bringing in more extremely fast boats that will finish even further ahead of the smaller boats, therefore making the smaller lower-budget boats feel even more out of it than they currently do.

If a maxi multis finishes in a bit over a day (as could be possible) then how much a part of the event would Nest Property (30' half tonner in the current race) feel, when it finishes in 4+ days? The affordable boats are already normally finishing after the prizegiving is over and when many big boats have already packed up. The diversity in the fleet is arguably too great already, and it's arguably hurting the social side and has almost destroyed the small-boat classes.

We cannot increase the speed and size of the tailenders without making the event more elitist, therefore we should not increase the speed of the frontrunners - and especially not by adding a type of craft that is as different as a motorbike is from a car.

There is certainly a technical reason to exclude multis - there is no measurement handicap system that has ever equated monos and multis, as the performance differential in different conditions is too great. I'm not sure what you mean about a "handicap formulae to measure performance"; unless you want to impose very close restrictions on boats or simply go to a yardstick type system ( extraordinarily hard to manage and particularly in diverse craft - how can you assess whether a modified Spencer 28 mono from 1968 is as well sailed as a modified Grainger 33 tri from the '90s?) then IRC is a pretty damn accurate measurement of performance. The performance differential of big cruising cats (in particular) over a full range of conditions is enormous; upwind in light airs a surprising number are surprisingly slow, downwind in a breeze they move well.

Yes, I prefered motor racing when it included a wider variety of cars - but does any major local motor race include everything from F1 or LM cars (ther equivalent of maxi multis) down to classic Fords (like Maluka) and '70s Corollas and then throw in motorbikes? Yes, there are events like the Avon Descent, but they are extremely rare.

I see what you are driving at, and I believe that it is as wrong as gatecrashing my local choir and demanding that they dump Handel for the Sex Pistols. People have the right to do what they want in a race created and run for the boats that the organisers and competitors want to sail, and if others don't like it they can make their own race - just like multi sailors say to windsurfers and kite sailors.

 

Agreed

Just once, though, I'd truly like to see a group of the big trimarans line up, invited or not, at the start of the S/H (hell, give the fleet a headstart for good measure) and then put on the show that the big canting boys deserve.

Can't you just see IDEC, Sodeb'O, G3 and that new big monster from Banque Populaire just holding steady while Oats does her best imitation of what is really fast?

Sitting in Hobart after a shower, sails put away, a draught, or two, drawn and a nice meal consumed, would do wonders for the egos of the canter owners.

Other than that small fantasy, who really cares.

 

I'd take on a rowing 8 with my kayak any time even at my age, provided that I get to pick the course. I'd like to see an 8 trying to get down my local winding stream. Watch out for the big rock! you have to portage round the fallen tree guys! Bring it on!

"saloon car racers" ...? They race cars in saloons? Is that just Australia? I'd like to watch that, but on TV where it's safe.

Why not have an "open" race in which evey boat has to start from a standard berth in a regular marina? That would impose an arbitrary limit on width (length too) that would have nothing to do with any race committee. The little agile boats could get out first etc. The very essence of fairness. Engines allowed but steam only!

 

Wild Oats Wins Sydney- Hobart

From Scuttlebutt Europe:
"Wild Oats XI strode majestically up the Derwent River to beat Skandia by one hour seven minutes and score a record fourth consecutive line honours victory in the Rolex Sydney Hobart after one of the best tactical battles seen at the head of the fleet in the race's 64-year history. "

Well put...

 

Two words for those who would think otherwise


Tattersall's Cup

From Seabreeze.com and Sail-world.com:

"An 11th hour battle among Australia's top 50-foot yachts for the ultimate prize in the Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race, the Tattersall's Cup for the winner on corrected time, has been taking place in Storm Bay at the entrance to Hobart's Derwent River."

and...

"One of Sydney’s most successful yachtsmen, Bob Steel, today completed a rare double in the history of the Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race when his latest Quest was declared the overall winner of the 2008 race, the winner on corrected time.

For that he receives the ‘sailors prize’, the Tattersall’s Cup, the trophy he first won in 2002 with a previous Quest, a Nelson/Marek 46.

 

Line Honors winner; ultimate prize winner ...

How many more winners will there be to this race?

It would be less confusing for the great uninformed and unwashed public such as myself if the boats could be handicapped at the start instead of at the end. If this great sport is to attract the kind of following that other sports have the events need to end when the race ends. The common man wants to see the winner hold the trophy while the blood is still fresh in the water. *

Not denigrating anyone's effort here or anything like that, this is just a suggestion so more people can get to appreciate these magnificent boats and the folk who sail them.

* ps., credit Masalai's earlier post for same idea!

 

Well, it is a handicap race as it is open to all sizes on a "rating" derived from some formulae, and my point has been that this could be applied to multihulls and include them and the only ones who would miss out would be the supermaxi "line honours" (fastest time) contenders and that by re-jigging the handicap corrections and stagger start all could arrive near simultaenously... Then to give Sydney its "mass spectacle" back, part B of the series, Hobart to Sydney, would make a really spectacular return, finishing under the Sydney Harbour Bridge (or a little further inside the bay)....

There are several divisions sailing simultaneously and consequently several "winners".... and absolutely no logical reason to exclude multihulls from future "Sydney - Hobart" races...

 

I hate to burst your fantasy bubble about the elite multi-hulls of the world coming to kick the *** of the likes of Bob Oatley's "Wild Oats" in the Sydney Hobart but... lets just consider for a second that the multis where allowed in the race, just what makes you think that Bob would be still running a mono? The "egos", as it has been so ironically put, would be riding the fastest thing they could muster. Judging todays entrants in the Hobart against other existing crafts capabilities under some assumed set of new rules is just a high school kids fantasy. Change the rules and the response of the competitors will change and I for one would not be underestimating the response of the locals.

Anywhooo... most of you are probably judging an event you have never sailed and only really know about from the media's perspective and the hoopla over the big boats. For me, and many others thats not what the race is about, its simply an adventure in good company and maybe, just maybe a shot at notoriety for one of many reasons. To get a true sense of the race you need to do it on a mid fielder... after all it started life as a cruise with results. That is where I think the real flaw in the idea of racing multis to Hobart lies. I don't think you'd get "the pack", the support and participation from the smaller boats that makes it interesting, gets the town of Sydney involved and gives the event character and life. Face it, most multi sailors like to sail in fair weather with a drink in one hand, blue water just ain't their thing. So yeah if you want to watch more elite ******* cheque book race its an idea... but not a good one. Better to set up some corporate sponsored multi bash to Hobart and see if it takes on with the public... any takers? Seriously if its in the multihull community to start and support a race like the Hobart it will happen.

Now if you want to talk about the real race to Hobart what about the Westcoaster.... no namby pamby soft routes to Hobart, just real hairy chested blue water sailing without the makeup and cameras. What about a west coaster for multis? That would show them who can cut it... or maybe thats the point.

http://news.theage.com.au/sport/shortwave-breaks-melbournehobart-record-20081229-76bm.html

Don't get me wrong, I love my multi... but...

 

So please let me have my fantasy, and enjoy, in my fertile mind, a mixed fleet of cooperative spirit like in the old days of the Bathurst 1000 when it was a 6 hour race (or was it 12 hours)? - I am getting old and partially remember the events that catered to many....

In my younger days my interests were in motor-sport for the adventure, socialising, community support in advancing technology, It was a network of like minded people who were keen to push the boundaries and enjoy the activity and share knowledge.... Where the F has that spirit gone?

That is why I advocated a start designed to have ALL finish at the same time if sailed according to their handicap (no linehonours) as all should have an equal chance of crossing the line first and next season their handicap would be adjusted to mean an equalisation process in the field of participants....

The other option is to declare the finish time and the challenge is to achieve that objective arrival time and depart when you wish... With modern GPS monitoring doing a detour to increase lapsed time could be detected and adjusted so slowing down etc would be not a cheats option...

 

Snif, snif.... I think I detect the distinct aroma of an Southern Hemispherean who's own brand of pretzel logic has gotten him to wheel out quite a wonderfully phantasmagorical version of a high school phantasy of his own; Hairy Chested, panty collecting, Tom Jones imitators and all.

Truly, it was all worth the wait Beany. ;-) Haven't read anything quite like that foray since Hunter S. Thompson's, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.

Thanks for dropping the dime, but really... have you not better stuff to do these days?

ChrisO

 

Got a tick to go with that stutter Chris?

Wonderful, the Chris monster posting no substance, bypassing the ball, and going straight for the man, way to show your class Chris.

BTW you turned out to be so right with your last shot a me didn't you?... Hows your stock broker, LOL is he still your friend?

Hmmmm you also seem to have missed the point of hairy chested bit... not surprising, maybe if you had actually done the race you might have got it. Its a Sydney, Melbourne rivalry thing, Melbourne's answer to the Hobart, a tougher race in many respects but mostly ignored... the towns rivalry is really quite silly and humorous to observe, a pissing competition between brothers if you will or maybe something you can relate too... a posting competition between two squabbling baby boomers. Now don't mention Queensland, man do they have tickets on themselves

While we are reading can I suggest --> Status Anxiety by Alain de Botton

It might help you and Doug, then it might not... but it certianly will explain a lot for you pettle.