Category Archives: Elite

Concerning all that is at the leading edge of sailing

Second Single handed sailing event in November

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The second event in November is the start of the Vendee Globe. Without question the Vendee Globe is, hands down, the hardest sporting contest on the planet. It might even rank in the top ten of the hardest things to complete on the planet. “Climbing” Mount Everest is a relative cake walk when viewed alongside the Vendee Globe.
For such a hard thing to do, the rules are simple, rather like the old gag about the simplicity of the rules for the Sydney Harbor 18 footers:

“They’re 18 feet long and they start at two o’clock”.

An open 50-Same idea as the IMOCA boats but 50 feet long

For the Vendee Globe the gag might run:

“The boats are 60 feet long and the start is in November”.

Realistically there are four rules.
•    The Boats: IMOCA 60 footers.
•    Crew: Single handed
•    Course: Around the world, France to France, under the Great Capes, Antarctica to starboard
•    Rules: Non-stop, no assistance.

An Imoca 60 in heavy weather near New Zealand

Simply reading this summary of the race does not do justice to the magnitude of the event.
Consider for a moment the following:

The record for this circumnavigation is 84 days set in the last race in 2008-2009. And that was of course for the winner. The last finisher crossed the line FORTY TWO DAYS after the winner taking 126 days. Another month and a half at sea! This is an average of just over 8 knots or about the time it used to take the fast BOC boats to sail from Newport to Cape Town.

Think about that for a minute.

What are you going to be doing for the next four months beginning 10 November 2012?

•    Will you be doing it by yourself?
•    Will you get, oh, 4-5 hours of sleep per 24, on a good day!
•    Will you be burning through 6,000 to 8,000 calories per day?
•    Will you be burning these calories on a diet largely fueled by freeze dried food?
•    Will you be trying to fix equipment that ranges across the industrial spectrum from chemistry, electricity, hydraulics, electronics, mechanics, composite fabrication, sail repair?
•    Will you have the skills, thinking, the determination to finish have to deal with all alone
•    Will you have to repair yourself in the event of injury?
•    Will you have the courage and skills to beat the record for a 24 hours run of 439 miles set in 2004? An AVERAGE of bit over 18 knots.
•    The 24 hour run record in the last Volvo Ocean Race is 565 miles in 24 hours, on a 70 foot boat with 10 guys…..

I could go on but you get the idea.

The Vendee Globe is much more than a sail boat race. Even after following the race for years, I still find it hard to precisely define what it is. Ultimately it is probably only possible to define it if you have done it. Only two American sailors, Bruce Schwab and Rich Wilson have successfully finished this race. A third, the late Mike Plant, completed the course but was not scored as a finisher because he accepted assistance south of New Zealand.

The blistering pace that defined the 2008 race bears comparison to another bench mark circumnavigation, the Trophy Jules Verne.

In 1992 my wife and I were in France looking at Mini Transat boats. Driving along the Brittany coast one afternoon, we had the car radio on and I heard the words “Commodore Explorer”. My wife had enough French to tell me that it was a interview, live at sea (well it is France after all)  with Bruno Peyron skipper of this  90 foot cat of the same name. The gist of it was they were hours away from completing a circumnavigation of the globe in less than 80 days the basic premise behind the Trophy Jules Verne-Around The World in 80 Days

•    16 years ago
•    10 or so guys
•    90 foot multihull
•    79 days.

By any standard the Vendee Globe is one of the most compelling events ever organized. The depths to which the human spirit needs to be plumed are mind boggling. A fantastic insight into this condition is a first person story of the race by one of the two US Vendee Globe sailors, Rich Wilson, is in his book- “France to France, Antarctica to Starboard”. Wilson, well known for his combining educational programs and sailing activities for school kids finished the 2008 race.

While not the fastest boat around the Big Blue Marble, Rich was:

The lone America, the oldest skipper, sailing one of the oldest boats, with one of the smallest budgets and he suffers from Asthma to boot.

The only thing I can think of that surpasses the Vendee Globe as a test of ones ability to overcome relates to Commander Bill King. Commander King was one of the original sailors to attempt the Grandfather of the Vendee Globe, the Golden Globe race in the late 1960’s. Commander King, a Royal Navy Submarine commander in the Second World War lets us see just a glimpse of the stresses he had to bear in that role, in this brief video on Vimeo.

Thanks to Scott Kuhner for the link.

If you are moved by that which moves the human spirit, watch the Vendee Globe this winter. Millions of Frenchmen and women do.

Single handed sailing in November

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For those students of single-handed and double–handed sailing, November has two
“don’t miss” events coming up. One is in Newport RI, the other in La Rochelle, France
Save the date, especially if you live in the Northeast. On Saturday 03 November 2012 at Newport Yacht Club, on Long Wharf in Newport, RI. NYC hosts the annual gathering of the Bermuda 1-2 group. From 1530 on.

The Bermuda 1-2 is the oldest continually running single handed ocean race in the north east and is one year older than the Single handed Transpac, first run in 1978, according to info on the Single-handed Transpac’s website–And I am happy to be corrected on this detail. The point is the Bermuda 1-2 has been around for a long time and has acted as a proving ground for several sailors who have gone on to bigger single handed races, such as the O.S.T.A.R and the (formerly BOC & Around Alone) Velux Five Oceans.

Sail handling skills are a key element of the Bermuda 1-2

This November meeting is open to all who are interested in meeting the kind of challenge that such a voyage poses. I.E. preparing and sailing one’s own yacht from Newport To Bermuda and then Double Handed return race back to Newport. There are few, if any, activities in today’s world where the skill, cunning, experience, will, and many of the other human characteristics we all envy in those who possess them, are required, and often wished for in greater quantities, than sailing one’s own boat on this course across the Gulf Stream alone.

If you find yourself inclined to see just how good a sailor AND seaman you are, not on a sunny day on Block Island Sound but the inner you, that needs to come to the surface half way to Bermuda, in hard weather, all the while wet, cold, tired, hungry and let’s say, a bit anxious, then this race is for you. One precise reason to come to this gathering is to meet the sailors who have “been there and done that” as they saying goes. Broken spars, damaged sails, getting sails (spinnakers) down in the midst of a squall, thru hull leaks, broken rudders, engine (and so electricity) failures and so on. Without placing too much emphasis on the crummy stuff, a veteran sailor will keep close the Prussian Army’s dictum about “plans rarely surviving contact with the enemy”. The essence of this, and all sailing for that matter, is in the preparation. The sailing is easy, it is the seaman ship that is the challenge.

And you don’t need to have a large ocean going yacht, although it does need to be over 30 feet LOA.

The Bermuda 1-2 size range is 30 feet LOA to 60

Like many grand endeavors, such as a marathon or a personal best in some activity, the first successful completion of this passage is a land mark in a sailor’s life. It is a called a race but the bulk of the competitors are sailing in “normal” boats much like the boats the rest of us have.

Several boats still carry mechanical self steering systems as well as electric Autopilots

I will say that for those of us of a certain age, the camaraderie is very similar to the “Old Days” where the competitors all help each other, exchange tools, how-to tips, weather information and so on.

And even if you are, shall we say  NOT in the market, for the race proper (in 2013), it is an ideal  venue to talk with a great group of sailors, men AND women. If you want to start slowly, the Newport Yacht Club also hosts two other events for single and double-handed sailors. Thus you can come and test the waters in say the New England Solo Twin held annually in July  or the Offshore 160 held in the off years, I.E. even numbered years opposite the Bermuda 1-2 There is also a calendar (still to be filled in fully for 2013) with all the short handed races I can find between Annapolis and Maine.

So, for Saturday 03 November:

•    The  official gathering time is 1530, for a couple of beers and catch up with mates, old and new. Folks are often there from about 1500 on.
•    There is a Forum beginning at 1600 that includes an introduction around the room of who is who and their goals.
•    The Forum includes discussion of changes to the race, since 2011 & comments by the Skippers Representative, Kris Wenzel, a multi-time (female) competitor.
•    She has organized U. Conn Met man, Frank Bohlen to come and address us on the issues of weather, including Gulf Stream 101, on the course and I reckon THAT alone is worth the price of the gas and beers from anywhere on the north east coast.

The “Gam” concludes at 1700 and from then until 1900 general conviviality is the order of the day. There is a cash bar in the meeting space and Hor’s d’oeurvs are available. Frequently a few groups will wander off after 1900 to sample Newport’s restaurants too.

If you are coming, please contact Race C’ tee Chairman, Roy Guay at roy@royguay.net so he can get a head count for the munchies that the Yacht Club prepares.

The images used above were taken either by me or a long time ship mate and former (is there such a thing?) professional photographer Don Miller Photography. Unfortunately I cannot remember which ones he took-The better ones I guess.

You can see more of his fine work on his website

Used with out permission-I got to give him something to heckle me for

Hope to see you in Newport on the 3rd..

Cheers

Coop

 

America’s Cup: thru the eyes of a 7 year old.

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The America’s Cup is turning, or more likely has turned, a sharp corner in its history. All the new things I am reading about the cats, the skullduggery behind the negotiations, the vast amounts of money (still) hovering around the event and, in the past week or so, seing the complete Circus assemble at Fort Adams in Newport have stirred up the mud at the back of my memory.

September in Sydney, Australia, is the late winter, early spring. It is still cool in the morning, and rain is common, making for a raw feeling in the air. Such chilly days are very good days to sleep in. On just such a dank and rainy September day in 1962, this particular 7 year old kid was trying to do just that, against the admonitions of his mother to get up and get ready for school. I had an ulterior motive for lying abed, though besides aversion to the weather and school. I was listening to the radio coverage of the America’s Cup races on Rhode Island Sound.

I had been around boats for literally as long as I could remember. My dad always had boats, small sailing boats: the 1962 boat was a converted 16 foot skiff, the lesser known cousins of the infamous 18 footers. Dad had brought it from someone, somewhere, the particulars unknown to me and he then proceeded to de-tune it. “Walagai IV” was re-rigged with a smaller (than the original huge) rig & he cut the bowsprit down to half size. For cruising comfort he added a foredeck, washboard and side decks and away we went. In this lovely old cold molded skiff he and I cruised and camped all over the Pittwater & Broken Bay estuaries about 30 miles north of Sydney. The boat had no cabin- it was an open skiff after all- but it did have a centerboard, a slightly rusty and not particularly smooth galvanized dagger board with a round bottom/tip to it and a large wooden handle on the top. I could not move it either in the trunk or after my dad had pulled it up and out of the trunk.

While it was cumbersome the presence of a dagger board did give us the singular advantage of drawing only about 4 inches with the dagger board completely withdrawn. Such shoal draft allowed us great scope in our cruising, particularly our options regarding overnight moorings. We could sail all over the relatively protected water of Pittwater all day then drop a stern anchor and put the bow up on any of the hundreds of beaches in the area. We could then take a line ashore and set up a regular tent on the beach or grass land above the sand OR we could moor the boat in 12 inches of water with a stern anchor out and a bow anchor or mooring line out to a suitable tree or rock and then rig a purpose built boom tent over the cockpit. The side deck and fore deck, with its splashboard and the boom tent were so designed & built that rain would not enter under the tent.

Under this warm and cozy arrangement I spent most of the weekends of my infancy and holidays of my early child hood snuggled in a homemade sleeping bag laying on a Lie Lo, an inflatable air mattress atop the boat’s floor boards. I have a picture taken by my father, (he was an artist and always had camera, sketch pad, water colors and pencils with him) annotated on the reverse in his fine hand as “Christmas Cruise, 1957”, of me asleep in the boat. I was two and a half at the time. My canvas army-surplus kit bag full of my spare clothes was my pillow. My earliest memories, in the late 1950’s are of the smell of Kerosene used in the hurricane lamp and the primus pressure stove: of Smalls Dark Club chocolate, an absolutely wonderful dark chocolate—for a 7 year old—complete with a picture of a gentleman sitting in a leather club chair as the graphic on the wrapping. Of varnish, the smell of Spaghetti and meat balls and something he referred to as Pliers Toast. Since the galley was, well modest, (a single burner pressure Primus kero stove mounted in a specially modified 5 gallon kerosene tin, adapted to the purpose) in order to have toast, one of his favorite cruising foods required some ingenuity. He would take a slice of bread, grip it on one corner with the pliers, and drape it over the exposed flame of the stove—for about 10 seconds. Turn it over and repeat. The result was the most wonderfully warm, slightly burnt on the outside, bread. Butter, kept in a prototype Tupperware plastic container sold for the purpose was stored in the bilges in the cool water during the day and Jam, in a glass jar, label removed and stored likewise made a great way to clean up the sauce from the Spag-Bol as he referred to the main course as. The Dark chocolate was “after’s”, Australian, or at least Father Cooper’s term for what we now call desert.

Thus from an early age I was a water rat. And of course with my dad getting all the usual local and foreign sailing magazines, I “knew all about the America’s Cup” even as a 7 year old. On reflection, 50 years on this means I knew that only the best sailors sailed on the 12 meters trying to win the Cup. Even, perhaps especially then, it had the reputation of being the Holy Grail and historically un-obtainable. No one could beat the Yanks.

I can remember knowing the names of the boats, the designers, where Newport, Rhode Island was and what Rhode Island Sound meant, even as a kid sailing my Sabot, not long after this episode. I muse on the notion that I was stung with the idea that sailing in the America’s Cup was the highest goal one might aspire too. Something beyond perfection and only the really best guys need apply. I still have a scrap book from later on, perhaps when I was 12, with all manner of sail boats in it, pictures cut out of the sailing and general press, for sailing was news worthy in those days in Sydney.

The particulars of the day’s race that kept me abed are not important except for The Voice. The commentary crackling over the short wave AM radio was by the local notable yachting journalist Lou D’Alpuget. He was perhaps the 1960’s version of Bob Fisher as a yachting journalist and sailor who, according to a quick Internet search just now,only recently died at age 91, apparently still writing.

My earliest memories, and they are strong memories, as a kid include lying in bed listening, with completely rapt attention that became extremely focused as the excitement in the voice welled up thru the crackling of the radio signal. I can remember the rapidly ascending pitch of Lou’s voice, as he relayed the race, seemingly puff by puff, actually wave by wave as it turned out, across the airwaves.

Perhaps Peter Montgomery apprenticed under Lou, or heard the same broadcast for Peter has a similar out rushing of that magical component everyone involved in the America’s Cup must have:
Unbridled passion.

This particular race was held in pretty hard air for 12 meters, low to mid twenties of wind speed, and the Aussies, fairly close behind, 12 seconds according to one source- perhaps
only a boat length at the top mark the last time pulled off what is a pretty typical classic Aussie “’ave a go mate” move and set “The Big Kite”. Film footage of this part of the race clearly shows that the white Aussie kite is way bigger than the defenders choice. A classic 18 foot skiff sailor move. The Aussies simply sailed past the defender, (in a move strangely prescient of the 6th leg episode 21 years later) and into the history books by being the first challenger since before the war on to win the race and that by less than a minute. The climax of The Voice was the moment when the Challenger surfed past the Defender and on to win that race. My memory is of almost completely frantic excitement, of Lou’s voice screaming down the air waves.

So long ago, yet the key ingredient still comes thru and I can remember the rising pitch of the voice and think Passion. Funny how a mere sail boat race can evoke such strong emotions in otherwise rational humans. I muse that it is the sink or swim gene in the Human Race that makes us attracted to the event. As human animals, if we cannot make ourselves better than the next guy, or give it a damn good shot, we might all be still back in the trees.

While all the other aspects of that morning 50 odd years ago have sunk under the weight of time, the one thing that stays with me, and pops out at the oddest times, is the passion in The Voice.

Occasionally when out around town (I now live adjacent to Newport, RI) I find old pictures of the America’s Cup matches at Salas’s or the old Christies in Newport. As I look at old pictures of Gretel, or even watch Weatherly, still going strong as a charter boat in Newport, take another load of mid-westerners out for a Faux Race and a lap around the bay, I can sometimes hear in my minds ear the excitement and the passion in Lou’s voice. It occurs to me that it is this passion that is the common denominator in any one who has anything to do with the America’s Cup. After all when one considers the motivations of the guys who commissioned the schooner America and the results she wrought, giving birth to the immortal phrase that defines the America’s Cup as no other enterprise is:

“your majesty, there is no second”

who amongst us does not on any given day dream that we are the Champion of the World, and that all before us have been vanquished.