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It is interesting how well the Tasers are doing with 38 boats at their Nationals.
The Tasers are another boat that the Laser Centre dumped long before the Dart 15.
The size of the Oppies & Topper Nationals is staggering (447 & 347 boats). The current growth classes seem to be the Laser Radial and the RS200 (155 & 133 boats). I guess that the Laser Radial is an Olympic effect and the RS200 seems to be winning the contest with the Laser 2000.
On the subject of attendances, has anyone worked out the number boats in a class attending a Nationals as a percentage of boats manufactured.
The S 15 for example got an attendance of 3.1% against boats built.
If you think that is low try working out the Dart 18 figures!
The figures are interesting, particularly as the top five (all 100+ entries) are boats mainly for children.
Over the years, there has been a decisive shift away from adult boats to those of children. I deduce this is because parents' competitiveness is now manifested through their children. Have you noticed how many parents bring their individual RIBs to an event?
It is for this reason that Lasers have grown while Finns have declined, yet both are Olympic classes. A Finn is too macho for a child. I sometimes wonder how many Optimist sailors ever buy an adult boat. At Thorpe Bay, our cadets wouldn't be seen dead in an Optimist, which unbelievably, are designed for children up to the age of sixteen!
Sailing is not the only sport where parents' competitiveness is manifested through their children. Football is a good example. If you drive past any playing field, you will see scores of parents lining the touchline. Now, however much you enjoy football, I don't think any of us would join the parents, unless our own little Jimmy happened to be playing.
I often feel sorry for the parents at the sailing events. They try to get involved as much as possible, usually by hooking their RIBs to their offsprings' boats between races. This is to apply fresh gel to their hair and give them a Cadburys chocolate button.
We should celebrate the Sprint as being a boat for cadets and parents alike.
Fading star of the Thorpe Bay fleet
Former rugby player in the extra-B
Struggling musician
Second best cabbage in the village show...
Marblehead, RC Laser and One Metre which is little unfair on any boat sailed manually on-board by a person. Their nationals can be pretty big looking at the figures and they take up much less space. So the comparisons are a little ropey with these boats in the list IMHO.
A little side-track: wonder if it would be possible to RC a full size 15? Don't see that its not impossible with a couple of beefy servos and gears controlling the sail and rudders, only problem would be a lack of moveable ballast (ie the monkey sailing it!).
One suprise for me is the Firefly dinghy class since its not a very common boat round our way anymore with 68 boats. Does anyone know where they are sailed?
I would have thought the Dart 18 would be the only class that could muster enough bods to beat us in the multihull nats and they have already had their event with 55 sailing.
Martin S.
Ex Sprint 15 Webmaster
Ex Seasalter SC Webmaster
RYA Regional Race Officer (South East Region) (Expired)
RYA Club Race Coach (Expired)
RYA Dinghy Sailing Instructor (Expired)
OK, are you volunteering your newly polished boat Martin.
Ballast is not a problem - 'sack on a track' is the new Willis servo method for moving weight around. Drill a few holes here and there and fit a monster scalectrix style unitrax in rounded rectangular shape to give weight fore and aft, side and middle ...........
So if you can do the sail and rudder controls ............
Or maybe we can use something to slow down Holmes, like a torpedo tube under one of our tramps.
