Update
The Botín-designed TP52 Azzurra does a fair impression of a clipper ship rounding Cape Horn, albeit this is Miami and the T-shirts are a dead giveaway... Having won the Miami round of the 2017 Super Series, the Azzurra team headed back to Europe with a useful overall lead over the much-improved German owner-driver entry Platoon. Azzurra tactician Vasco Vascotto could also look forward to some early sailing with his other grand prix mount, the radical new Maxi72 Cannonball also designed by Botín (see next month)
game of inches it always was. It is easy to get motivated when the opportunity to race in quality fleets is presented. Our post-mortem of the TP52 event in Miami took place with the
speed team working to identify areas where we struggled. As with any good analysis, we always learn more after a solid thrashing. Conclusion: that analysis highlighted a couple of key points, upwind open course boat speed, rate of turn when tacking and starts. In my mind, it all begins with consistent starting. Our upwind
speed is dictated by lane preservation so we have to start where we can control our destiny. In Miami Azzurra started well and could control the fleet. From there if we don’t execute plan A with a higher percentage then all we get is what we deserve… scraps. Here too the game of inches prevails and we need to stop giving away feet. The only action on the racecourse this month was at the Voiles in
St Barts aboard Bella Mente. Much like the Caribbean 600, I label this a must-do event. The racing is coastal oriented around some spectacular rock piles. A bit one-sided but nonetheless spectacular. It was not our best week. By that I mean we were fast, our boat -
handling was solid and yet we had an OCS. As I write I am sensing a theme here… must start well. The event was shortened, the last day abandoned due to no wind, but if you are going to sit and wait around for wind then St Barts is not the worst place to do it… America’s Cup: I have stayed away from commenting too much
about the Cup; not really sure what to think about it these days. Candidly it feels as if it has been reduced to just another event and yet it is the America’s Cup so by default it will have coverage. I know five of the six teams got together and committed to the
same path that the event is on under Oracle’s reign. Yet I would suspect that agreement would not hold up to the scrutiny of the New York Supreme Court if contested. Ultimately the holder of the Cup can and will determine the
direction. Some may honour what was written, others may not, and one team, Team New Zealand, the longest-standing challenger, said no way. An interesting tell to the substance of that ‘challenger meeting’. Time will be the judge but let’s hope whoever wins takes the growth of the sport into consideration… Standing by, Harwood, MD
DOING THE CHARLESTON – Dobbs Davis For bang-for-the-buck value in competitiveness, fun, ambience and just a rollicking good time, it’s really hard to beat Charleston Race Week. Every April Randy Draftz, his wife Anna and dozens and
12 SEAHORSE
dozens of volunteers, sponsors and industry supporters band together to create an event that brings together all elements of the US racing community in this vibrant port town in the Old South: there are one-designs and handicap racing; there are inshore and offshore courses; there are new planing designs like VX1s and boats for the old geezers like J/24s; there are junior sailors, wounded warriors, collegiate all-stars, and now even a post-race exhibition pro-am held off the beach. The event is unique in its size (about 200 entries), its diversity
and a combination of both fun and intensity packed so cleverly into just three days that you feel you’ve been here for an entire week. And unlike most other race weeks in the US, this one has both a local organisation and community racing base plus a large percent- age of out-of-town talent who come mostly for the fun… some from as far as Italy and the UK. The characterisation of this event used to be it was one for the
‘average Joe’, but it’s really grown beyond that: there are plenty of high-profile pro sailors who are also enjoying a Dark ’n Stormy on the beach here each night. One of these, John Kostecki, was helping a J/70 team help
themselves to another impressive win in what has developed into the most impressive one-design fleet in the US. Sailing with Joel Ronning’s Catapult, this team coached by Grant ‘Fuzz’ Spanhake built off their 2016 worlds win in San Francisco in a similar environ - ment with a breezy, shifty, current-strewn inshore course area, this time with 73 boats in the fleet. ‘Our team goal was just to stay in the top six,’ said Fuzz, a tall
order for most teams but achievable for Catapult, who reportedly spent three months training for the worlds and three days in Charleston before race week. The class at the top is reminiscent of the old J/Boat days when the sailmakers duked it out for class dominance, but with pro-level support like this there are some serious other teams in the mix now too… You’ll see much more of this soon at the worlds in Porto Cervo where many boat names will be familiar from much larger yachts. Besides the new pro-am, another innovation was adoption of
ORC rating for the four handicap classes, two inshore and two offshore. Organisers from the Charleston Ocean Racing Association (CORA) chose this over local PHRF because of the diversity of the boats arriving from out of town… history shows they could not easily assign them PHRF ratings without a bar fight. So Randy rolled up his sleeves, got training as a measurer and pitched in to help get certificates generated for locals while many visitors had their own.
INGRID ABERY
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