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rudder to be dropped out of the boat, to lift it into a RIB then up to the workbench. Two small impacts, not even 1cm in diameter, on the leading edge of the horizontal rudder foil either side of the bulb intersection, were found, and the team checked with the race measurer for permission to patch them.
After confirming there was no structural alteration or laminate involved, but less than half a teaspoonful of black resin, they got the all-clear and refitted the rudder the next morning. These were small dents, and when filled and faired it looked as if someone had just touched the leading edge of the red foils with a black marker pen, but they were in a critical place and the crew quickly noticed they were losing a significant amount of lift.
Through all this, as I witnessed dropping the rudder out, then
lifting it up the high and narrow Portsmouth quay ladder to the work- shop, Hendo kept up a loud commentary reminding me that I wasn’t allowed to touch a thing here or anywhere else. Not to help lift the rudder up the ladder, not to help carry a sail bag when heading out racing, or even touching the boat when alongside in the Oracle RIB. ‘Thanks for your offer, Blue, but only shore crew are allowed to do this, and after the team were penalised in the last Cup we are sticking absolutely to the letter of the rules here…’ So what are the key challenges for the shore team imposed by the next Cup? ‘For me and the shore guys, the big challenge is how we deal with the added complexity,’ says Henderson.
sports, swimming, gymnastics and track dominated the story. From the televised coverage in the US – owned and tightly controlled by NBC – you would never know sailing is an Olympic sport. This lack of coverage certainly does nothing to help the cause of US Olympic sailing, once such a bright spot in this nation’s sporting arsenal. Through every recent Olympic cycle US sailors have wondered why their team is no longer competitive – or even dominant – in the sailing events, with a pithy medal count out of all proportion to our population size. And when looking back in history there were indeed far more US sailors represented on the podiums from the 1950s through to the 1980s. Hard to believe in 2016 that in 1984 US sailors won medals in every class at Los Angeles… So can the US ever return to this level of Olympic success?
It’s become a cliché now, but not without serious funding and without a serious restructuring of the pathways that lead to the Games. Recently this has been acknowledged and steps taken to improve the process, since the more traditional, open- market style used to determine US Olympians in the past has not held up to the well-funded and more focused efforts made in other nations with obvious successful results. The US squad has upped its game (a little) with better funding and coaching strategies, but it is still a very long way from being a force on the international stage. The roots of success in these campaigns ultimately always relate to funding, which secures the equipment, time and talent – coaching talent at least as much as sailing talent – needed for success. With- out significant corporate or public sources it will always be an uphill climb to solicit enough private sources (as wealthy as Americans are) who share the vision to support young Olympic athletes. And with so few pathways left to move on into paid pro-sailing, whether in the America’s Cup or other grand prix arenas, the direct payback for Olympic success is also far less certain for the sailors themselves than was once the case. Meanwhile, without a sustain- able and ongoing Olympic programme there is little incentive for even our best small boat sailors to stay involved in Olympic classes from one cycle to the next.
Rio 2016 will no doubt be followed by yet more soul-searching among those who manage and coach our Olympic sailors. Sadly, however, for our best young talent, in the absence of a sustainable funding model very little is going to change.
Renewing their vows… Bill Lee’s sublime 68-footer Merlin is reunited with its designer and builder exactly 40 years after first emerging from Lee’s legendary Chicken Coop up in the hills above Santa Cruz. Merlin was built for a little under $50,000 and launched the ULDB movement. Among those on for her first sail were Tom Blackaller and Dee Smith, when the first chute hoist was, to quote, ‘Amazing!’ Merlin weighed in at 11 tonnes while her roundly thrashed Transpac rival Kialoa hung off the ‘crane’ just shy of 39 tonnes. Kialoa cost more too… much, much more
‘First, we have to communicate with more people and keep those people updated on what’s going on. Dealing with 50 personalities, and critically making sure they know exactly what the next step is, the key factor there is really getting to know your people. You can’t micromanage this stuff, you have to trust them and let them get on with it. And in the same breath the designers and engineers need to have that same feeling towards us… ‘All of these components are so complex. Certainly with the electronics but increasingly so with the hydraulics now, it’s becoming so refined that one person just can’t be across all of this stuff, so the specialist guys run it and own it and all I have is an overview; the key is keeping it all coherent!
‘From now through to the Cup next year a lot of very clever people in all the teams will be concentrating very, very hard, Blue...’ Blue Robinson
USA Where did it all go wrong?
While the Olympics dominated the sailing media, in the US we were insulated from seeing it in the mainstream media, where the ball
22 SEAHORSE The wizard returns
The notice of race has been issued and the entry doors are open for the July 2017 edition of the Transpac, the 49th since the race was first run in 1906. And while not currently shown on the entry list, it’s no secret that Santa Cruz boatbuilding and design legend Bill Lee is planning to enter his 1977 race winner Merlin, the slim, lightweight 68-footer that 40 years ago set off a revolution in offshore monohull design.
Widely regarded as the first significant Ultra Light Displacement Boat (ULDB), it was Merlin’s impressive Transpac record run of 8d 11h that not only held for 20 years*, but also inspired an entire new generation of ULDBs that would chase that and other offshore records on the US west coast and beyond.
Lee and his fellow Santa Cruz boatbuilders subsequently flour- ished in the 1980s and 1990s, designing and building not only Santa Cruz 70s to chase down Merlin’s record, but countless other similar smaller designs inspired by Lee’s famous ‘Fast is Fun’ philosophy that defied the IOR leadmine typeforms of the day. Had the millionaires (and billionaires) newly minted in Silicon Valley not invaded the once ‘vibrant’ Santa Cruz from over the hills to the east, this thriving boatbuilding culture might still be alive today. Nonetheless, hats off to Bill and his team who are preparing one of the most important and elegant offshore racers ever built for her 40th anniversary run to Diamond Head. * When Merlin’s Transpac record was eventually broken, it was by an early Pyewacket, owned by Roy Disney… Pyewacketwas a Bill Lee-designed and built Santa Cruz 70, a semi-production derivative of Lee’s original definitive creation. Dobbs Davis
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