Rod Davis
And getting crazier…
Why? I spend a bit of time wondering why? Why things are the way they are; what forces are push- ing events one way or the other? Some come out of left field for no apparent reason, others are looking out for self-interest. The answers rarely lie on the surface. Looking deeper some- times reveals answers, other times they’re just too deep to find. I just smile, shake my head, and softly whisper ‘WTF’. The world can be a crazy place sometimes. Take the majestic J-Class racing yacht. One hundred and thirty feet of sleek racing yacht of yesteryear. Used in the America’s Cup back in the day until it got replaced by the much smaller 12 Metre class, because the Js became too expensive, even for the rich. Fast forward to 2016, there are more Js being built and raced than ever before, and they are a lot more expensive. It’s a triumph of art and tradition over technology (although there is a lot of technology in the ‘modern’ J).
The cool thing is the J-Class is coming back to the America’s Cup. Not to sail in the contest (how good would that be!?!) but to have their own regatta during the Cup. Watching these massive boats and crews manhandle spinnaker poles that take six people to carry, and downwind sails that would cover a large house, might just steal the show from the current America’s Cup 50ft catamaran, with six crew, one wing and one jib for the whole race! At the recent Maxi Worlds our chase boat driver (born in 1995) was an Aussie boy who raced lots of boats in Sydney. Good kid named Harley (like the motorbike, as if he has not heard that before.) Anyway, Harley has never sailed a boat with a spinnaker pole.
Never raced with a spinnaker… as in never ever. He has only sailed on boats with bowsprits and prods. I was dumbfounded. So I asked again, and again. Finally, exasperated, asking if a boat had a spinnaker and pole, could he rig it and put it up… ‘not a clue’. I started giving him flak, about lack of proper training, even his upbringing… but had to stop when a flash-moment hit me. I don’t
22 SEAHORSE
have a clue, and never have, and don’t care to know, how to rig or use a gaff. And, like Harley, I couldn’t see why I would ever need to know. Maybe we don’t need to know about the past. Then Harley asked, ‘What is that boom sticking out in front of the mast of the J-Class?’ I got confused on what the future really is, so started on “how to rig and use a spinnaker and pole in three lessons.”
These things that make you whisper WTF are all around us, in every facet of life…
What about the price of a bottle of water vs petrol? How is it that water costs more than petrol? Petrol is much harder to make, store and transport. But buy a litre of both and you will soon find water costs more, much more. Water costs more than Coke! I know economists talk about ‘what the market will pay’. Yeah, but that still seems a bit wrong to me.
Speaking of wrong, sailing being eliminated from the 2020 Paralympics is simply wrong. The Paralympics is more inspiring, by miles, than the Olympics. When those athletes can run, swim, sail and perform with their disabilities, we able-bodied warriors have no excuse to say ‘it’s too hard’. We don’t know hard like they know hard.
Not sure how or why sailing got kicked out of the Paralympics, given clean wind power would be a great equaliser for all kinds of disabilities, but alarm bells better be ringing and red lights flashing about sailing in the Olympics after the 2020 Games in Tokyo. The yachting world is about to start our four-yearly, hotly contested debate over classes for the Olympic Games. We seem to do this so it coincides with the US presidential elections to see who can sink lower!
People will push their point of view for their favourite class – bitching mercilessly and moaning about rival classes; rarely, if ever, considering the total picture. Everyone will talk, few will actually listen, and in the end the national federation’s self-interest will dominate. We will muddle along with the final Olympic class selection
MAX RANCHI
TOM LUITWEILER/PPL
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