It was not so many years ago when many of the world’s fastest and most spectacular racing yachts would travel to Cowes Week as a matter of course – and not only in Fastnet years. This is Skandia Wild Thing on a visit to the UK threading through the traffic past Cowes Green as she dodges the building ebb tide. At this year’s event the biggest boats were down around 45ft, with a similar trend at the Copa del Rey in Palma. Once again the biggest yachts are today more interested in racing offshore where they do not need a crew counted in the dozens. Meanwhile, the Cape 31s are bleeding inshore fleets of the most competitive teams – owners also tiring of dragging around expensive, heavy interiors that are rarely used except after racing on a rainy day
under ORC, I see similar trends. This year just three out of the 18 boats in ORC 1 were younger than 10 years, none in ORC 2, four of the 21 in ORC 3, and one of the seven in ORC 4. Across the four classes just two boats on the podium were younger than 10 years: Scugnizza, an Italia 11.98 launched in 2019, and the J/99 Meerblick Fun dating from 2018. Both scored a first in class, though, which could indicate a trend difference from IRC. Or perhaps they are just well sailed?
If I may suggest two areas for the rating managers to look at firstly would be whether and how to promote fewer crew… Certainly in IRC the maximum crew number, even if tied to the weight limit, seems (too) generous.
Secondly to look at the age allowance that is designed to encour- age older boats to keep racing by keeping them more competitive. I certainly would not like to find older boats rated out of the game, but today we see money being poured into the older boats to opti- mise perfectly everything that does not affect the age allowance – I feel that correcting that trend (in small steps) will be advisable. In a way if rated racing, certainly for day racing, is to be interesting, it requires one-off boats and with that the fun of planning, designing, building and then optimising your personally tailored yacht. As soon as that is not there and we rely on production boats for day racing, one-design racing is a good alternative, obviously finan- cially but also from a sporting perspective, as well as the fact that focusing on offshore racing becomes even more rewarding. There is no way that owning and building one-off boats for inshore racing in the sub-50ft range, probably soon below 60ft, will return. Day racing must find its future in embracing one-design classes. Rated competition below 60ft will then continue to develop towards optimising existing boats, the classics of the future. All in all Covid and now also the war in Ukraine have further pushed down competitor numbers in Europe. A recession, not that unlikely, might cause more havoc. Not for this year’s Maxi Yacht Rolex Cup, though, with 50 entries and about half of them over 80ft in length, pushing new boundaries. Perhaps the fantastic images of the Maxi’s racing in Sardinia may help to inspire other boat owners to pick up racing (again)…
Cherry on this year’s Maxi Yacht Rolex Cup publicity cake is the much hyped first competitive outing by Flying Nikka. But is it really? Just as in Andersen’s tale of the emperor’s new clothes, are we not watching a naked emperor as Flying Nikka – for reasons of safety as well as fair competition – has a start of her own; in reality she is not racing but showcasing what could be a future Maxi class? Equally interesting is the first competitive outing of the first Club- Swan 80 My Song, this one competing for real and taking on a strong fleet of Maxis… most of them 5-18ft longer. Pity the Maxi 72s are not in the same start, leaving us to guess true performance somewhat as well as sporting hierarchy in the 2022 Maxi fleet. All involved with the ClubSwan 80 project were understandably relieved to see their baby fly downwind in medium breeze at the same speed as the much bigger Wally Centos. Also to see her finish her first race in third place knowing that upwind there is still plenty of room to improve; her centreline rotating canard is not fully func- tioning yet and tweaking stability remains an important option. My Song has a generous rig amounting to very much the same sail area as the 3ft longer and near 5-tonne heavier Deep Blue! No wonder this swan flies like an eagle, to borrow Steve Miller’s famous song title. Miller certainly was not referring to sail area to displace- ment ratio, however… Two very interesting debuts showing lots of potential. Who can ask for more? Rob Weiland, TP52 Class Manager
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