Before the explosion in pro sailing in the 1990s even high-profile campaigns like Kialoa relied on a majority of crew competing for expenses at best and quite often paying their own way. Like all the IOR maxis Kialoa always raced with professionals onboard, counting the boat captain plus some of the delivery crew in the middle along with at least a professional tactician and sailmaker further back in fantasy land. But we were still some way from the later era of pro crews committing to multiple programmes in different fleets. Pre-Covid, a crew party at a Super Series round or a Maxi72 or superyacht event would see the same names on a different shirt. With the recent success of social racing, though lockdowns are easing it may be a while before these new faces onboard are bumped off again for an under-employed pro sailor
Some feel this series should not travel at all, certainly not during the year, and at most switch locations between seasons? Besides that the TP52 owners might never agree on the one and only location; I feel taking all venue change out of the competition will seriously reduce the attraction. Whether for the participants, sponsors or fans and I do not see how we can survive at a substantially lower level of any of these three.
Crew travel restrictions are the most obvious thing now hampering participation. A series like the 52 Super Series, mainly raced in the western Med, has about 60 per cent of its participating crew originating from outside the EU!
I suspect for Maxi racing in the Med the numbers are not much different. Pre Covid-19, so without any travel restrictions, the sched- uling of most high-level pro sailors was pretty daunting if not unhealthy, but mainly then to themselves.
Unlike in most sports pro sailors play for several high-level teams during one season. Imagine Cristiano Ronaldo playing not just in Italy for Juventus and maybe half a dozen matches for the Por- tuguese team but also for a team in the first division in Italy, just because he is a friend of the club’s president, as well as a few matches for Manchester United, the Los Angeles FC and Cerezo Osaka in Japan… flying tight schedules in between them, private jet in his case. But not our ‘poor’ sailors.
Sounds like crazy but this is exactly what hundreds of pro sailors till recently did, year in year out. Often with zero days to spare between events, let alone enough days to (self)-quarantine or just relax a bit. With a family at home you fly back whenever you can. Two or three-day visits home to New Zealand or Australia from the Med or the US are no exception or, better said, were no exception. Till well into 2021 this will not be possible and possibly for even longer. Choices to be made.
Owners may look at planning their future racing somewhat differently, for both boat and crew. And arrive at choices and arrange- ments that demand less travel, possibly achieve less moving around of crew between teams (and classes) and allow for a bit of time between events to reduce the risk of spreading diseases at a rate we cannot tolerate.
This will not be all negative and over time it might also have positive effects in the results and fun departments. Just as when optimising a boat, there is no end to it, we can always do better. Aim for a win-win, no time to sulk over days gone by. Then when it is just a win try to do better next race. As sailors do… Rob Weiland, TP52 and Maxi72 class manager
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