Sailing Anarchy

go to sea

There can be few tougher tests for a new 33-footer than being thrown into the fiercely competitive Rolex Fastnet Race. To pile on the pressure, Fastrak XII, one of the new Jeanneau Sun Fast 3300s, had only been launched 10 days before the start.

While Fastrak XII was in the capable hands of experienced offshore sailors Henry Bomby and Hannah Diamond, they were as new a partnership as the boat. And yet 80 hours later Bomby and Diamond had delivered an impressive performance finishing second overall in the 61-boat doublehanded fleet. But that was just the start.

They were also second overall out of 84 boats in IRC3, a fleet that included fully crewed and doublehanded entries. Read on.

you know it ain’t easy

The latest on Francis Joyon’s Tea Run attempt is coming to an end, but not without a rather difficult situation…

IDEC SPORT maxi-trimaran will enter a very tricky stretch as they enter the Thames Estuary with all its shipping, buoys and currents… a dangerous area that sailors prefer to navigate in daylight. Nothing is ever easy for Francis and this time he has run out of fuel and his batteries cannot be charged, so this zone will be particularly risky, as he will be sailing without his AIS and radar…

Typical of what we have come to expect during Joyon’s adventures, you might say. The holder of the Jules Verne Trophy and winner of the last Route du Rhum has throughout his career experienced many similar unexpected situations and dealt with them successfully, with his incredible, untiring physical and mental resources making up for the technical deficiencies. Read on.

it sucks

The 3,600dwt general cargo vessel MV Ankie has made her first voyage with two eConowind Ventifoil wings installed. The vessel sailed the North Sea from Delfzijl in the Netherlands to Hamburg and Norway and then back to Rotterdam.

The modular Ventifoil units are wings with vents and an internal fan that uses boundary layer suction to double the force of the Ventifoil, while reefing when needed. Together with the Technical University of Delft and MARIN, eConoship studied several concepts of wind propulsion, concluding the suction wings studied by Jacques Cousteau were most promising.

On the captain’s demand, the Ventifoils deploy automatically to the optimal angle relative to the apparent wind. The generated force is transferred into the deck, and motor power can therefore be reduced. The Ventifoils can be containerized inside a 40-foot container or fixed to a vessel. Read on.

grease monkey

Everyone who buys a used boat knows what this Anarchist says…

Protecting all the winches from corrosion by carefully packing each one with the three types of grease known to man.  Brown heavy duty machine grease, over laid by blue trailer bearing grease, topped off with some form of white grease.

Love ya work. Jump in the thread.

scotw

Samantha is a girl for all seasons, and always makes SA look good whether she’s Sailor or Skier Chick of the Week

the man

In this new video about L. Francis Herreshoff by our friends at Off Center Harbor, you’ll get to sit in on an intimate conversation among three gentlemen who actually knew Herreshoff.

You can click here to step aboard with biographer Roger Taylor, historian Maynard Bray, and close friend Art Brendze as they relate personal stories and deep knowledge of the man behind the brilliant yacht designs.

Thanks to our friends at OffCenterHarbor.com for making this video available to Anarchists.

TrumpGP

We’ve never pulled punches about the kind of person we think Larry Ellison is.  Even as fans of his SailGP project have begged us to ‘go easy’ because of ‘the good’ he’s doing for the sport, we’ve maintained that Larry rarely has  done anything for a truly good reason. His latest project is more about Larry’s inability to accept defeat and spiting the tiny little nation who so completely humiliated him in Bermuda.

And today, Ellison’s spite for ‘the people’ likely killed his series for good when the news broke that Lazza is now raising millions for one Donald J. Trump, hosting the orange diabetes host for a quarter-million-dollar-a-plate fundraiser next month, presumably in some castle or palace or spaceship or wine cavern.  Ellison becomes the first tech titan to openly support Trump outside of the notoriously detested Peter Thiel; obviously the thought of Bernie Sanders coming for any of the billions that Ellison is entitled to by right was just too much for Ellison and his infinite generosity.

Looking at the 2020 SailGP season schedule we’re struck by what a well-educated and socialist-loving bunch of venues are on the list, and we are not at all sure that Sydney, Copenhagen, New York, Cowes, and San Francisco are going to be excited about providing support for Larry Ellison’s passion project, especially since Trump is likely to attend at least one of the US events.

Anyone who downloads the SailGP App, visits a SailGP venue, or shares a SailGP link will indirectly be supporting Donald Trump’s 2020 campaign, and anyone who works for SailGP will be directly supporting it.

Hey, It was good while it lasted. Discuss in the FailGP thread.

bad actors

This is my version of hell. I told you why I wasn’t going to the us sailing “leadership” forum, and here, in (almost) living color, is exactly why: Dave Reed, Dawn Riley, some dork (with his badge on to signify his self-importance), Tucker Carlson, oops, Thompson and Tom Ehmann.

Excepting Ehmann, I could not find four people who dislike me more, and vice versa. And look at that ridiculous “stage” – could they cram them any closer together?

Can you imagine me up there – hahahaha! I’d be wearing a black Anarchy hoody, on my third Bloody Mary, saying inappropriate things, making snoring sounds, and probably farting about every other minute. I’d blame Riley too, and no one would doubt me.

Yep, looking forward to my invitation for next year. – ed.

fill ‘er up

Personally, I’ve had this kind of other woman while also having another woman. Sayin’… – ed.

Another gem by Sara Steenland.

yacht club justice

Reading the front page piece on the chair throwing sailor getting a conviction recording set aside reminded me of the abuses of justice seemingly afforded to those or through those of supposed higher standing.

I wonder how the lack of understanding of the word punishment or similarly penalty has slipped in some quarters.

This sailor threw chairs at another causing actual bodily harm – not one chair but 5. What a shame that his social life may be curtailed – isn’t that what a punishment should be? A punishment? 

Would he have got away so lightly if he was – for example – claimed to be the result of a single parent upbringing ?

Or a country leader who broke rules regarding foreign influence in a country’s elections and his mates declined to allow evidence that could have damaged his chances allowing him to get off scot free then in the light of his comments gets his buddy’s jail sentence reduced – hmmm…

Or bringing it back to home when a Sydney Hobart super maxi tacks in the water of another and receives the lowest possible actual penalty (one place) the chairman of the jury who had served for 8 years is mysteriously NOT invited back the following year.

Revolutions are made of smaller injustices than these and no small wonder there are liberals in the world. – SS.

can i sell you oceanfront property?

young bucks

For Ben Beasley and Nick Gardiner, the start of the 2020 Short Handed Sailing Association Round North Island Yacht Race can’t come soon enough. As the youngest competitors in the race, on the smallest boat in the fleet, Beasley (19) and Gardiner (20) are keen to get out there and prove they can take on this epic adventure.

Their yacht, Moving Violation, is an Elliott 7.9 designed by Greg Elliott. At just 7.0m on the waterline Beasley and Gardiner will have plenty of work to do to keep Moving Violation at the front of the pack in what will be a diverse division including  Coppelia and Arbitare, both Farr 11.6’s, Duty Free, a Farr 1220, Fifth Dimension, a Beneteau First 36.7 and Distraction, a Farr 1020. Also, in this division, we have Am Meer, a Bavaria 38, Start Me Up, a Ross 930, Pelagian II, a Stewart 34 and the fleets second smallest boat, C U Later, a Ross 8m. Read on.

stretching it

Idec now hauling ass on day 26. Read on. The lower half of that mainsail has a bad look – better get that figured out!

going down

We suspect there will be a few more of these nose dives as we get to the inglorious end of these things.  Here’s one explanation as to why this one happened:  It looks like the flight controller took his eye off for a bit, allowed the foil too much lift, it came too near the surface and aeriated losing all lift – only one way to go then which is back down with a bang, the rig overtook the hull and game over.

Title inspiration thanks to John Cale.

flock of seagulls

A read of this article from the Guardian infuriates us. “Relocate” 1,000 seagulls for the precious America’s Cup. Really? For a ferry terminal? For one event? Why not let Ineos frack the area while they’re at it. It would be a great cross-branding marketing home run! 

The good news is that it seems to work, although it is bad precedent to think that animals, especially at-risk animals, can just be moved out of the way for such a frivolous reason as a fucking sailboat race. Oh wait this isn’t just any race, this is the four boat AC race. America’s Cup uber alles!

The building of infrastructure for the America’s Cup has forced the relocation of 1,000 at-risk seagulls in Auckland, in what is believed to be New Zealand’s largest mass relocation of a bird colony.

The project saw the colony of red-billed gulls moved from a space on Auckland’s waterfront that has been earmarked for a ferry terminal to be built for the sailing race, which will be held in the city in 2021.

Squawking, chip-stealing seagulls are under threat in New Zealand, with some colonies experiencing “unbelievable declines”, and others disappearing altogether over the past few decades. Read on.

Title inspiration well, thanks to, you know who. But do you remember this song?

we missed it

Having pointed out that the Stars $ Stripes AC team, such as it is, had a custom model of their boat made with not the leeward foil down, but rather the windward one, we can’t believe that we didn’t notice that the official AC poster has the foils on the wrong side…on all four boats.

Thanks to Anarchist Jorge for pointing it out.

Kinda reminds of this.

break it down

Usually raced in one design, The Ocean Race opens at the IMOCA for the next edition in October 2021. The VO65s will still be in the race, but reserved for young crews. Interview with Johan Salén, Managing Director.

During 2018, we learned of the change in ownership of the Volvo Ocean Race. Now called The Ocean Race , it now belongs to Atlant Ocean Racing Spain, led by Richard Brisius, Johan Salén and Jan Litborn, and will take place on two classes of boats.

The next edition of The Ocean Race (Whitbread Round the World Race from 1973 to 1997 then Volvo Ocean Race from 2001 to 2018) will take place in 2021-2022. To open the race to the ultra-technological world of French offshore racing, the new organizers have decided to make IMOCA the new class of The Ocean Race . We will therefore now find two types of boat on the starting line, the VO65 on one side and the IMOCA on the other.

However, two years ago, the future of the 65 feet was not secure, as Johan Salen explains.

Read on, thanks to Regate.com

shut ’em down

So, there are now other perspectives on just what exactly happened in this incident. The stories are in play right now. Can’t see this not turning into a legal battle at some point…

UPDATE:  My name is Ron Gibbs, andI’m the Commodore of the Arizona Yacht Club. This accusation is absolutely false. Mr. Hill failed to confirm his presence in a timely manner and did not advertise the auction items on his website as he had verbally agreed. When he didn’t show up on time (he was an hour late) we assumed he wasn’t coming. When he did arrive, he was unprepared as he had not reviewed any of the material. We had already moved on to Plan B. We are still waiting to hear Hill’s explanation.

But wait, there’s more: (click to expand)

From FB, and no reason to think this isn’t legit, as the poster is legit. ‘Zona is a racist state anyway – remember this asshole? And now they have this little shrew, Senator Martha McSally to be proud of.

Title inspiration again, thanks to PE.

track ’em

Cool shot of DN Iceboats doin’ they thang.  Story here.

double wide

We are super stoked to announce today that McConaghy/Aero Yachts have stepped up to become the new title sponsors of our bad-ass Multihull Anarchy forum.

Multihulls are only to become a larger part of the game, and we couldn’t be happier than to have one of the world’s premier boat builders with an incredibly active multihull focus.  – ed.

slippery

You wouldn’t use anything other than Dyneema for your halyards or sheets,’ says Banks Sails’ boss Paolo Semeraro. ‘So why accept anything less in your sails?’ There are good reasons why most sailmakers don’t offer sails reinforced with Dyneema despite its well-known strength, durability and toughness. Instead, they tend to use sailcloth made with carbon or aramid fibre.

Dyneema may be stronger than carbon, much less brittle and three times lighter for the same diameter, but it’s slippery, which makes it awkward to laminate into the body of a sail – and you really don’t want a sail with load-bearing filaments that are liable to slip around when it flogs. ‘Nobody else is using it,’ Semeraro says. ‘But we have found a way to make it work.’

After five years making Dyneema-reinforced sails with no problems, there is no longer any doubt that they have indeed cracked it. Read on.

inboard/outboard

One of the weirdest things that people do,  mostly  to 1970’s or so production sailboats, is to (rather than fix or replace a broken inboard), they hang an outboard off the transom. 

Most of these boats are clearly not well maintained, often a live – aboard sitch, and most are often found in “alternative” moorings. So while perusing Ericson 35-2 ads, we came across a perfect example…

Beautifully restored 1974 Ericson Aailboat. 35 feet, new interior including hot water heater, fixtures, head, floors and reupholstered ceiling and couches— ready to very comfortably live aboard! Includes 3 job sails and main sail all in good working condition. Main sail cover needs to be patched and boat needs an outboard motor but ready to go! Price dropped to reflect need of new outboard motor. Buy it here.

what is it?

A new 50′ cat?

double champs

This past week,  the U.S. sailors with the best performances of 2019 were honored at US Sailing’s annual Rolex Yachtsman and Yachtswoman of the Year Awards. At the end of the night, 2019 505 World Champions Mike Martin and Adam Lowry were presented with the trophy along with specially engraved Rolex timepieces. Kiteboarder Daniela Moroz won the US Sailing Rolex Yachtswoman of the Year.

paradise lost

On March 5, 2019, the accident marked the French nautical community. The Paradise sailboat, offering cruises in Antarctica, lost its skipper, Arnaud Dhallennne and a crewmember, propelled overboard while the boat was laid down by a wave in formed sea conditions, returning from South Georgia.

Despite the searches, they could not be found and the sailboat was brought back safely by her second, Morgane Ursault-Poupon. Read on.

sell out

Granted, this isn’t sailing, but it is related via the UK AC effort, and it speaks volumes about MB’s disregard for image, let alone the message it sends about their concern for the environment that they have partnered with this.

Seriously, Mercedes Benz? Isn’t this a company that prides itself on being the very best, yet they take money from a huge fracking company?

Hard to cheer for this team anymore.

by the time i get to arizona

UPDATE:  My name is Ron Gibbs, andI’m the Commodore of the Arizona Yacht Club. This accusation is absolutely false. Mr. Hill failed to confirm his presence in a timely manner and did not advertise the auction items on his website as he had verbally agreed. When he didn’t show up on time (he was an hour late) we assumed he wasn’t coming. When he did arrive, he was unprepared as he had not reviewed any of the material. We had already moved on to Plan B. We are still waiting to hear Hill’s explanation.

But wait, there’s more: (click to expand)

From FB, and no reason to think this isn’t legit, as the poster is legit. Fucking Arizona is a racist state anyway – remember this asshole? And now they have this little shrew, Senator Martha McSally to be proud of.

Regardless, nice work, AYC! Title inspiration thanks to Public Enemy.

hard core baller

Pro sailor Lia Ditton continues to train for her 14th ocean crossing, from Japan to San Francisco solo – this time rowing not sailing! To wrap up 2,895 miles of training under oars on the US West Coast, comes this latest short film from Lia Ditton in collaboration with FindItFilm.

The film charts, Lia’s 728 mile row from Ilwaco, WA to San Francisco, California in September 2019. Days lost in a north-bound current eddy, surrounded by sharks, a storm, gale force winds and 40ft breaking seas on the Continental shelf, Lia found the Oregon Coastline to be a tougher challenge than crossing the atlantic – something she’s done 9 times, 3x as a solo sailor.

but, but, but, my yc membership!

A man who assaulted a woman, causing her bodily harm, has had the recording of his conviction set aside – partly because of his Royal Queensland Yacht Squadron membership. Peter Hollis, 74, an RQYS member for 61 years, threw five chairs at Lou Lander, then 55, with two hitting her head and arm, drawing blood, in mid-2016.

He was convicted and fined $5000 last year, with the conviction recorded.

Hollis appealed over the recording of the conviction, claiming the sentencing judge was wrong in not finding it would affect his RQYS and Maroochy Sailing Club memberships. The appeal court said because of the organisations’ importance to Hollis, “in his social sphere’’, it was likely a recorded conviction would “materially adversely impact’’ his social and economic wellbeing.

Justice David Boddice referred to the seriousness of the offence, but also Hollis’s age, and the former solicitor and real estate licensee’s previous unblemished character. He said a significant part of the 74-year-old’s social life revolved around the yachting ­organisations.

Ms Lander, whom a court was told lived in fear of Hollis after the attack, said she found the comments “galling’’.

Ms Lander, who had previously been in a relationship with Hollis, said she was extremely disappointed by the appeal court decision. “Domestic violence, and imposing adequate deterrent on perpetrators, should be paramount to the courts, not whether or not membership at an exclusive yacht club would ‘materially adversely impact’ on the (perpetrator’s) social wellbeing,” she said.

RQYS general manager Shawn Ket said the squadron’s board was currently considering all relevant material before making a decision regarding Hollis’s future membership. He said Hollis had voluntarily kept away from the squadron while awaiting the appeal decision.

let’s cheat!

I’m not quite sure that all of what this Anarchist lists would be considered cheating,  but fuck it – let’s cheat!

Can you make a “PHRF cheater”?

I would say yes. Over the years it’s been my observation that most boats are sailing at or below their ratings, and occasionally a few boats are way out performing their ratings. The question is why?

Now we all know that there are some boats out there that are flat out not rated accurately. There are reasons these anomalies exist such as lack of data points on low production boats, but Im not talking about these. I’m talking about the high production boat with a well established rating.

Let’s first look at “a well established rating”. This is a problematic statement. Take look at a random boat that fits this category. Say a J-30. This boat was in production for 7 years ending in 1986. This means that the NEWEST J-30 is now 34 years old. When was the last time your local PHRF board re-assessed the rating for a J-30. My guess would be 34 years ago!

Why is this important?

Looking around at the PHRF fleets I’ve sailed in over the last 30 years, there is something consistent. The average age of the fleet tends to be stuck in 20 year old boats. I would venture to guess this is largely based on the affordability of 20 year old boats. Well with this in mind we have to remember that things happen to a boat in 20 years. Jump in the thread!

go to the show

Towards the end of the European boating season, the ancient sailing city of Genoa hosts one of the Mediterranean’s key in-water boat shows. Held every September, the Genoa International Boat Show, organised by Ucina, the Italian marine industry association, celebrates Italy’s love affair with the water.

Set in eastern end of Genoa’s well protected and busy commercial harbour, this six-day show is all about maximising the value of the “in water” concept. With the Mediterranean lapping on the other side of the harbour wall, the two marinas are filled with boats ready for sea trials. This, plus two floors of a large exhibition hall with a semi-covered external area allows Italy’s most prestigious marine exhibition to showcase the very best of the industry.

The boats are grouped into types, accessed by wide walkways. Yachts, RIBs and runabouts cluster near the main hall, while catamarans (now a major growth area) are in the west part of the marina. Beyond them, motor yachts dominate the western end of the show. Read on.

some hoax, eh?

Climate scientists on Friday revealed the latest troubling new observation in Antarctica, illustrating the consequences of the rapid warming of the area brought on by the manmade climate crisis.

As The Guardian reported Friday, researchers stationed at the Esperanza research station at the northern tip of the Antarctic peninsula found that temperatures reached 64.9º Fahrenheit (18.3º Celsius)—the highest temperature logged since scientists began recording the continent’s temperature in 1961.

Read on.

tea for two?

We grabbed this from sailboat.com. A good look at an interesting new shorthanded boat.

On the pontoon of Kernével at Larmor-Plage, we find Jean-Pierre Kelbert who welcomes us on board Léon, the JPK 1030 of the shipyard. The owner leaves us the keys to his sailboat for the day and we will try it out in duplicate.

We will therefore discover the JPK without instructions and without a site skipper, which is rare. Come to think of it, knowing that a good amateur regatta boat must be easy to understand and operate, Jean-Pierre Kelbert must have confidence in his JPK 1030. Read on.