Area D North Qualifier Announced

The Outback Cup started a few years ago and has continued to grow every year, mainly because its a great regatta. We brought in the mocal Cat Fleet last year(16 boats) and the Monohulls embraced us, asked us to "up-the-annie" this year. I think we have done just that. Hobie division 9 points regatta, and Alter Cup Qualifier. Should be a large open class also, so bring it on, you will not be disappointed at Columbia Sailing Club on September 27-28th!

David Mosley
www.seacats.org

HI John and David

How are you running the qualifier at a one design regatta?

Won't you force a sailor to choose between his one design start and the Alter qualifier portsmouth start?

If you really forcast 50 boats... you won't be able to start them all together, collect times and then score them in class, open and for the Alter cup.

We ran the qualifier like this one year as a subset of a larger open event. Non US Sailing members raced but were not scored for the alter cup. We had a great turnout of 30 boats... however the competition suffered a good deal. Now, we make the tradeoff of opting for the serious racers in a small (frequently 10 boat regatta) who would take the opportunity to compete in the alter cup if they won rather
then use the qualifier to encourage US Sailing Membership.

One of the problems we faced was the majority of the fleet decided they had no chance of winning the qualifier NOR would they go if they did magically win. They prefered leaving the event we fob'ed the Alter qualifier on alone.
Lots of confusion without much up side.

Thanks
Mark

C'mon, Mark. How many times do we have to run a successful event down here with this format before you believe we can tie our shoes? Don't sweat the details, unless you're planning on joining us - not very politic to snipe somebody's event at your current distance. US Sailing is not simply about the championship, and this is another one of the events that's out there to prove it. This is intended to encourage new and renewing members, not discourage people from participating because they might not win. With that attitude, why race at all?

Hope you were just in a bad mood, and the clouds have since lifted -

J

Hi John

Sorry you took my post that way. Seriously, when we have discussed the qualifier in our region... the One Design sailors argued that they would be excluded while the Open sailors insisted that everyone had to be racing against one another. Since we have a lot of strong 16 and 17 sailors in the region we agreed that we needed a separate event.

Its the last regatta of the season, usally after everyone's nationals and its October in New Jersey so its cold... but the usual racers have the equipment and motivation to go racing.

Perhaps you guys have a brilliant solution and I was interested in hearing about it.

Take Care
Mark

Mark,
I am confused (as usual). Aren't you the person who said he is making it his mission to get the big regattas to start one-design fleets together and score them as both one-design and Portsmouth to improve competition?

I don't know how they are doing it at this qualifier, but maybe they are doing it your way. And, in the meantime, you are saying that in your area the one-design fleets won't go for that?

Just curious

Hi Mary

I am a huge proponent of racing that way. However, I try to group the boats of similar performance together into separate races (Similar to OCRA and CRAM). I agree with critics that its not much fun to race a Hobie 14 against an Inter 20. Inter 20's, Nacra 6.0's with chutes, F18's and F18HT's will sail around the course together and you might as well race them together. The hobie 14 should be in a separate grouping with similar boats. Moreover, I don't think anyone would enjoy a 50 boat starting line with boats ranging from Hobie 14 to Inter 20's for a buoys race.

The Alter cup qualifier is unique, the winner can move on to the national event and so they must win the race against all competition on portsmouth. For this event, the stock Hobie 14 could correct out over the Inter 20's. IMO you must have a separate start for these competitors. Indeed some competitors in a qualifier that I ran argued that it was not fair to mix Alter cup and Non Alter cup racers on the starting line because in a short race, the start was critical and a novice sailor could inadvertently screw you up.

I am also sensitive to the concerns of the Hobie classes with respect to their points regattas. I don't see the point of antagonizing the Hobie one design racers who don't want their one design races split into two groups with several joining the Alter class for what ever reason.

Perhaps its not a big deal to the hobie racers if they opt for the Alter start over their class start. John is correct, I am not racing so I don't have a vote. I was confused about the structure of this regatta and simply shared the discussion between open and hobie classes in area C.

In the end, you must have a consensus among the racers for how you will run the event, otherwise... they will vote with their feet and save their time and money for an event closer to their expectations. The term "points regatta" means a great deal to a Hobie racer. Years ago Jamie Diamond spoke of how they revived cat racing in Ohio. They found that people would show up at a Hobie event expecting lots of for example Hobie 16' only to find a low turnout and wind up not have much fun. They simply stopped racing. OCRA turned things around by making it clear to the sailors what they could expect on the race weekend and then delivering on that promise. OCRA's solution of three bands of portsmouth racing with one design groups has been very successful and something that we try to emulate in CRAC. The central point is to make sure that you listen to what the racers want, decide how to organize your event, clearly layout the classes and what you expect the numbers to be and then deliver on this promise.

Good luck!

Take Care
Mark

Okay, how about this? Do it OCRA-style with the one-designs and the left-overs starting together in appropriate Portsmouth groupings. Score as both one-designs and Portsmouth in each start group. And then after the primary regatta is over, take the top X number of Portsmouth finishers from each start group (this includes both the boats that were sailing in one-design classes and the classless boats), and have a couple of run-off races just among them to determine who qualifies for the Alter Cup. If someone is not interested in contending for the Alter Cup, just go down the Portsmouth results lists until you have enough boats for the final sail-off races. For the people who are really interested in competing for the Alter Cup (and for the race committee, as well), it would be a whole lot easier to take a few extra hours on the last day of a regatta than to schedule a whole separate event that is only going to draw a few dedicated people. And, meanwhile, while the Alter Cup Qualifier finals are being run, the rest of the sailors can get their trophies, pack up and go home.

I don't know if that would work, but it really would be nice to find a feasible way to incorporate the Alter Cup Qualifier into a larger regatta to help generate more interest -- but at the same time without interfering with the scoring and competition of the main regatta.

As I say, I don't know how they do it in Pensacola. Maybe they have a formula that works. If so, it should be shared with the rest of the Multihull Council Area Reps.

In each Area, the Qualifier only affects one event out of the whole season, and it would be nice if it could somehow be seen as a prestigious thing to be able to incorporate the Qualifier as part of your regatta.

or perhaps tack on an extra day at the end of the regatta (we all want to go to awards - right?). Announce those that qualified and run the eliminator on Monday (or something).

Jake

Sure, why not? Or maybe do it with a regatta that's on a three-day holiday weekend. It's better than what has been going on in the past with Alter Cup Qualifiers, some of which I suspect are almost nonexistent -- more like, "Okay, who wants to go this year?"

in reality, those really serious about going to the Alter Cup wouldn't mind taking Monday off work to attempt to qualify.

I have been silent on this issue to see how people would react or make suggestions. Since we have a predominantly large open class here in S Carolina, the qualifier would be a snap. However, before we were even aware that the Alter Cup qualifier needed a home, we had arranged for a Hobie Division 9 race. My point is, I want to hear from Division 9 sailors. First how many are interested in racing for the cup vs how many are there for Div 9 points.
We have an open mind and want to please the crowd. The Outback Cup Regatta was originally designed to be a "fun event" to get sailors out who didnt have that win or nothing attitude, so with that in mind, we want a large fleet of happy racers. We had 60 boats last year, 16 of them cats in our first ever invitation from Columbia Sailing Club. For those of you that came, you know how mych fun we had, and had some great sailing also. This year looks to be even better, so mark this event on your calendars now.

David Mosley
www.seacats.org