News
Added by damonAdmin on May 17, 2004 - 01:17 PM
The Broken Mast Regatta is one of the oldest continuous annual Hobie Regattas. This will be the 29th time that Hobie Fleet 134 of Memphis, Tennessee have celebrated the "Hobie Way of Life" by bringing catamaran sailors together for a weekend of fun, food, and racing.
The fun starts on Friday night, if you choose to arrive early and get setup, there will be a welcome party and something on the grill starting at 6:30pm June 4th. Breakfast Saturday and Sunday, lunch Saturday, and a sit down dinner Saturday featuring genuine Memphis Barbeque are all included in your entry fee. Also included are beautiful regatta t-shirts, door prizes, and the famous "broken mast" trophies.
Trophies will be awarded in four classes, Hobie 16, Hobie 17, Hobie 18, and open class. Lately the Broken Mast has been known as a major regatta for the Hobie 17 class, last year saw 15 Hobie 17's for some great one-design racing.
Added by damonAdmin on May 09, 2004 - 12:00 PM
Here's a report from the scene at the Hobie Worlds in Cancun Mexico written by Liza Cleveland, who is crewing in both womens and open races.
The day was going to be a challenging one. Arriving on the beach at 8:30 to help the Brazilian Grand Master team with whom we were switching off boats, the wind was alread blowing hard. It was cloudy, and the wind was still from the NE with a possibility of going more easterly as the day progressed.
The Masters and Grand Master teams left the beach, and I went back to the hotel to eat more food. Because Annie and I were only .7 kilos over minimum weight, there was still a possibility of another weigh-in. Which reminds me, at the end of our last race on Day 1, we hit the beach and immediately a gentleman from the Race Jury came up and asked that we please get weighed again. We had promised ourselves to be sure to drink a bottle of water each on the way back to the beach, but we forgot, and once you hit the beach, if they think you might be underweight, you get weighed immediately. If it turns out that you are underweight, all your races for that day are disqualified. So we went over to the high-tech scale, stripped down to our bathingsuits, and got weighed. Luckily we had gained a kilo...as I mentioned, we´ve been trying to eat as much as possible!
Race 1: After the somewhat chaotic exodus from the beach (due to the fact that they blow a horn and all of a sudden 60 boats want to leave out of a fairly small stretch of beach that is not near reefs), we headed out to the race course. Suddenly I was experiencing conditions heretofore never experienced by yours truly. The waves were massive. The wind was blowing about 17 knots which is a decent double-trapping breeze, but the waves made just staying on the boat difficult. At times when you are out on the trapeze, the boat would fly over a wave and both your feet would leave the boat!
Added by damonAdmin on May 06, 2004 - 06:32 PM
May 6, 2004 - Performance Catamarans, Inc. To Build The Nacra A2
Santa Ana, California -- Today, Performance Catamarans announced the
introduction of the new International A-Class catamaran. Teaming up with the
well-known design team of Morrelli & Melvin and co-designer Jeremy
Laundergan, Performance will manufacture the Nacra A2, their first entry
into the carbon catamaran market.
The International A-Class Catamaran is a high-performance ³box rule²
International Sailing Federation design specification dictating an 18-foot
long, 7-1/2 foot wide catamaran with 150 square feet of sail area and a
minimum weight of 165 pounds.