ILCA sailboats and sailing. (Prior to 2021 known as Laser)
I got to get out on the Laser for the first time in 5 months spending 2 hours doing windward-leeward laps around an imaginary course. It was good opportunity to remember how everything went together and to get comfortable in the boat in the ~10kt breeze under overcast skies.
This video describes how to remove sail numbers from a Laser Sail. Note that this technique only works with Goo Off Professional*
Tips:
Use a soft cloth like an old tshirt for rubbing the goo on the sail.
The reason we first apply goo remover to the backside of the sail is to separate the goo from the sail so that the goo comes off on the number. If you start by applying goo remover over the number, it separates the vinyl number from the goo, then you’ve got to scrub the sail a lot harder to rub the left over stick goo on the sail.
*I’ve used Goo Off Professional for years for this and it worked fine. Only after I ran out of it and bought Goo Off Heavy Duty did I realize it didn’t work with all solvents. It works with Acetone, but that stuff evaporates so quickly you can only do small sections at a time.
Our yacht club has been working on a new long range plan and we’ve done a bit of age analysis to see how our membership has changed over the past 10+ years. For the past 8 years I’ve run the Chesapeake Laser Masters Championship and I usually skimp on awards for the Great Grand Masters (65+) because historically there have only been a handful of competitors in that bracket compared to the more numerous competitors in the younger age brackets. This was the first year that several competitors pointed out how many more GGM sailors there were and thus deserved trophies that went a little deeper. And that has gotten me thinking about the age demographics of our Laser Masters regattas.
Here are the demographics of the Chesapeake Bay Laser Masters Championship for all of the years I have available. Laser Masters sailing starts at 35 years old and the brackets are Apprentice: 35-44, Master 45-54, Grand Master 55-64 & Great Grand Master 65+. I’ve broken down each year by % of the fleet in each of the age groups to show how that has changed over the years.
Here is the same type of data for the US Masters Championship:
Both regattas differ a little bit in what they show and which age groups are growing, but both clearly show over the past 3-4 years a smaller Apprentice category and slightly larger M, G and GGM categories. What’s causing this? It could be the aging Baby Boomer population who were in their teens-20-30s when the Laser became popular in the 1970’s and learned to sail on them. There’s always been a bit of a boomerang in sailing where people go away during and after college and while they are starting families, and then they tend to come back and involve their family in sailing. Could it be that the following generation (X) that was raised in Optis and spent less time in the Laser, is not returning to the Laser in the same numbers as the generation before them? Or are more boomers just boomeranging back into the class later in life and skewing the pot? Time will tell, but there’s clearly a change underway.
What are your thoughts? Leave them in the comments.
Raw Data:
Chesapeake Laser Masters
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US Laser Masters
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Why Chesapeake Laser Masters and US Masters? 1) Because Masters events are the only events where we know the age bands of sailors. While there are regattas that know the age of the competitors, it’s not typically published. 2) These are the events that I had the most and oldest data on.
I finished my sailing season off on Sunday with the FBYC Laser Frostbite Regatta. We had 9 boats out in some light North and Westerly winds for 5 races. It was fun close racing on a short course. I won the last 3 races to win the day by just 2 points.
That makes for 55 days of sailing this year, one more than last year. I’m looking forward to some time off and I’ll be planning next year soon!
Last weekend was the 31st Chesapeake Bay Laser Masters Championship at Fishing Bay Yacht Club. We had a great fleet of 45 boats come to sail. I was the event chairman and I also got to be out on the water during racing to take some pictures. Here are a few of the best:
All in all it was a great regatta. I couldn’t have done it without the help of our race committee and all of the Laser Fleet members who helped out. And it was nice to have all of the masters sailors I see so often on the regatta circuit come sail with us in Deltaville.
Arrived at the Columbia Sailing Club this evening and ready to sail the District 12 Championship tomorrow!
We had a great first day of the District 12 Championship at Columbia Sailing Club in Columbia South Carolina. We sailed 5 races that at some point in each of the races we had 4 knots and 10 knots. In the lighter winds I did well on the first upwind leg most races and worked hard to hold onto my spot on the downwinds. I put up a 3-2-8-1-2 and am currently 2 points out of first behind John Potter from Beaufort SC. Tomorrow will be another light air day and hopefully I can keep up the top 3 finishes to have a shot at the title.
Provisional Results (the winner in race 3 will be RET and everyone moves up one)
The forecast for the last day of the Laser District 12 Championship was for light air and as we were sailing out to the race course we had great wind – 10-12 knots. By our 10am start it had dropped at bit and it continued to go down from there. Today was a basically a two-boat race. Unless I put up two DFLs it would have been hard not to get 2nd place. Once a drop would be factored in, I was effectively 1 point behind John Potter, so it would come down to today’s races as to who won the regatta.
In our first race today I had a crummy start – I just about won the boat, but had no boat speed at the start. John was to leeward of me and was a boat length and a half ahead when I crossed the line. I took a big duck and headed out right while he sailed to the left. Wanting to consolidate I came back to the middle having made up some ground, but John tacked on me and forced me back to the right. On the middle right of the course I had better pressure and got in front of John, but the boats who went left did much better than us putting me around 6th and John several boats behind me by the time we rounded.
Downwind John caught up a few boats and on the 2nd upwind I stuck to the middle of the course while John went to the left. When we got to the top 3rd of the course a 50-degree righty came in and I laid the mark while John out to the left still had to tack to fetch it. At the mark there was one boat between us and downwind I worked to pass one boat on the way to the finish. With two boats between us that put me 1 point ahead of John.
After the race we sat on the course for half an hour with no prospect of wind and the race committee abandoned racing for the rest of the day and I won the District 12 Championship Regatta. Not only was John great competition this weekend, but so were sailors such as Rob Bowden who would have beat both John and I had he not been OCS twice. All in all it was a fun regatta and I got to visit a an awesome club who put on a great and I got meet a lot of new District 12 sailors.
All but the last photo courtesy of Joe Reyes
Here’s the back t-shirt design for the 2012 Chesapeake Bay Laser Masters Championship. It’s based on this picture. The front will feature the plate logo.
We did 7 races today in light wind for the Laser Fall Regatta at Fishing Bay Yacht Club. I generally kept the boat moving and didn’t dig too far into any holes and maintained mostly top half finishes to end up 3rd overall.
Another nice weekend of racing at Fishing Bay Yacht Club for the 73rd Annual One Design Regatta. We had 10 Laser and 3 Radials among the 112 boats total at the regatta. We got in 3 long races on Saturday. The first race was probably the most exciting. I led for most of the race and got passed in the last 50 feet to the finish line and a moment after the pass I death rolled just feet from the finish. I still managed to right the boat and finish in 2nd. I finished 2nd and 5th in the other two races.
We would have raced some more, but storms moved into the area and chased us off the water. Our course got off the water just fine, but the tail end of the Flying Scots coming in from the far racing area didn’t make it before the front hit and several boats were capsized near the club. Thankfully there were no injuries or damage to the boats involved. Dinner and the party got a slow start on account of the rain, but it did clear eventually and allowed for a good time.
On Sunday the wind was a bit lighter. We raced long courses which spread the fleet out quite a bit. In almost every race I would have a great start, miss a shift and find myself 2-4 at the first mark. On the 2nd upwind I could usually pick off all or most of the boats ahead of me. That’s what happened in the final race and passed upwind for the lead on the last 1/4 of the upwind to give me 2nd overall (results). All in all it was a good regatta and we had quite a few fun races.
More awards pictures and a few scenes from around the club are here. Below is a video of a few scenes from the regatta.
Day 1 at the Virginia Governor’s Cup Regatta at Ware River Yacht Club. We had 10 boats out and started the day in 6-8. In the first two races I had good starts, picked the shifts right and led both races. In the final leg of the 2nd race the sea breeze came in at 13-15 knots and we did two more races in that wind. As I was out there hiking my butt off I realized I hadn’t sailed a single event this year in wind. I just didn’t have the muscles for it and my results showed. This was the wind for Henry Amthor and he put up two bullets in the final two races to take the overall lead today. I made a bad decision to put in an extra tack in the final leg of the 3rd race and dropped to 3rd. I managed a 2nd in the final race. With 1-1-3-2 I’m just one point behind Henry in 2nd place and we’ll be sailing day two tomorrow.
On Sunday at the Ware River Yacht Club Virginia Governor’s Cup Regatta we had a nice breeze and 3 more races. The way the wind funneled into the club from this particular direction you would have thought there was far more wind than there was. At least one fleet scratched out for the day and a few sailors in the other fleets sat it out as well.
Out on the water it was a perfect 12-16 knots all day out of the WSW with a light chop. Our first two races went pretty well and I put up a 3-2. Going into the final race the top 3 boats were all separated by just 3 points meaning whoever won the race won the regatta. Henry and I were both over early and had to go back. After restarting I worked my way out to the right while Henry went to the left with the other boat who had won the first two races today. I made the right work and had a pretty comfortable lead at the first mark. From there I extended on the long close reaches to the wing mark and back and on the final upwind I covered and stayed in front to win the race and the regatta.
Ware River Yacht Club always puts on a good event and it was nice seeing them bring the junior Lasers over to our course. It was fun starting in 10 boats and we had some pretty close competition. All in all a good regatta and a good tune up for FBYC’s Annual One Design Regatta next weekend.
