Monday, April 07, 2008

Dear Sally

Dear Sally,

Thanks for organizing and publishing our 2008 District 7 Laser regatta schedule... and thanks to all the regatta organizers in clubs and fleets that have collectively put on such a magnificent schedule for us this season. Having arrived in New England early last summer, and being somewhat preoccupied with the move and its aftermath last year, I am excited to be have some much Laser sailing right on my doorstep... and even more only a few hours drive away.

I see that in April and May we have a number of one day regattas to warm up for the season. Some of the ones that tempt me the most are the Peter Milnes Regatta in Newport at the end of April (which I did with my son last year), the QYC May Madness Regatta in Wakefield (which we wanted to do two years ago), and then at the end of May a regatta on Lake Sunapee in New Hampshire which my son is always raving about since he went Star sailing up there. Maybe we'll make it to Sunapee this year?

Then in June the pace really hots up with two and three day regattas almost every weekend. We start off with a two-day event in Barrington (just one bay over from my house), then on successive weekends the Championship of Buzzards Bay (a real blast last year) and the US Masters Championship (also on Buzzards Bay).

As if that wasn't enough, in July and August on consecutive weekends we have a one-day event on the lake near my son's house, followed by two two-day events, the Newport Regatta and the district championship in Barrington, and then two three-day events that I did sail in last year, the Hyannis Regatta and the Buzzards Bay Regatta.

Phew. I'm going to need to get fit.

As well as all that I see we have a five state district Super Series with regattas in Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Vermont and New Hampshire. Hmmm, what happened to Maine? I'm sure I can fit in a regatta in Maine too if I really want to. It would be kind of cool to sail in all six New England State. Are there enough weekends to fit it all in?

But wait, it just gets better.

In September there is the famed New England Masters at Third Beach Newport, the Ponce de Leon Dinghy Series in Marblehead, a couple of regattas on Saturday and Sunday of the same weekend at two New Hampshire sites (that sounds like a fun trip), and even more stuff in October.

I see you've also mentioned the Canadian Laser Masters in September in Nova Scotia, which if I'm not mistaken is at the same place as the 2009 Laser Masters Worlds. I might have to do that one to check out the Worlds site.

Geeze, there is just so much Lasering to do in New England this year.

See you on the water.

7 comments:

Litoralis said...

Looks like we have a busy schedule this season.

Anonymous said...

Is there a Tillerman family series where the two of you keep track of who won each event and declare an annual family champion?

Anonymous said...

No need to keep track. The whippersnapper knows who won the series.

Litoralis said...

At this point T-man is essentially a professional sailor. It is not surprising that he usually beats me easily. Now that he has spent the winter traveling the world to compete in regattas and to participate in clinics I suspect the same thing will happen this season.
Hopefully after finishing school this semester I will be able to join him in his travels more often.

Anonymous said...

Maybe you should setup a handicap system to make it competitive? Something like the opposite of the Laser Master's scoring.

Anonymous said...

Strange, I looked at the schedule and was outraged.

First, there are only really 3 major events on the east coast this year - Canadians, US Geezers, ACCs, and kinda CORK.

Second, 3 of my local 5 district champs conflict with the major events. Outrageously poor scheduling!

Yes, the ungraded events might be fun, but I schedule from the top down. Just seems like some of the "middle" options disappeared this year.

I think I'm reasonable with my expectations for the class, but his is just piss-poor!

Anonymous said...

You have a point Brian. I guess I was just drooling over the large number of mid-level regattas that I can sail this year and still sleep in my own bed every night. Having just sailed a couple of Masters Worlds in Europe and Australia in the last six months I am looking forward to some quality sailing nearer home this summer.

As someone who used to be a regional regatta coordinator for another class, I have some sympathy for the difficulties of scheduling events to avoid the wider geographical conflicts that you identify. Frankly it's sometimes a hard enough job just finding venues for all the major events in one region/district and persuading the host clubs in that area not to choose dates that conflict with each other.

Of course I tried to avoid scheduling our most important regional events the same time as any major national events. And I did try hard to work with my fellow schedulers in other nearby regions to make sure that the equivalent of all our district champs didn't conflict as I knew some sailors liked to travel to several of these (especially as they were all Worlds qualifiers in that class.) But I didn't always succeed.

And if you (or anyone else for that matter) feels that you can do a better job of regatta scheduling than the current volunteers... you know the solution don't you?

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