Saying no to wings, foils, carbon fiber, and satcoms
Issue 121: July/Aug 2018
I’m embarrassed to report that I’ve long been a bit sour on the America’s Cup, as it’s evolved. Embarrassed because boats and sailing bring me pleasure. I’ve spent much of my adult life living aboard sailboats and sailing. I’m the editor of a sailing magazine for goodness’ sake. If you’re into baseball, you care about the World Series. I’m into sailing, but even when the Cup was held on the West Coast, in a body of water I have sailed myself, I couldn’t rouse any interest in the large fast foiling cats crewed by athletes in helmets and high-tech gear.
And maybe that’s it. Maybe it’s the speed and foiling and helmets and high-tech. Maybe there’s nothing there for me to relate to. A kid can play catch wearing the same mitt and cap and throwing the same ball the pros in the World Series use. That has to mean something.
Yet the America’s Cup isn’t suffering from lack of interest. Plenty of folks are really into it. And my “can’t relate” argument falls apart when I consider NASCAR and Indy auto racing. They have lots of fans who presumably like to drive cars, but not cars anything like these race cars, not wearing fire suits and doing 200 mph around banked oval tracks.
So, I was resigned to my indifference.
Then, in 2015, I read about the 2018 Golden Globe Race, and I got excited. It was one of those epiphany moments: “Of course there should be a race like this!” I can’t begin to imagine what it’s like to fly across the Southern Ocean at 30 knots in an Open 60 with a canting keel and full-time satellite coms with a support team, but at 6 knots in a Tradewind 35, towing a drogue down the faces of huge swells? Yes!
I realized that the Golden Globe Race is the sailing race I want non-sailors to see. If the closest Jane Q. Public comes to sailing is the America’s Cup on ESPN, she’s going to know our sport and pastime as guiding rigid-wing marvels, straddling control and catastrophe while a frantic crew spins winch handles at a pace that makes her glad she’s not aboard. But what if she instead sees the modest monohulls depart Les Sables d’Olonne, France, on July 1, close-ups of solo, helmet-less skippers at ease, looking back at land with heroic smiles on their faces and anticipation in their eyes? That might prompt her to pick up a copy of Boat Trader.
You’ve likely heard the details about this retro race by now (and by the time you read this, the race should be nearly under way). Per the race rules, these boats, 30 years old and older, will not be modified. No weight removed; no sail plan increased. These are modest long-in-the-tooth boats not unlike those many of us sail. It’s a race between good old boats.
There will be some professional sailors competing, but also lots of sailors like you and me, people who’ve worked hard to acquire and ready their boats, doing much of the work themselves, and financing much of the costs themselves. Once they cast off, the playing field is level; nobody will have the advantage of a shoreside team to help with weather or routing. These sailors will be out there, day and night, for the rest of this year and into the next, racing, alone.
I’ll be rooting for every one of them, and probably especially for American Istvan Kopar, because I’ve gotten to know him a little from reading Fiona McGlynn’s anchor story of our race coverage.
Of this race, Istvan says, “We admire the other great sailors, but the gap between nature and its users has been getting more visible by the day. Those competing in the Vendée Globe or Volvo circumnavigation races are becoming increasingly dependent on man-made equipment, and less dependent on nature. They start to look and act like astronauts in space, getting more and more isolated from nature. There is a demand for that, and it is all well and good, but we still need Optimists during our upbringing. And for the very same reason, we need races like the Golden Globe Race to maintain our heritage and seamanship, as well as to increase the number of self-sufficient, independent, and consequently happy people in the world.”
Yep.
I wonder if Istvan’s not so into the America’s Cup too.
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