Oman Open Worlds Videos - Day 7

By Doug

This is the final race and all eyes were on Robert Scheidt (BRA 205239) who was just one point ahead of Olympic silver medalist Pavlos Kontides (CYP 205124). The match racing that many anticipated did not occur and Pavlos was not a factor in this start.

Brett does a great job focusing on Robert who at 0:40 is in a crowd near the pin trying to create some space by working Sam Meech (NZL 196871) above him. This group is being watched closely by a judge boat that is right behind them. It's a great example of how the best Laser sailor ever starts in a crowd.

General recall.

In a previous post, I showed this picture that Brett captured from the final start of the Worlds. It seemed to make the sailors around Robert look slow:

This next video shows that with one minute to go, Robert creates a good hole below him although it did not last. Everyone pulls the trigger at about the same time, it's just that Robert pulls his a fraction of a second sooner. But for me the really interesting part is just after the start when he lets his main out a little to foot and gets speed. Note that the end of his boom goes up instead of out, showing that he did not have lots of vang. You can see the result by looking at the shadow on Robert's sail - it shows just how much faster he was going compared to the boat to windward of him.

Pulling the trigger a fraction of a second early + great boatspeed = a great start. Add to this reading the breeze and shifts better than anyone else, world class downwind speed, and the result was inevitable. Robert wins this race and his 9th Laser worlds.

Thanks again to Brett for these awesome videos.

Fred Schroth's Easter Laser Regatta

by Pam

Fred has been putting on the Easter Laser Regatta in Austin for 30 years. His regatta is sort of like the pulse of Laser District 15 in Texas as to potential participation numbers. It's always the first circuit stop in District 15 and rarely do any of the other other circuit stops match his participation numbers. 

However, Fred isn't the best about posting the results in a timely manner. So we thought we'd help him out with this handy little summary of his participation numbers over the years as well as links to where you can find the results. We couldn't find some of the earlier years' results so if anyone has any information to fill in the blanks, please send it to us and we'll update the chart. 

Fred's website:  http://schrothfiberglass.com/easter.htm

You can find out everything you need to know about this year's 31st Annual Easter Laser Regatta at the above link.  It's always Easter weekend and the local talent is some of the best in Texas.  They don't always travel or do the circuit but they rarely miss Fred's regatta. 

Scott Young is already blogging about getting ready for the Midwinters in Florida. He has no expectations for how he'll finish, but let's face it, an old, fat, rusty, out of shape, Scott Young would easily be in the top 5 but a Scott Young that's training ... look out. 

Annual	Year Results Link	Number of Participants	Full / Radial / 4.7	Winner
1st	1984
2nd	1985	35	35 / 0 / 0	Doug Kern
3rd	1986	39	39 / 0 / 0	Doug Kern
4th	1987	37	37 / 0 / 0	Steve Bourdow
4th	1988	29	29 / 0 / 0	Eric Faust
6th	1989	23	23 / 0 / 0	Chris Junge
7th	1990	21	21 / 0 / 0	Paul Foerster
8th	1991	24	24/ 0 / 0	Paul Foerster
9th	1992	25	25 / 0 / 0	Scott Cheney
10th	1993
11th	1994	32	32 / 0 / 0	Lars Hansen
12th	1995
13th	1996	32	32 / 0 / 0	Doug Peckover
14th	1997	39	28 / 11 / 0	Eric Faust
15th	1998	57	47 / 10 / 0	Doug Peckover
16th	1999
17th	2000
18th	2001	63	47 / 16 / 0	Zach Railey
19th	2002	76	46 / 30 / 0	Eric Faust
20th	2003
21st	2004	54	37 / 17 / 0	Mark Eldred
22nd	2005	53	34 / 19 / 0	Scott Young
23rd	2006	39	27 / 12 / 0	Doug Peckover
24th	2007	41	32 / 9 / 0	Gavin Rudolph
25th	2008	40	40 / 0 / 0	Eric Faust
26th	2009	46	35 / 8 / 3	Scott Young
27th	2010	46	32 / 9 / 5	Scott Young
28th	2011	28	18 / 4 / 6	Scott Young
29th	2012	43	26 / 9 / 8	Doug Kern
30th	2013	45	31 / 10 / 4	Scott Young

Oman Open Worlds Videos - Day 6

By Doug

This is another good video, this time because of who is in this gold fleet start. We're at the pin and 15 seconds into the video, we have Rutger van Schaardenburg (NED 204567), Emil Cedergardh (SWE 204437), Philipp Buhl (GER 203170), Nick Thompson (GBR 201402), and Kristian (NOR 204758). To give you an idea of the talent, Rutger finished 4th overall, Philipp finished 3, and Nick had 7 top-five finishes but finished 17 (had to count an RET). It ended up being a general recall.

Note that Robert Scheidt chose not to start at this risky end of the line.

Restart, and we're watching another person Brett is coaching. James Espey (IRL 192703) gets sandwiched between David Wright (CAN 199330) and Francesco Marrai (ITA 205243). There's a big gap above Francesco but no one takes it. James survives and pinches off Francesco.

The camera moves up the line and we see Bruno Fontes (BRA 203765) and Tom Burton (AUS 199012) just below Kristian. Both James and Kristian get good starts.

The next start is committee boat favored, and we see Kristian starting with Philipp Buhl, David Wright, Tom Burton, Charlie Buckingham (USA 182345), Nick Thompson, Matthew Wearn (AUS 203770), Sergey Komissarov (RUS 202692), Marco Gallo ITA (196685), and former world champ Gustavo Lima (POR 202210). We hear Brett talk about how starting here is too high a risk. General recall. 

Note again that Robert again was not at this risky end of the line.

Next start, and we start watching James and Kristian line up under Lee Parkhill (CAN 197120). Kristian stays put while James goes further down the line and finds a nice hole that disappears when Joaquin Blanco Albalat (ESP 197295) to leeward pushes out his boom and works the tiller at 0:45 in the video.

This is a is a technique used (invented?) by Ben Ainslie that was considered legal because if tiller does not cross the centerline then technically it's not sculling. Now, it's illegal. There is no judge boat in the immediate area and Blanco gets away with it, although he was yellow flagged for a second time in race 9 and had to retire.

We see hear Brett asking James to squeeze up to close the gap to windward.

We then switch to the right to watch Kristian battling with David Wright with a lot of tiller movement that could have been yellow flagged. Kristian starts with top-five finisher Jesper Stalheim (SWE 204666) right below and is saved by another general recall.

This sequence starts with 1 1/2 minutes to go. We briefly see Robert (BRA 205239) heading further down the line. His starting technique is quite unique because he waits as long as possible to decide where he wants to start. In another start, I saw him standing on his transom, planing on port down the line, looking upwind with less than 2 minutes to go.

At 0.50 we see Tom Burton (AUS 199012) tack twice to close the gap below James. There a judge boat right behind and everyone is well behaved. We can hear Brett talk about a last-minute shift and how James is squeezed and rolled at the same time because of a mistake that he made.

Further to windward, we see Kristian with a good lane and start.

Oman Open Worlds Videos - Day 5

By Doug

There was less wind on day 5 and this was a really interesting start.

Brett is coaching Kristian Ruth (NOR 204758) and focuses on him for the entire sequence. It's committee boat favored and the boats lined up before one minute at the crowded windward end of the line. Kristian is between Tobias Schadewaldt (GER 203739) and Ashley Brunning (AUS 206037).

There's a judge boat watching closely that they would have been aware of, so we get to see the amount of tiller movement before the start and kinetics after the start that the sailors feel are permitted at a world's event. They all pull the trigger with five seconds to go and Ashley was fortunate not to get yellow-flagged at 1:30 in the video.

While the start was clean, none of the boats in this sequence had a good finish in this race.

Happy New Year

www.quora.com