Union Jack flown high by new Moth 2010 World Champion

Final day of racing at the PUMA 2010 International Moth World Championships hosted a clean 10 knots of breeze and minimal sea conditions. Race 13 saw one boat OCS and will knots of breeze at 290 degrees. Bora Gulari dominated the mark roundings with local sailor Chris Graham challenging the top 6. Ricky Tagg also make it into the top 10 however Bora, Dalton Bergan and Brad Funk took the top 3 spots.

The final race of the championship sponsors by Sailingbits was a high octane spectacle with winds increasing across the course from 9 - 12 knots. These conditions favoured the heavier competitors with all boats crossing the start line cleanly.

Arnaud P and Bora challenged Simon Payne for the top spot finally resulting in AMac taking the lead on the final downwind leg scoring the bullet he needed to take the overall second spot.

Simon Payne's 5th position did not affect his dominance over the fleet winning by a clear 9 points. The ecstatic British sailor flew his national flag to the awaiting media to celebrate taking the International Moth World Championship 2010 title.

Final thought of the day from Jake Dewey, Head of Sailing Division PUMA - " Exciting finish with it coming down to the last race to decide the top 3. What a great day"

It doesn’t need a PhD in rocket science to understand the success of MACH 2! Stefanie Schurer ( sschurer@unimelb.edu.au )

 “What should be the ideal weight of a Moth sailor?” and the answer was given by Greg

Wise on a blog from 2004 (http://www.moth.asn.au/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=81):

“It really depends on what conditions you sail in. If it's mainly under 10-15 knots, then 65-75Kg

would be good, usually the less you weigh the better. Above 15 knots and you could carry a

little more weight, say 75-85Kg and above 20 knots anything up to 90 Kg is fine.”

Wind conditions in Dubai so far were less than 10 knots, hence, those sailors, who weigh

75 kg or less should be the fastest sailors. Let’s test it:

See below the weight distribution by boat design: for both Mach 2 and Bladerider

(includes Fastacraft, Prowler, Assassin, and Full Force) riders the mean weight is slightly

less than 75 kg. The median is slightly greater for the Bladerider riders (approx. 77kg).

Nevertheless, this suggests that, on average, most riders should be fine in light winds.

However, have a look at the full distribution of weight for both boat designs and you will

realize that the variation and the range in weight are much greater for all Bladerider

riders. It appears that a larger fraction of riders lie in the optimal weight range for Mach 2

riders: 58% of them weigh 75kg or less. Among all Bladerider and other boat design

riders, only 47% weigh 75kg or less. Among all 15 Mach 2 riders who weigh 75 kg or

less, 80% are in the Top 20 of the current ranking (After Race 12) . All of these 15 sailors

participated in at least one of the last two World Championships in 2008 or 2009 and six

of them participated in both of the last two World Championships in 2008 and 2009.

There is not a single junior sailor among these 15 sailors.

Among the eight other riders who sail a Bladerider (or another boat design) and weigh 75

kg or less there is only 1 sailor in the Top 20 (Position 20). Among these eight other

riders three are juniors and two are women. None of these eight sailors participated in

both of the last two World Championships in 2008 and 2009, and only two participated in

one or the other World Championship. [In fact, only four of all Bladerider and other boat

design riders participated in any of the last two WC, while 19 of all Mach 2 riders did so.

17 of them are ranked in the Top 20]. 

Hence, my conclusion from the available data so far is that the majority of highly

competitive sailors, i.e. the best trained (proxied by weight) and most experienced

(proxied by participation in past Moth World Championships) made an investment into a

 2

MACH 2. I wonder, what would happen if all MACH 2 riders in the Top 20 would swap

their boats with the Bladerider sailors for the remaining two race days. What do you

guess would happen? 

Another Payne-less day for Simon

With a light start to day 5 of racing the postponed race 10 took place after a short delay at 14.00.  The wind was holding a steady 9 knots across the course.  The fleet were obviously keen to start the days racing as many pushed the start too early!  After 1 general recall the race finally got off to a foiling start. Brad lead the fleet for the entire race followed by Simon Payne and Scott Babbage.

The wind dropped for race 11 to 7-8 knots and swung right to a heading of 310 degrees. With an average of 11 minutes per lap AMac and Simon again fought for top position with AMac finally pipping him to post

Race 12 once again saw the eager fleet keen to finish a third race for the day causing another general recall. This time the committee replaced P flag with the Black Flag meaning anyone starting before the gun was penalized with an automatic disqualification. Fortunately the sailors choose to sail with caution allowing the race to get off without further hitches. Simon Payne, Mike Lennon and Brad Funk vied for pole position during the dying late afternoon winds with the American leaving the Brits in his wake.

Overall positions after race 12:

1. Simon Payne
2. Brad Funk
3. Andrew McDougall
4. Arnaud Psarofaghis
5. Dalton Bergan

For full results see the results page

Final thought of the day comes from Rob Gough- “I just bought my wife a Puma t-shirt and visor”

Light winds and lots of low riding

Low riding was the name of the game and the end of racing on Day 4 at the World Championships.

Race 8 saw a brief postponement while the wind gained strength.  44 boats took to the water to start the first race of the day at 13.30.  With a light but steady 7 knots all boats started with 1 OCS.  Simon Payne dominated at every mark rounding and across the finish line with superior tactics and speed.

Race 9 pushed many boats to the limits of light wind sailing with over half the fleet residing to low riding for the majority of the race.  Arnaud P took the lead from the start, however AMac took the bullet after out sailing the fleet on his final gybe.

With only 6 knots of breeze at the start line and tide running at the windward mark the race committee postponed the final race of the day until Saturday.

Final thought for the day from the fleet statistics

"When you pool all boats, then there is no correlation between age and performance. But when you do the same correlation by boat design, you’ll find:

1. If you ride a MACH 2: The older you are, the better you are ranked (so far)
2. If you ride a Bladerider, Fastacraft, Prowler, Fastacraft, etc: The younger you are, the better you are ranked (so far)

Does that mean that MACH 2 makes older men faster or does it mean that MACH 2 is the faster boat and only older guys can afford it (b/c it’s the most expensive)? Or is MACH 2 the most challenging boat so that you need to be very experienced to be able to sail it properly?"

Diamond of a Day

Day 3 hosted shifty 8 - 10 knots of breeze and calm seas.  Many boats foiled and streached their wings along the Dubai coast.

Race 5 started in 9 - 10 knots of wind and was dominated by Arnaud P as he vied for top stop at every mark.  Brad Funk however keep his cooled and challenged him, finally taking line honors after a 40 minute race.

Race 6 had a slight change of wind direction and a couple of knots lost.  Dalton Bergan dominated the fleet during every leg rounding first on nearly every mark and gate.

Race 7 saw Martin Gravare push the gun to the limit.   AMac however dictacted to the fleet where he should be at the first windward leg.  However Arnaud P took the mantel at the end of the race.

Standings at the end of Day 3

Overall

1. Simon Payne
2. Brad Funk
3. Arnaud Psarofaghis

Masters

1. Simon Payne
2. Andrew McDougall
3. J-P Ziegert

Women

1. Emma Aspington
2. Kerstin Sommer

Junior

1. Marcel Herrera
2. Alex Buerger
3. Dougie Imrie

The final thought for the day - "Hot & Shifty"