In This Issue
2018 West Marine J/70 World Championships
RC44 World Championship record third title for Team Nika
Thought Through - Melges IC37
World Sailing: Will the Emperor have any clothes?
Fredrik Loof secures OK Dinghy European title
Mirabaud Sailing Video Award - Vote for the best sailing videos of the year
Launch Of The Great British Sailing Challenge
Featured Brokerage
The Last Word: Elvis Presley

Brought to you by Seahorse magazine, Scuttlebutt Europe is a digest of sailing news and opinions, regatta results, new boat and gear information and letters from sailors -- with a European emphasis. Contributions welcome, send to

2018 West Marine J/70 World Championships
Marblehead, USA: The glitterati from the world of sailing came to Marblehead for the 2018 West Marine J/70 World Championships. Ninety-One teams from 18 different countries battled out 11 highly competitive races. The depth of talent in the fleet was unprecedented with Olympic Gold Medallist, America's Cup winners, and world champions vying for one of the biggest world championship is the modern era.

There was a fairy tale ending for Jud Smith, born and bred in Marblehead, winning the J/70 World Championship with his team racing J/70 Africa, and representing the Eastern Yacht Club, hosts for the event. The intensity of the battle was such that Jud Smith succeeded without winning a single race, and only making the top three on one occasion. In the end Jud Smith's Africa (Eastern YC) won the world title by a single point.

Final top ten:
1. Africa, Jud Smith / Lucas Calabrese / Will Felder / Marc Gauthier , USA, 105 points
2. Stampede, Bruno Pasquinelli / Max Skelley / Eric Doyle / Nathan Wilmot, USA, 106
3. 3 Ball JT, Jack Franco / Bill Hardesty / Lior Lavie / Allan Terhune , USA, 108
4. Relative Obscurity, Peter Duncan / Victor Diaz-de-Leon / Willem Van Waay / Max Hutcheson, USA, 123
5. Savasana, Brian Keane / Thomas Barrrows / Mike Marshall / Ron Weed, USA, 124
6. Marnatura (Corinthian), Luis Bugallo / Enrique Freire Faria / Gerardo Prego Menor / Alberto Basadre Lopez / Jorge Lorenzo Roman, ESP, 131
7. Noticia, Jose Maria Torcida / Luiz Martin Cabiedes / Rayco Tabares / Pablo Santurde / Carlos Hernandez, ESP, 134
8. Enfant Terrible, Alberto Rossi / Branko Brcin / Bianca Crugnola / Andrea Felci / Stefano Rizzi, ITA, 154
9. New England Ropes, Timothy Healy / John Mollicone / Alden Reid / Paul Abdullah , USA, 156
10. Any Colour, Scott and Alex Furnary / Zeke Horowitz / Evan Aras / Jake Doyle, USA, 173.0

Full results

www.j70worlds2018.com

RC44 World Championship record third title for Team Nika
Team Nika became the first team ever to claim a hat trick of RC44 World Championship titles after Vladimir Prosikhin, tactician Dean Barker and their crew managed to fend off Igor Lah's Team CEEREF on the final day of big conditions racing off Cascais. The two boats started the day with Team Nika five points ahead.

In 15 knot NNW winds, Chris Bake's Team Aqua was fastest out of the blocks in the first race to become the sixth race winner at this World Championship. Meanwhile in the leader's fight Team CEEREF closed the gap to three points.

Race two saw Team Nika righting the wrongs of the previous race, as they creeped round the top mark first, ahead of Team Aqua. Bronenosec Sailing Team followed in fourth but immediately gybed. Within seconds she took the lead, going on to claim her third bullet. Tactician Cameron Dunn explained: "We rounded in the biggest rightie we'd seen and in a big puff - very windy, in the mid-high 20s. We did a nice hoist, better than all of the boats around us and jumped the gybe on everyone. After all that happened yesterday [when they received a four point penalty] I was like 'please let this work...' I was very proud of the boys today."

The RC44 Championship Tour concludes with its final event of the season in Cascais over 14-18th November.

2018 RC44 World Championship - Overall results After 12 races
1. Team Nika, Vladimir Prosikhin, 36 points
2. Team CEEREF, Igor Lah, 42
3. Bronenosec, V. Liubomirov & K. Frolov, 52
4. Team Aqua, Chris Bake, 52
5. Artemis Racing, Torbjorn Tornqvist, 58
6. Charisma, Nico Poons, 60
7. Peninsula Petroleum (22) John Bassadone, 64
8. Aleph Racing (17) Hugues Lepic, 74

2018 RC44 Championship Tour - overall ranking
1. Team Nika, Vladimir Prosikhin, 6 points
2. Team CEEREF, Igor Lah, 7
3. Charisma, Nico Poons, 8
4. Team Aqua, Chris Bake, 10
5. Artemis Racing, Torbjorn Tornqvist, 11
6. Peninsula Petroleum John Bassadone, 16
7. Bronenosec, Vladimir Kirill / Liubomirov Frolov, 17
8. Aleph Racing, Lepic Hugues 18
9. Tavatuy, Pavel Kuznetsov 27

www.facebook.com/RC44.Class.Association
www.twitter.com/RC44Class
www.rc44.com

Thought Through - Melges IC37
Seahorse And in every respect... The launch of the IC37 by Melges marks not just the appearance of a very tidy new raceboat but the start of a new class which has been tailored from the start to ensure maximum participation

Competitive big-boat one-design racing is clicking up a notch at New York Yacht Club (NYYC) and soon elsewhere around the world with the new Mills-designed IC37. This affordable, strict one-design speedster will be making its competitive debut in the 2019 season, and the order books at Melges are already filling up fast.

It's been 20 years since the last big wave of offshore-sized onedesigns hit the marketplace and helped foster a revolution in big-boat racing. The excitement and enthusiasm of these designs and their class-managed racing brought thousands of sailors around the world into competitive sailing at a level hitherto enjoyed only by a handful of Grand Prix enthusiasts. Since then, most other new onedesigns have focused on high performance at an athletic level that is out of reach for many otherwise competitive pro-am sailors. Perhaps just as important to NYYC's vision of the sport, as reflected in the IC37 design itself, will be the emphasis placed on class rules to give incentives to a diverse array of Corinthian sailors. Women, juniors and other emerging sailing talent will all be encouraged to join in the fun so that the next generation will be given the opportunity to continue to enjoy this great game.

Full story in the October issue of Seahorse

World Sailing: Will the Emperor have any clothes?
At the World Sailing Midyear Meeting at London in May, alarming financial problems were reported in only round terms by the World Sailing leadership. In short, it appeared to many that the organization would be bankrupt by the end of next year if not sooner. Sailing Illustrated broke that news shortly after the May meeting in a world exclusive here.

With the organization's Annual General Meeting coming up in Sarasota, FL in just over a month's time, members of World Sailing's Council have been pressuring President Kim Andersen (DEN) for a full and frank explanation of the financial situation in advance of the Sarasota meeting.

To that end a Conference call of the Council has been scheduled for a week from today, Tuesday October 2nd, at which a financial report will be given by Andy Hunt (GBR), the organizations non-sailing CEO.

Full story in Sailing Illustrated

The following letter was sent to World Sailing by lawyer Joe Bainton:

Re: Immediate Website Publication of 2018 Financial Statement of World Sailing and World Sailing Marketing

I write on behalf of myself and the individuals to whom a copy of this letter is formally addressed. All of us, via our respective MNA's, are now and for decades have been members of World Sailing and its predecessors in interest. Each of us has contributed to the sport we all love in our own way, some of us having served in positions now occupied by you.

It is fair to say that we were deeply troubled by the audited loss of £5,239,000 of World Sailing Limited ("World Sailing") in 2017, which was roughly $6.8 Million. The forecast for 2018 was another loss of £3,384,000 or roughly $4.4 Million. These losses do not take into account the audited losses of the "other" World Sailing about which we believe but a small fraction of all dues paying sailors are aware, namely World Sailing Event Management Limited ("WS Event Management"). Its audited operating loss for 2016 was £981,057 or roughly $1.3 Million, which brings the total 2017 losses for what the public views as "World Sailing" to approximately $8.1 Million. To our knowledge there were no projected operating profits/losses for WS Event Management for 2018.

It is not the purpose of this letter to catalogue our views about your stewardship of World Sailing and WS Event Management. It is the purpose of this letter, however, to remind those addressees who serve as Board Members that Section 68(c) of the World Sailing Constitution states that the Board "shall supervise the work of the Chief Executive Officer and Executive Office and has final responsibility for the corporate and financial affairs of the Federation." (Emphasis added.) This means in plain English that regardless of the deference shown by courts under the so-called "Business Judgment Rule" and notwithstanding the existence (at the expense of Sailors world-wide) of Director & Officer Insurance, they are simply not at liberty to ignore the same common sense and good judgment that they apply in the conduct of their daily lives and thus permit President Anderson to pursue whatever folly he may conceive regardless of its economic risks.

In this regard we remind the Board Members that Article 101 of the Constitution that addresses the topic of "Indemnity" and generally provides broad indemnity to Directors and Officers also states: "but this Article shall only have effect in so far as its provisions are not avoided by Section 151(a) Companies Acts 1931."

The Board Members were elected because they are active participants in our sport and generally known to be persons of probity to their peers. They have a legal duty to actively accept responsibility for the financial affairs of both World Sailing and WS Event Management. In that regard, I note that the only way that WS Event Management was able to obtain an audit opinion last year without a "Going Concern Qualification" was because World Sailing provided a letter to the Auditors promising economic support.

Article 94 of the Constitution requires the Board to provide financial statements not less than 21 days prior to the Annual Meeting to persons entitled to receive notice of the Meeting. We find it very odd – and wholly inconsistent with prior practices – that as of today there has been no dissemination this year among Members of any reports on the 2018 financial results. That said, pursuant to Article 94 of the Constitution, we demand that on or before October 5, 2018 World Sailing publish on its website Financial Statements for World Sailing and WS Event Management given World Sailing's already stated commitment to support that organization.

Note: Of our group who are concerned about World Sailing, three members are former Constitution Committee members, two as Chairman. We want to point out that The Board must and can give Council or a member thereof the right of inspection."

Article 93 of the World Sailing Constitution can be read as, "a member shall have the right of inspection any accounting records or other book or documents of the Federation when conferred by statute or authorized by the Board or by the Federation in General Meeting."

Article 94 requires that a very complete audited financial report shall "not less than twenty one clear days before the date of the meeting (the AGM, our comment) at which they are to be laid, be delivered or sent by post to the auditors and to all other persons entitled to receive notice of General Meetings in accordance with section 11 Companies Act 1982". There is no mention of telephonic communication in the Constitution for this Article.

Fredrik Loof secures OK Dinghy European title
Fredrik Loof has lifted the 2018 OK Dinghy European Championship title with a thrilling last race win, after the title fight went right down to the wire. Charlie Cumbley from Britain, took silver, while Thomas Hansson-Mild, also from Sweden, took bronze.

These three sailors have dominated all week, winning all eight races between them, though the narrow points gap to the rest of the fleet is perhaps an indication of how tough the week has been.

The breeze was back in the east for the final day, filling in late morning, but never really taking hold until the middle of the second race. The course area was set opposite Bandol, in the waters off Sanary.

The SNB has been the perfect host and the OK Dinghy class looks forward to coming back to Bandol soon. Even so, the next Mediterranean championship has also been arranged for May 2019 and you get the feeling that quite a few sailors racing this week might be back. It has been just so much fun in a beautiful location. -- Robert Deaves

Final results (after 8 races)
1. Fredrik Loof, SWE, 21
2. Charlie Cumbley, GBR, 27
3. Thomas Hansson-Mild, SWE, 28
4. Bo Petersen, DEN, 33
5. Chris Turner, GBR, 33
6. Valerian Lebrun, FRA, 39
7. Tomasz Gaj, POL, 53
8. Greg Wilcox, NZL, 55
9. Pawel Pawlaczyk, POL, 57
10. Stefan Myralf, DEN, 74

Full results

2018.okeuropeans.org
www.okdia.org

Mirabaud Sailing Video Award - Vote for the best sailing videos of the year
Votes for the second edition of the Mirabaud Sailing Video Award are open, and the public is invited to discover the best sailing videos produced this year.

Open to audiovisual professionals, editors, cameramen, producers as well as professional sailors, the Mirabaud Sailing Video Award recognizes the best sailing video produced every year. No less than 28 directors from seven countries submitted the video of their choice for this edition of the award.

Impressive videos from amongst others the Volvo Ocean Race, the Class Ultime, Olympic series or the Mini-Transat were sent. Prestigious sailors, such as Armel Le Cléac'h, François Gabart and James Spithill are the actors of some of the videos submitted.

The winners will be celebrated in public during an official ceremony at the Yacht Racing Forum, on 23 October in Lorient (FRA), in front of the sports' leading personalities from all over the world: regatta organisers, class managers, sponsors, yacht clubs, sailors...

The main prize - the Mirabaud Sailing Video Award - will be determined by the international jury. The Public Prize will depend on the number of votes on Internet. The Special Prize of the Jury will be awarded to the sailor who produced the best video during a regatta.

Visit our website to vote for the best videos of the year : www.sailingvideoaward.com

Here's one from our friend Robert Deaves:

Launch Of The Great British Sailing Challenge
Click on image to enlarge.

British Sailing Challenge Following the proven concept of the SailJuice Winter Series, the Great British Sailing Challenge offers year-round racing for every kind of sailing boat...

The Great British Sailing Challenge is about to launch a few months from now, and it's set to make a big impact on the UK racing scene. Whether you race a dinghy, a small catamaran, or even a sportsboat, the Great British Sailing Challenge is aimed at you.

It's a series of handicap racing events that take place throughout the year, and it's open to pretty much any sail-powered craft. The Challenge will involve at least one event per month throughout the whole year, with the target of around 100 boats taking part in each event. Competing sailors will earn ranking points from each event they compete in, with the top 100 sailors invited to a winner-takes-all-final in Autumn 2019 to award the best sailors of the year. In addition to the overall leaderboard, there will be a number of specialist rankings such as age, gender and boat type (eg. Hiking Singlehander, Asymmetric, Symmetric, etc).

The Selden SailJuice Winter Series takes place in the cold months. The GBSC takes place throughout the year and will incorporate some of the events in the Selden SailJuice Winter Series as well as a number of other existing events, and some brand new ones too.

One of the key reasons for the success of the SailJuice Winter Series is the introduction of the Great Lakes handicap numbers, a refined version of the standard RYA PY numbers. We're taking the proven formula of the Great Lakes numbers for the jump-off point for the Great British Sailing Challenge, and then we're using GPS trackers on the competing boats to start analysing the numbers in greater detail. We call this 'Dynamic Handicapping'. Whereas the numbers in the Great Lakes are analysed and altered once a year, GPS-based Dynamic Handicapping enables much faster and more frequent analysis of the relative performance of different types of boat. Like Strava, the mobile app which has revolutionised the cycling world, or Park Run and what it has done to popularise running, the organisers are taking a 'Big Data' approach to the sailing world.

Over time, this will make it possible to produce accurate handicaps for:

different wind strengths
older, less competitive boats
sailors of different abilities, from virtual beginners to world-class athletes.

The first event will be the Fernhurst Books Draycote Dash on 17 & 18 November 2018, which is also the first event of the Selden SailJuice Winter Series. More events will be announced in the coming weeks and months. And if you want your club to host an event, get in touch!

www.sailingchallenge.org

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The Last Word
The image is one thing and the human being is another... it's very hard to live up to an image. -- Elvis Presley

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Advertising inquiries to Graeme Beeson: or see www.scuttlebutteurope.com/advertise.html

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