Brought to you by Boats.com Europe, 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

Ding Schoonmaker Awarded ISAF Beppe Croce Trophy
Photo of Ding and Treecie by Dick Enerson. Click on image to enlarge.

Ding Schoonmaker James 'Ding' Schoonmaker (USA) today received the 2011 ISAF Beppe Croce Trophy - which honours an individual for their outstanding contribution to the sport of sailing.

ISAF President Goran Petersson presented the trophy, which was first awarded in 1988 in memory of Beppe Croce, the ISAF President from 1969-1986, to Schoomaker at the 2011 ISAF Annual Conference in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

Schoonmaker's involvement in sailing goes back to 1944 where he first sailed an Old Town 13 foot sloop at Watch Hill, Rhode Island. After his first experience Schoonmaker was hooked and in 1949 he became involved in the Star class after Olympian Jack Price (USA) asked him to crew for him.

In 1952 Schoonmaker took to the helm and finished second at the American Star trials to become reserve helmsman for the Olympic Yachting Team for the 1952 Olympic Sailing Competition in Helsinki, Finland. Schoonmaker was also reserve helmsman for the 1964 Olympic Games in Tokyo, Japan.

But the highlight for the American came in 1975 when he and Jerry Ford captured the Star World Championship in Chicago, USA. In a 73-boat fleet Schoonmaker beat the reigning champion Tom Blackaller. His on the water achievements also include gold medals from the Star North American Championship, European Championships, South American Championships, Western Hemisphere Championships and Bacardi Cups.

Off the water Schoonmaker's record of service to ISAF dates back to 1968 when he became a member of the Keelboat Committee, before moving on to the Centreboard Boat Committee in 1972 and Permanent Committee in 1978. Schoonmaker became an ISAF Vice President in 1986 and held his position until 1994, a position he regained in 1998 and held until 2004 following four years as the Sailing Committee Vice Chairman.

Ding has also financially supported sailing for many years. He helped to set up and was instrumental in the construction of the US Sailing Center in Miami, has given generously to US Sailing over the course of two decades, and in 1990 established a $150,000 endowment. He also gave Ivan Riano, a teenage refugee from Cuba, a Laser sailboat when he heard about Riano's sailing aspirations.

Through his generosity and unrivalled commitment to sailing Schoonmaker, alongside other ISAF members, formed the World Youth Sailing Trust 20 years ago. The Trust has since gone on to support sailors from less experienced sailing nations and provided them with coaching at the ISAF Youth Sailing World Championships.

Schoonmaker now resides in Naples, Florida with his wife Treecie where the pair continue to support sailing in the local community.

sailing.org

2012-2013 Vendee Globe Presented in London
Photo by Ingrid Abery, www.ingridabery.com. Click on image to enlarge.

Vendee Globe Six British skippers, who would like to take part in the 2012-2013 Vendee Globe, attended a meeting organised by the Vendee Globe in London on Thursday 10th November. Dee Caffari, Brian Thompson, Steve White, Oscar Mead, Phil Sharp and the Scottish sailor John MacKay would like to take part in this most demanding solo ocean racing event, as it offers the guarantee of a good return on investment for sponsors. This meeting in London was held in the presence of Sir Robin Knox Johnston, the famous winner of the 1968-1969 Golden Globe.

The Vendee Globe, the prestigious non-stop solo race around the world was in London on Thursday to show how much it would like to see British skippers in the 2012-2013 race, which is due to start from Les Sables d'Olonne on Saturday 10th November 2012. "Britain, which will host the Olympics next summer, has a huge influence in Olympic sailing, but it should also aim to be up there on the podium of the Vendee Globe," declared Denis Horeau, the Race Director, when he presented the non-stop solo round the world race to the British media.

The British sailors, Mike Golding (Gamesa) and Alex Thomson (Hugo Boss) have already announced they will be taking part, but several other British competitors would also like to be there at the start of the 7th Vendee Globe, such as Dee Caffari, Samantha Davies, Steve White, Brian Thompson, Oscar Mead, Phil Sharp and the Scottish sailor, John MacKay, as they also wish to be part of the British contingent.

vendeeglobe.org

Join The Virtual Yacht Race from Weymouth to Perth with the Liveskipper Game
Live Skipper The first virtual competitors have taken the start November 10th.at 14h00 GMT from Weymouth. You can still join the fleet and make it for Perth prior to 3rd December.

Be the best and win a trip to Australia to attend the final phases of the world championship.

LiveSkipper, a game enabling you to skipper a virtual boat in genuine weather conditions, is teaming up with the Perth 2011 ISAF Sailing World Championships to organise the official Perth 2011 virtual race. To celebrate this exceptional championship, LiveSkipper is offering you the chance to make for Perth aboard a virtual maxi-foiler capable of making over 40 knots of boat speed.

LiveSkipper is synonymous with:
- The most comprehensive of the multiplayer sailing games
- An intuitive interface
- Total freedom: play it where you like, when you like
- Numerous options: selection of sails, point of sail control, course programming.
- A weather chart updated every 3 hours
- Regular major races, with short races every Friday
- A community of over 70,000 enthusiastic players

www.liveskipper.com/perth2011/

That Was A Week, That Was!
As the IMOCA Open 60 fleet slide into the second half of the Transat Jacques Vabre, the race is on again as the whole nine boat fleet start to enjoy some trade winds sailing.

Even if they have remained a fitful and shifty, after 36 hours rooted to a high pressure system, the five boat group to the south is off and racing again into decent breeze, trying to close to down the miles that they have lost, especially to the runaway duo Virbac-Paprec 3 and Hugo Boss.

Virbac-Paprec 3's co-skipper Jeremie Beyou and Hugo Boss's Guillermo Atladill spoke with one voice on today's radio vacations, confident of the gap of nearly 200 miles they have opened to the third placed underdogs, France's Burton brothers who have bounced up the leaderboard, passing Gamesa this morning.

But between the race leader of the 21 remaining competing boats, Actual, forging her way downwind in the trade winds and the last Class 40 there is now 1400 miles of ocean. And in each of the three classes the differentials are starting to have an ominous look. In the Multi 50's the match between Actual and Maitre Jacques is now separated by 400 miles, in the IMOCA Open 60's it is 200 and in the Class 40 it is 100.

The stress and hard work of the last eight days have taken their toll. Sleep has been worked into the routines in each class. Eric Drouglazet recounted his nightmares where the boat slams into huge waves, the Burton brothers have been able to get six or seven hours in a row and Kito de Pavant hit the sack in a 'coma' for three hours.

"It was like a coma for three hours, out cold. And it took Yann an hour to wake me up. He is sleeping now and I think it would take an earthquake to wake him up."

Standings at 1700hrs CET on Thursday, november 10th, 2011.

IMOCA
1. Virbac Paprec 3 (Jean-Pierre Dick - Jeremie Beyou) : 2443.7 miles to finish
2. Hugo Boss (Alex Thomson - Guillermo Altadill) : 27 miles to leader
3. Bureau Vallee (Louis Burton - Nelson Burton) : 224.5 miles to leader

Multi50
1. Actual (Yves Le Blevec - Samuel Manuard) : 2921.2 miles to finish
2. Maitre Jacques (Loïc Fequet - Loïc Escoffier) : 391.3 miles to leader

Class40
1. Aquarelle.com (Yannick Bestaven - Eric Drouglazet) : 3154.4 miles to finish
2. ERDF Des Pieds et des Mains (Damien Seguin - Yoann Richomme) : 112.7 miles to leader
3. Groupe Picoty (Jacques Fournier - Jean-Christophe Caso) : 184.2 miles to leader

www.transat-jacques-vabre.com

Volvo Ocean Race: Groupama's Gamble
Will Groupama's coastal gamble pay off? The next 24 hours will tell, as the French team and the huge lead they have accumulated close to the west African shore come under threat from a new weather system and three rivals sick of taking losses in the windless west.

A bold move from skipper Franck Cammas? The Frenchman says not, he was expecting the other boats to go the same way when he made his call inside the first two days of Leg 1. But whatever the motivation - and a team choosing Highway to Hell as their anthem might be expected to take a few risks - the only significant question now is whether it was a wise one.

As of 1300 UTC on Thursday, the decision had brought them a lead of 140 nautical miles over Team Telefónica, who are ahead of PUMA Ocean Racing powered by BERG and CAMPER with Emirates Team New Zealand. Those three teams followed conventional wisdom by deciding that west is best when it comes to reaching the way point at Fernando de Noronha off the coast of Brazil.

While it's a case of so far so good for Cammas, leading the first French entry in the race for 18 years, weather forecasts point to a new low pressure system that could come in to destroy the trade winds to their south.

The nightmare scenario for Groupama is to see their three main rivals starting to exploit the new system from Friday afternoon. By the following day, the trio could be hitting boat speeds of 18 knots in the pure trade winds, eating into the lead of a French team whose speed at 1300 was around 14 knots.

Ian Walker's team resumed Leg 1 officially at 0216 UTC on Thursday after returning to the point where they were forced to suspend racing when their mast snapped in horrific conditions on Saturday, just six hours into the race.

Sailing with a new mast, and with no more replacements in the locker, means the team will take a cautious approach.

volvooceanrace.com

Musto to Showcase the New 2012 Collection at METS
Photo by CAMPER / Chris Cameron. Click on image to enlarge.

Musto The world's largest exhibition of marine trade equipment takes place in Amsterdam between 15-17 November and the Musto team is pleased to be there.

Come and take a sneak preview of the new 2012 collection including the latest HPX Pro Series developed in conjunction with the CAMPER & Emirates Team New Zealand Volvo Ocean Race team, as well as the Musto & Camper collaborative marine footwear collection.

Also featured is the new Musto HPX Ocean Boot with OutDry® Technology which has been nominated for this year's DAME Design Award. Musto is the first in the marine market to incorporate the innovative OutDry® lamination process which bonds the waterproof and breathable membrane directly to the external layer of the boot, perfectly sealing any possible water entry point.

Visit us in the British Pavilion stand 03.301
www.musto.com

World Class Competition On Tap
Key West, Florida, USA: Grand Prix champions and racing enthusiasts are gearing up for Quantum Key West 2012. The twenty-fifth edition of Key West Race Week will feature strong international programs and top-tier competition.

A race week hallmark in years past has been new design debuts. The absence of new models in recent years appears to be over. New designs in 2012 include an R/P IRC 52, a J/V IRC 52, the Farr 400, a McConaghy 38 and a Carkeek HPR 40.

Renowned professionals Dee Smith and Peter Isler will serve as tactician and navigator when Hap Fauth helms the Juan K designed Team Origin 1851 Med Cup boat in a power-packed IRC class that already boasts six other 52-footers. Two of the entries are the new custom IRC 52s Highland Fling XII (Irvine Laidlaw, Monaco) and Interlodge (Austin Fragomen, Newport) - both making their racing debuts in Key West.

Among the notable early entrants in Melges 32 class is Samba Pa Ti, which skipper John Kilroy sailed to second place at the most recent Melges 32 World Championships. Another strong player is Geoffrey Pierini, who steered Sicktrix32 to third place at the Copa del Ray.

The Farr 40 class is returning to Key West after a one-year hiatus to hold its world championship in Australia. Barking Mad (Jim Richardson, Boston) and Flash Gordon (Helmut Jahn, Chicago) are among the recognizable programs already entered in Quantum Key West 2012. Tink Chambers of Stagg Yachts, which manages the Farr 40 class, said a ship carrying U.S., European and Australian boats is currently en route from Istanbul following the recent European Championship.

The Mini Maxi class presented some of the closest racing last year. 2012 will feature the long awaited line up between the two boats that won the last three Mini Maxi World Championships - Niklas Zennstrom's J/V 72 Ran (2010 & 2011) and Dan Meyers' J/V 66 Numbers (2009).

Regatta chairman Peter Craig and his team at Premiere Racing are always looking for ways to improve Key West. This year includes the introduction of J/Boat specific classes. A special handicap consortium headed by J/Boat founder Rod Johnstone and PHRF consultant Bruce Bingman has created two classes for owners who want to race against boats of similar design and performance.

Johnstone envisions a faster class consisting of designs like the new J/111 and Key West regulars like the J/109 and J/124. The second class will likely be comprised of smaller models such as the J/92 and J/95. Johnstone said owners can find rating comparisons on the J/Boat website and said the handicapping for Key West will be done using a time-on-time formula.

Regatta dates are January 15 - 20, 2012.

www.Premiere-Racing.com

WMRT President Peter Gilmour Receives BrandLaureate Award
Click on image to enlarge.

WMRT London, United Kingdom: Peter Gilmour, President of the World Match Racing Tour and Race Advisor to the Monsoon Cup, has received The BrandLaureate Brand Icon Leadership Award 2011 by the Asia Pacific Brands Foundation (APBF).

The BrandLaureate Brand Icon Leadership Awards 2011 were launched by the APBF to honour the most outstanding icons in Malaysia and around the world. The recipients of this award were selected by a judging committee who scrutinised their career track record, achievements, and contribution to the industry and nation.

Gilmour was instrumental in making the Monsoon Cup, the final leg of the World Match Racing Tour, a reality in 2005 and has since been one of the driving forces to have developed it into Malaysia's second biggest annual sporting event.

The award was previously only given to brands and corporations however Gilmour was awarded the accolade of Brand Icon for his "inspiration, intelligence, ideas, innovation and imagination," all ofwhich have helped bring huge change to Kuala Terrenganu in Malaysia where the Monsoon Cup is held and also to developing the sport of sailing in the country.

Speaking about the award, Peter Gilmour said: "I am honoured to receive this award in acknowledgement of the contributions I have made to Malaysia. It has been a great experience working with the people of Malaysia and especially Terengganu. I would like to thank former Malaysia Prime Minister Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi for his vision and for giving me the opportunity to add to the accolades of this great nation."

wmrt.com

Sailing Legends - The Story Of The World's Greatest Ocean Race
Sailing Legends - The Story Of The World's Greatest Ocean Race By Bob Fisher and Barry Pickthall - Endeavour Books - £40 + p&p

A special numbered limited edition signed by the authors to make the perfect Christmas gift The Whitbread Round the World Race - now the Volvo Ocean Race - spans 40 years, ten races and more than 300,000 miles across the most inhospitable seas. From gentlemanly competition in yachts designed more for graceful living than screaming around Cape Horn, the race has progressed to purpose built craft with few creature comforts, crewed by fanatical, professionals.

Millions have been spent, legends created and six men have died. No one takes the race lightly and no one tells the story better than journalists, Bob Fisher and Barry Pickthall who have been there for every race from the first in 1973. They mark the anecdotes, highlight all the major stories, and provide biographies of sailing's greatest names from the first handicap and line honour winners, Ramon Carlin and Sir Chay Blyth, to double winner Conny van Rietschoten, French legend Eric Tabarly, those great New Zealand rivals Sir Peter Blake and Grant Dalton, through to the latter day Volvo race winners. They also detail the awesome advances in design and construction that make today's yachts formidably tough, surfing greyhounds capable of hitting 40knots + and sustaining 600 mile daily runs. The book also lists every crewmember to have taken part.

176 pages. 128 colour pictures and illustrations.

To order, go to www.southatlanticpublishing.com

To view a "flipping book" format of Sailing Legends see issuu.com/pplmedia

Longtze World Event in Hyeres
The Longtze will finish this 2011 season in true style, the Longtze European Tour will post a new participation record with 26 crews lining up for the "Longtze World Event" to take place this weekend, the 11-13th November, in Hyeres.

More than 60 boats were involved on all the various waters around Europe, a annual circuit made up of 17 events raced out of three basins (alpine Lakes, Atlantic-Channel, the Mediterranean). It features great federation events such as the Primo Cup, the Spi Ouest France, the Grand Prix de l'Ecole Navale and, for the first time this year, Novembre a Hyeres where Longtze will contest their big international end of season race.

"Newbies" to follow
An almost 100% female crew led by the 2002 420 World Champions, Magalie Pallanca and Coraline Jonet, makes their debut on a Longtze.

Lorient's Bertrand Castelnerac, coming notably from the Mini circuit, has invested in a Longtze with a quite different aim but one that is equally constructive for the development of the Class: "the Longtze is a very nice, very attractive boat with a strong student circuit. It's there that we wish to be involved: supporting the student teams. In Lorient we have the potential to put together a training group, to advise the crews on the water, but also in the management of their project ashore, their communications, etc. And of course, if I manage to hook in a partner, I will mount a crew to take part in the Longtze European Tour in 2012."

The Swiss sailing Master, Michel Vaucher, who designed and created the first "Gautier sails" for the French-speaking Swiss Longtze "NELSailing Sarl", will take part in his very first Longtze event.

The Longtze World Event is the last racing meet of the series for the 2011 season, but it also marks the beginning of a new chapter...

The Longtze Class also invites you to the Salon Nautic in Paris early December.

longtze.org/fr/yachtclub.html

Sailing Tourism Investment Needs Further Integration
There has been a distinct trend over the last few years, for the sport of sailing to be 'propped up' by investment from tourism budgets. This is true at an event level and a team level.

The pitch is simple. Hosting a world class event will put your town, city, region or country 'on the map', show that you can run a top sporting event and deliver economic returns through increased hotel occupancy and visitor spending.

Such promises are activated with different levels of enthusiasm. The part about having a host city broadcast around the world is easy enough. Actually getting people to book plane tickets and hotel rooms is a bit harder.

This week in London, tens of thousands of travel professionals will visit World Travel Market (WTM). According to the WTM 2011 Industry Report, sports tourism has a growing role, but paradoxically major events don't have a lot of impact on the decisions of travel consumers with 81% of UK holiday makers saying that the Olympics and Football World Cup does not make them any more likely to visit Brazil.

Despite the importance to sailing of partnerships between destinations and events, the sport was invisible at the travel trade show. More worrying is the lack of awareness of destination officials and marketing personnel about events.

A straw poll of representatives from cities and countries investing in sailing showed that some venues need to do a bit more integration to realise any tourism benefit from hosting events like the Volvo Ocean Race or America's Cup World Series.

The China stand did not have any representatives from Sanya. The New England stand did not have any representatives from Newport or Rhode Island. People promoting Miami suggested we look online for information as did smiling PR people from Oman Air. Abu Dhabi gave us a USB stick which 'would contain any relevant press releases'.

The only mention we could find anywhere of sailing was a brochure produced to promote Lake Garda which included a list of 2011 sailing events.

Full article by David Fuller in YachtRacing.biz:

www.yachtracing.biz

Letters To The Editor -
Letters are limited to 350 words. No personal attacks are permitted. We do require your name but your email address will not be published without your permission.

* From Jim Champ re: Anthony Shanks: ... International judging is a junket of the highest order,

Ah yes, I've seen this style of thinking before. I don't operate in the highest level of International sailing, but the school of thought is found in other types of recreational activity. May I present an example?

My partner is involved in dog showing, and when I used to troop along to some of the shows I used to hear a lot of complaining from the competitors about the sport's administrators and judges, and how they weren't interested in the sport or the activities, didn't own dogs themselves and were only in it for the freebies and the status and the ego boost and so on.

This rather puzzled me, because as an outsider I couldn't see the appeal of staying a weekend or whatever in a pretty ordinary hotel, hanging round in a big draughty noisy shed and being supplied with mediocre food, tea and coffee. Even more so if you had no interest whatsoever in the activity going on.

So I did a little bit of research, and discovered, not entirely to my surprise, that everyone involved in the admin and judging where former competitors, dog owners and so on, even if they were not now. And as for why they were not competitors now, I did't find it that difficut to believe that after 40 years of carting dogs round the country, brushing grooming and primping them to ridiculous artificiality, some might lose you enthusiasmn for doing that yet again, but still want to be involved in the sport they loved and maybe give something back.

The criticism was also levelled that some, even many of them were not former top competitors, but personally I had trouble working out why the mental qualities and talents that make top competitors are necessarily those that make for competent judges and administrators.

Now I don't tread in the sailing corridors of power like a lot of the rest of you, but is any of the above a teeny bit familiar?

* From Eddie Mays:

Re: Scuttlebutt Europe #2466 - The Ark Royal at the bottom of Lyme Bay - Sacrilege!

I had the pleasure of learning to sail at Lyme Regis and it is one of the finest sailing waters in the UK. The thought of 20,000 tons of scrap metal changing the characteristics of the Bay do not bear thinking about. There are already plenty of wrecks in the Bay for divers to use and they do in droves.

#2467 - Andy Dare misses the point - 40 metres of water (140 ft in old money). Ark Royal has a waterline depth of 26ft. Her superstructure must add another 80 - 100ft, depending on how much they cut away before scuttling her and so we are left with a probable 30 - 40 ft of clearance between the top of the ship and the sea level. Modern large tankers have a draft of 65ft when laden. I know because I served on one in the 1960s and they have gotten no smaller since. Fully laden they are too deep to go through the Dover Straits and so they discharge part of their cargo in Lyme Bay to smaller tankers. The Ark Royal would present a real danger to this type of operation.

Featured Brokerage
Featured Brokerage Boat 1990 35' Custom Racing Yacht. 74,950 GBP. Located in Lymington, United Kingdom.

This boat is genuinely in tip-top condition having had a decent re-furbishment a little over a year ago. Aside from the re-fit you can tell that the owner has lavished time and money on the upkeep of the boat, to keep her maintained to such a high standard. The current owner has amassed a fine collection of silverware since she first started racing the boat and has won or been placed on a significant number of competitive outings. Still a fast yacht, she has the potential to be converted to a racer/cruiser or just sailed away as she is.

Brokerage through Boatshed Performance.com: www.yachtworld.com/boatshedperformance/

Complete listing details and seller contact information at
uk.yachtworld.com

The Last Word
I hate small towns because once you've seen the cannon in the park there's nothing else to do. -- Lenny Bruce

Bookmark and Share

Use this box to send a copy of this issue of the Scuttlebutt Europe Newsletter to a friend:
[FORWARDFORM]

Or [FORWARD] for a page where you can send copies to up to a dozen friends.

[USERTRACK]

About Boats.com
Boats.com provides marketing and Web services to boat builders, dealers, brokers and service companies throughout the global recreational marine industry. The Boats.com Website provides consumer access to information, boat listings and financial and insurance products. With more than 143,000 new and used boat listings from more than 5,500 brokers, dealers and manufacturers, Boats.com is the largest concentration of recreational marine industry marketing in the world.

See the Boats Blog at Boats.com -- www.boats.com/blog/

To subscribe, unsubscribe, and select HTML or Text format visit scuttlebutteurope.com

Editorial and letter submissions to

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

Search the Archives

SEARCH SEARCH

Our Partners

Seahorse Magazine

YachtScoring.com

Wight Vodka

Robline Ropes

Harken

Marlow

Navico

Translate