Over 60 skiffs

The Musto Skiff National Championships are set to begin tomorrow

The Musto Skiff class has been growing rapidly over the last few years, nowhere more so than in the UK. This year the National Championships, which get underway on Thursday have received 61 pre-entries with more expected to enter on the day, in fact we heard on Tuesday this number had already increased to 64, an impressive fleet these days. The Musto Skiff class has struck up a relationship with GPS tracking company Map My Tracks - the event will be the first time live GPS tracking has been used in a non-Olympic dinghy championship.

The regatta, to be held at Whitstable Yacht Club from 12-15 June 2008, will be among the first to benefit from Map My Tracks live event tracking. Map My Tracks was launched in February 2008 and uses mobile phones (with GPS or an attached antenna) into live sports tracking tools, providing map and performance data in real-time to sailors, live tracking on the internet and a range of website track analysis and replay tools.

Currently the wind is forecast to be at around the five to 11 knot range for the entire week, though today we are getting reports several Mustos are on the beach preparing in a solid 18-20 knot wind. If the weather does stay light obviously the lighter sailors will benefit, possibly some of the new sailors in particular. "With the fleet growing so fast at the moment it is hard to keep track of exactly who is at the top," event organiser, Rick Perkins told TheDailySail. "We seem to have a number of young, agile sailors coming into the class out of boats like the 29er as opposed to taking the Olympic route. I guess any number of them could see the top end of the fleet and if it is light stand a great chance."

Of course the light winds may well favour the lighter sailors but with trapezing and spinnaker handling the Musto Skiff definitely rewards time in the boat. Due to this our money is still on some of the older (British) hands sailing in the fleet to take overall victory.



Richard Stenhouse:

Without doubt the man to beat in the Musto Skiff Richard Stenhouse has won just about every event going. In 2007 he became the first official Musto Skiff World Champion, never finishing off the podium in the event. He has won the National Championships on four separate occasions in 2001, 2002, 2003 - held in Whitstable - and 2006. In addition to this in 2003 and 2004 he won the European Championships and took victory at the then Gold Cup - now the Worlds - in 2003, 2004, 2005 and 2006. In fact there has never been a Gold Cup or World Championship held in the class that Stenhouse did not win; a truly dominant sailor.

Rick Perkins:

At a very light wind National Championships last season in Lyme Regis, Perkins took victory, which made him the fourth different champion in four years. More recently Perkins finished a slightly disappointing fifth place at the first ever World Championships in Lake Garda last season. The win last season actually represents Perkin's first victory at a National, European or World Championship in the class. However, he has been sailing these boats for a considerable time now and knows how to make a Musto Skiff go fast. "I will give it my best shot and that is all you can do. Every year the event gets bigger and so it gets harder to win," Perkins commented.

Ian Trotter:

Trotter is another long time Musto Skiff sailor, even being present at the National Championships as far back as 2001 and could well take victory in Whitstable this week. Last year at the World Championships he took third overall and in 2006 he did the double, winning the combined European and UK National Championships. Perhaps most significantly he beat Stenhouse into second position at these events by a respectable margin.

Dan Henderson

Last year in the very light Nationals at Lyme Regis Henderson - one of the youngsters to have come into the fleet in recent years - was second overall at the regatta. Hailing from Thorpe Bay Sailing Club - on the other side of the Thames estuary to Whitstable - Henderson should not be short of local knowledge as he aims to go one better this season.

Daniel Dixon:

Third at the National Championships last year and sixth at the Worlds in Garda, Dixon has consistently shown his skill in a variety of wind conditions. In 2006 he was fourth at his first ever Musto Skiff National Championships, proving he is a prodigious talent.

Martin Boatman:

Despite several years at or near the top of the Musto Skiff fleet Boatman never seems to have quite managed to take victory at a major event. An absence from major Musto events over the last couple of years also makes him a bit of a wild card this season. He certainly has the past results to stand him in good stead this week, having been eighth, fourth then third at the Europeans and third at two consecutive National Championships before he took time away from the boat. Perhaps this will be the year he manages too make the top of the podium.

With the UK fleet the biggest in the World and the World Championships now not too far away - 24-31 August in St Moritz - a number of overseas competitors will be taking the opportunity to take on the top Brits. So far there are entries from Austria, Hungary, Holland, Spain and Slovenia. To a large extent these overseas competitors are unknowns and it will be interesting to see how they do.

More than anything we are excited to see how the race tracking is going to work. We have all seen this sort of thing taking place at Olympic events but for this technology to finally be filtering down into the mainstream dinghy market is exciting. We will certainly be watching some of the racing online, hopefully there will be some close exciting races that can really show off how exciting tracking might well become.

Follow the event at: http://www.mapmytracks.com/events/musto-skiff-2008-uk-nationals

Entries:

Pos	Helm	Sail Number
1	Rick Perkins	GBR 293
2	Simon Reynolds	GBR 362
3	Dan Vincent	GBR 193
4	Simon Dodds	GBR 114
5	Martin Boatman	GBR 274
6	Christopher Wossala	HUN 337
7	Guy Harrill	GBR 116
8	Bruce Keen	GBR 205
9	Felix Luchterhand	AUT 223
10	Richard Smith	GBR 260
11	Dan Ward	GBR 286
12	Tom Offer	GBR TBC
13	Jerry Wales	GBR 350
14	Alastair Gould	GBR 74
15	Francis Stileman	GBR 225
16	Ian Trotter	GBR 294
17	Matt Conner	GBR 227
18	Russell Clark	GBR 151
19	Grahame Smith	GBR 291
20	Hugh Shone	GBR 262
21	Hans Zuurendonk	NED 255
22	Daniel Henderson	GBR 305
23	Jonathan Cameron	GBR TBC
24	John Reekie	GBR 312
25	Ben Swann	GBR 163
26	Barry Shotton	GBR 216
27	Matt Hollis	GBR 356
28	Nick Hollis	GBR 355
29	Richard Stenhouse	GBR 369
30	Richard Lovering	GBR 314
31	Leigh Albrecht	GBR 65
32	Griff Tanner	GBR 146
33	Dan Dixon	GBR 161
34	Andrew Peake	GBR 288
35	John Evans	GBR 211
36	William Smith	GBR 125
37	Gareth Davies	GBR 290
38	Tony Coulson	GBR 304
39	Tim Chapman	GBR 333
40	Alastair Conn	GBR 130
41	Stephen Lowe	GBR 56
42	Nigel Brown	GBR 165
43	Ron Barnes	GBR 228
44	Sergei Samus	GBR 284
45	Graeme Oliver	GBR 363
46	Mick Keates	GBR 283
47	David Poston	GBR 153
48	Iver Ahlmann	GER 170
49	Richard Purdy	GBR 240
50	Ian Judd	GBR 200
51	Grant Forward	GBR 117
52	Peter Griffith	GBR 139
53	Christian Reynolds	GBR 372
54	Rob Trotter	GBR 127
55	Tom Wright	GBR 209
56	Bruce Spratt	GBR 154
57	Alex Koukourakis	GBR 292
58	Jon Simpson	GBR 160
59	Gavin Homer	GBR 253
60	Pablo Arandia Sabater	ESP 247
61	Mitja Margon	SLO 271