The Olympic cat

We take a look at the latest developments in the Tornado class and the likely medallists

The Olympic catamaran, the Tornado , grew out of the International Yacht Racing Union B Class Catamaran rule. For the B Class this most basic of box rules, specified a boat 20ft long, 10ft wide with 235sqft of sail and weighing 155kg. In 1967, some five years after the IYRU catamaran class rules were published, the Rodney March-designed Tornado was selected to become the new Olympic by the IYRU at a Catamaran Trial ready for the 1976 Games. Since its debut in Montreal it has remained the highest performance class at the Games ever since. Now, over 40 years later, the class is due to head into its final Olympic Games after being controversially removed from the 2012 Olympic line-up.

With the exception of refinements in technical details such as a few tweaks to the hull and some developments in the rig, the Tornado had remained largely unchanged from its beginnings until fairly recently. The Olympics in Sydney 2000 saw the class competing for the last time in what many would consider its original set-up – one trapeze and two sails. Prior to Athens in 2004 an entirely new rig had been added to the boats, utilising two trapezes, a square topped mainsail and a gennaker. The added square top to the main increased its size from 15-16sqm, while the jib saw a smaller increase from 7 to 7.2sqm with full battens permitted (although sheeting was still limited to the front beam) while the new gennaker added a useful 25sqm downwind. These changes came into effect on 1 March 2001 with the aim of reflecting the current trend of three sail, twin trapeze beach cats and keeping the Tornado as the fastest and most spectacular of Olympic class.

With these new rigs being introduced between the 2000 and 2004 Olympics, development and refinement was rife over this period. There were a great many experimentations within the class in areas such as how best to handle spinnaker drops and hoists from a trampoline. The class association wisely chose to leave these matters relatively open in the rules, allowing sailors to experiment and come up with the best solution. It was not long before the class all swung towards a solid spinnaker tube attached to the pole for launch and retrieval and a self-tacking jib system to make life easier downwind.

With a new configuration of sails the class naturally began experimenting with sail shapes and materials. This is still prevalent today and there are likely to be around ten different makes of sail across the fleet of 15 boats out on the water in China. The exact number of different sail makes present is hard to predict as many teams use a combination and have a tendency to change from event to event. The major change to take place in the sails in-between this Olympics and the Games in 2004 is that the class has now brought in a specified set of materials that sails may be manufactured from.

This lockdown in materials mostly came about from a Dutch-Anglo-American training group, who developed a new lightweight polyester cloth. A much lighter sail was possible with the use of this cloth, but early sails had a tendency to rip forcing the group to take extra care on the detailing and finishing of them. Used in the mains and jibs the sails were made by Ullman Italy (Pablo Soldano) and USA (Jay Glaser). At the 2004 Worlds in Palma the three boats in the training group won six out of the nine races, finishing second, fifth and seventh at the regatta. Many teams were keen to get their hands on the material, and failing this they forged ahead with their own programmes. Rapidly costs began to spiral and the class were forced to limit this development.

An equally significant evolution over the last four years has been the switch to carbon masts. Previously the fleet had been using relatively heavy aluminium sections so the change to carbon has resulted in a significant weight saving and made the boat a little livelier on the water. In part the change in masts is another thing responsible for the continued sail development taking place in the Tornado, however, what has not changed is the manufacturer. Where Marstrom were building the aluminium masts for the fleet almost exclusively, so Tornado sailors as a whole seem to have stayed with the Swedish manufacturer for their carbon spars.

This brings us onto another aspect of the Tornado that has seen very little change certainly in the last 20 years or so. Tornado hulls are, much like the masts, built almost exclusively by Marstrom Composites and have changed very little in design over the years. In fact, even when the class switched to the new design of rig, the hull stayed exactly the same. In China almost all teams will be using the Marstrom hull with one possible exception: Back in 2006 Graham Eeles, a UK boatbuilder with a long Tornado history began building a slightly tweaked Tornado. When the class was dropped from the 2012 Olympic line-up earlier this year, Eeles was forced to stop his production of hulls as he saw little future in it. However, at the time of the announcement he had been able to manufacture a few hulls. There is a rumour one of these hulls will be out on the water in China. The design does not differ a great deal from the Marstrom, but the main difference is that the Eeles boat has slightly thinner bows and so a more slab-sided look at the front.

Perhaps because it is a catamaran or because of its technical nature, the Tornado, more than any Olympic class, seems to be one where sailors need time to get up to a top level of sailing within it. Because of this or the adage that ‘once you’ve gone cat, you can never go back’, the leading Tornado sailors have all been racing in the class for many years and the average age of medal contenders is extremely high. Many people thought the change to a three sail rig would result in some new young teams to come through the system, however, it seems it is mostly still the same faces at the front:



Darren Bundock and Glenn Ashby (AUS):

Currently ranked number one in the world, Bundock and Ashby are the team to beat, after winning Sail Melbourne, the Australian Nationals and Sydney International Regatta this year they went on to take the Tornado World Championships, for the second time this Olympic cycle (Bundock has been World Champion six times since 1998). This Australian pair has rarely finished outside the top five in major international regattas over the past three years. For Bundock this will be his third Olympics having taken silver in Sydney but following this up with a disappointing eighth place in Athens. Since the last Games Bundock’s crew John Forbes has retired, with the highly capable perennial A-Class World Champion Glenn Ashby taking his place.

The Australian team is perhaps one of the few teams on the Tornado circuit that manage to be extremely quick throughout every wind speed. However, their preferred wind strength tends to be medium or heavy airs.



Roman Hagara and Hans Peter Steinacher (AUT):

The Austrian reigning Olympic Champion Roman Hagara can never be discounted having won Olympic Gold in 2004 in Athens and 2000 in Sydney. Hagara is one of the long standing legends in the class and has been at the top of the fleet for many years.

Along with his crew, Steinacher, Hagara is generally considered to be the light wind Tornado king and it will take a great performance to beat him in the predicted light weather in Qingdao this year. However, they have failed to break into the top ten over the course of the last two World Championships, coming 20th and then 11th. In spite of this, they are still widely respected and took victory at the 2007 Olympic Test Event and third the previous year. Most agree this pair are at their best when a really important regatta roles around so expect to see them fighting hard for Gold.

Fernando Echavarri and Anton Paz (ESP):

2007 World Champions Echavarri and Paz where unable to defend their title this year, finishing the Worlds a disappointing seventh overall. Interestingly this echoes their previous World Championships positions where they won in 2005 and were seventh in 2006.

Currently the team are ranked second in the world just behind Bundock and Ashby. They could, however, face some difficulties in Qingdao with the weather not going their way. This is a pair who are famed for their windy weather performance. Their results tend to get worse as the wind goes down so it will be interesting to see their results in China. However, they will have been trying to improve this aspect of their sailing and are firm medal contenders.



Mitch Booth and Pim Nieuwenhuis (NED):

Veteran Tornado campaigner, Booth along with his crew Nieuwenhuis will, as ever, be a force to be reckoned with at this event. Booth recently competed in his 26th Tornado World Championships (where he finished sixth) and the Australian turned Dutch sailor knows the class inside out.

The pair probably perform at their best in the moderate to windy side of the wind scale so could struggle a little as a result in China. However, Booth is an extremely impressive tactician and the difficult conditions will almost certainly favour the ‘thinking’ sailor.

Most recently, Booth has unveiled an upwind gennaker that he has been developing in conjunction with John Lovell and Charlie Ogletree (USA). Whether this is a great development for gold, a cunning ruse or the desperate steps of a team who traditionally struggle in light winds remains to be seen,

John Lovell and Charlie Ogletree (USA):

Many believed this pairing to be a shoe-in for Olympic selection last year; however, they were taken to the wire at the US, first-past-the-post selection regatta.

The team took the silver medal at the last Olympic Games in Athens and are fast when the pressure is on. Tactically they are very solid, though sometimes they lack the straightline speed to get up into the top few in the windier weather. Typically they are seen as another team that sail at their best in the light wind which should make them a threat this summer.

Lovell and Ogletree are the other Olympic team involved in the development of the upwind gennaker concept. As a pair they can be more conservative than Booth and Nieuwenhuis so are probably less likely to use the sail.



Leigh MacMillan and Will Howden (GBR):

In comparison to many of the Tornado fleet these two sailors are actually relatively young. Occasionally this can be reflected in their results which can be somewhat erratic. They walked away from the 2007 last World Championships in fifth position and replicated this performance at the Olympic Test Event in Qingdao. However, a disappointing Worlds earlier this year saw the team take 18th overall. Although they have had some good results on the European Olympic circuit since then inconsistency seems to remain a problem.