From the feedback - 12/04/01

He would say it was sailing skill, wouldn`t he? If Andrew Hurst (no relation) believes that technology allowed Iain Percy to win gold in Sydney, then why doesn't he try stepping into Iain's boat and beating him on the water while Iain uses 'old' technology. I get very tired of journalists (yachting and otherwise) trying to pull down Brits who do well. We should celebrate their success, not try to find reasons to denigrate... We used to say "those who can, do - and those who can't, teach". Maybe that should be changed to "those who can't, write about it".

From Jim Champ
He would say it was sailing skill, wouldn`t he? If you look at race results you will see that the spread of finishers in development classes is no greater than it is in one-designs, so clearly crew ability is always more important than boat speed. Its also true to say that every class, even the Laser, permits sail adjustment, so the ability to rig and set up the boat correctly is always significant. But finally, surely the sailor who can win in a tight one-design has only mastered a part of the sport. The 'complete' sailor is one who can win a major championship in a restricted development class in a boat they have designed and built themselves. The list of people who have done that is both very short and very distinguished - Uffa Fox, Jack Holt, Ian Proctor, Russ Bowler, Bruce Farr, Iain Murray and Julian Bethwaite are some of them. And their names will be remembered long after the names of the one-design champions of their eras are forgotten.

From Paul Bayliss
He would say it was sailing skill, wouldn`t he? It's all very well to claim that technology helps anybody go faster, but technology in the wrong hands will have the reverse effect, either by not understanding how it works, or even if they do, by pointing the boat in the wrong direction and just going even faster the wrong way! Give credit where it is due and that is most definitely here.

From David Greening
He would say it was sailing skill, wouldn`t he? Ian maligns himself. The fascination of dinghy sailing is in the number of skills required to be competitive in the race; fitness and tactical ability are important, but so is boat tuning and gear selection, there have been plenty of big budget campaigns that foundered because the money was spent on the wrong gear. On carbon/Mylar rigs, the Finn must be the ideal boat to benefit from these technologies (which have been around for longer than most people think, I remember Eric(?) Bixby's carbon rig in 505s in the eighties and Bob Ames' early carbon 14 rigs), the control of laminate and reflex response suits an unstayed rig, the longevity of Mylar sails may be compared with the renowned longevity of the Finn hull. Carbon masts are great, they do all the right things, they are light, strength/stiffness distribution can be controlled, the reflex response gives better gust response and they can be repaired, the downsides are price and breathability. However the price will hopefully be improved with manufacturers such as Proctors and Superspar coming into the market with more mass market technologies. Fragility, I believe, is a function of the larger diameter thin wall sections, where any imperfection or ding acts as a stress raiser, causing collapse of the tube. I expect that this type of problem will resolve itself as mast makers learn the limits or limitations of their technologies. Mylar sails have been around for a long time now and are great. I think their main advantage is that they hold their shape until they fall apart (I recently sailed with a competitive ten year old Mylar main on my National 12 although the interlaminar mildew was off-putting), this gets you away from the arms race of replacing Dacron sails every two or three regattas (or years for many sailors). It is great for us mere mortals, that Iain Percy can carry out all this rig development at his sponsors' expense, that will eventually feed down to us!