Non-racing activities concurrent with '11 NACR. Interested?

[Bob Hunkins]

An area of for significant improvement in the Day sailer Association is in the area of participation from the non racers/cruisers. I have never seen non racers except perhaps as members of the host club present while a NACR has been held.

This has not always been the case. From my reading of Day Sailer Quarterlies, back in the old days some non racers would come out to the NACR, and from what I can tell it was mostly because they had good friends in the class association.

I would like to bring some of that back, but I am not certain what interest there is in the people out there. So, let me ask:

If there were activities for the non-racer concurrent with the North American Championship Regatta, would you come?

What kinds of activities would interest you?  


This year in Houston, I want to have a "Day Sailer National Rendezvous" concurrent with the NACR.

The possible activities I see are:

-Meeting other Day Sailer owners from across the country, and making new friends.
-Swapping rigging ideas, learning more about the boat. 
-Sailing around the local area.
Here, there is Clear Lake, where Lakewood Yacht Club is located, and
Galveston Bay where we are having the races.
In Galveston Bay, you can sail south along the coast toward Eagle point
and go to Redfish Island, a recently rebuilt breakwater that is along the
Houston ship channel.  It is a popular destination for boaters in the
Houston area, and I have sailed there a few times. It is fairly simple to
sail up to the shore, jump off the boat and tie off to some of the
boulders there. 
- Watch the races as a spectator from your boat.

Those are my ideas at this time. If there is serious interest people who would come to this, I will work on making it happen. Please let me know what you think and your ideas.
Thanks,

[Alan]

I'd be interested in all of the activities. It would be a concentrated learning experience, as well as huge fun.

The problem I'd have with 2011 is finding time, especially since I'd need to tow the boat from California to Texas. Have an event at Tahoe in 2013 or later, and I'm there.

[seandwyer]

To some degree, I'm with Alan. If this were closer, I would definitely be interested, but unfortunately for the next 2 summers I won't have time to travel that far.

But to a larger degree, what I really want to express here is that I think if you can, you should have this event next year in Houston or wherever seems to make the most sense. Then, every year have something similar, moving the event each year to different parts of the country so that all Daysailers eventually have something close by. Perhaps after a few, there may be support for more than one per year - a North, South, East West sort of approach. Just a though.

[Alan]

I just found the Events link under Day Sailer Association, which says the 2012 NACR will be at Huntington Lake, California, the week of July 9, 2012.

Yes! Not too long a drive, I can probably get time off then, etc. Just gotta plug the boat's fix-and-upgrade schedule into a calendar...

OK, forget what I said about Tahoe in 2013. Ohio instead.

[jdubes]

I'd be interested in all the activities if they were closer. I'm with Seandwyer, we should have more regional activities. North, South East etc...

[Geronimo]

I too would participate in a regional event. I brought my DS1 to the annual small craft festival in St. Michaels, Md a couple times. It fit in nicely with wide variety of boats. They have a camp cruise to Wye Island on Thursday and return to the museum on Friday. Google the event and maybe we can get a group to rendezvous there next October.

[GreenLake]

First, I applaud the thinking behind this suggestion - providing a more inclusive venue. Depending on the actual program this could be quite attractive to those of us who either aren't or aren't yet inclined to race competitively, or who don't have any reasonable opportunities.

Unfortunately, next summer is booked for me, so I clicked the vote for "future" as the best option, but I would want to know more about venue and program before I'd commit.

There are few locations that I would consider in driving range, and only one of them is close enough that I would feel bringing my boat would be an option.

If an event had a strong and active sailing component to it, I would be far more likely to be interested in it. Crewing on another DS and directly sharing sailing experience would be more interesting than just swapping yarns about the best brand of epoxy or sitting around a campfire practicing the scaffold hitch. (Not to knock those two activities, they do have their place).

As far as I am concerned, such a component doesn't have to be exclusively a cruising event - a friendly non-competitive race, perhaps pairing the "non-racers" with experience people might be both fun and an occasion to learn a lot.

I'm thinking informal sailing clinic, informal introduction to racing, for those curious to try, and most of all, some fun.

All non-champion, side-show events should be open to boats that have non-class legal modifications for cruising.

[jeadstx]

I think it's a good idea to have non-racers come to the National races and participate in non-race events. I was thinking of coming down to watch the event in 2011 until I found out that it conflicts with the 2011 Texas 200 (although the date for the Tx200 is not firm yet, but will be very close to the same date), which is an event I plan to attend. I didn't make it the whole way last year and I want to this year.

Back on subject tho, I've been wanting to sail with other DS's to exchange ideas as mentioned. Having that chance at the National event I think would be a great thing to happen. Sailing activities for both racers and non-racers would also be good. I'd find it interesting to see how the racing boats are equiped and I think that those that have set thier boats up for just daysailing or camp cruising would like seeing the different rigging / equipment setups on those boats. Also I think that anyone (not DS owners, who might be looking for a sailboat) that may be be checking out the event would see more versatility in the DS class. It might help to present a marketing tool for the DS.

John

[UCanoe_2]

I too would participate in a regional event. I brought my DS1 to the annual small craft festival in St. Michaels, Md a couple times. It fit in nicely with wide variety of boats. They have a camp cruise to Wye Island on Thursday and return to the museum on Friday. Google the event and maybe we can get a group to rendezvous there next October.

The Mid-Atlantic Small Craft Festival is an awesome event! Here is a link to the CBMM's Facebook album:

http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/alb ... 7602706211

There were two Daysailers there this year, my O'Day and a Spindrift from NJ. Definitely mark your calendars for the first weekend in October next year.

[Bob Hunkins]

Bump

[Imgaryo1]

Bob,

Kudos for getting this subject out there. I can tell you are really working on the upcoming NACR and I'm sure this will be a great event.

Reading thru the thread, it seems clear that there are many sailors out there that don't realize that the Daysailer NACR is held at a different location every year and rotates between the east coast, central and west coast. Its also clear that there are cruising events that the racers are not aware of (ex: Mid-Atlantic Small Craft Festival which I had not heard of but would enjoy participating in).

Each year, sailing clubs are encouraged to submit their regatta schedules for publication in the quarterly. However, this leaves out the independents which my guess would include most of the cruisers. Perhaps the time is right to have cruisers submit a schedule of cruising events and we might start to see some crossover between the two groups. I can't think of a better way to help the class grow and maybe increase memebership in The Daysailer Association.

As a side subject, Annapolis, MD would be a good choice for the 2013 NACR since the event moves to the east coast after Huntington Lake and the fleet manager has done some preliminary work on schedules with SSA.

[GreenLake]

From my vantage point, the Daysailer NACR events seem to fulfill two purposes: holding the championship races and bringing together the "inner circle" in the DSA (whatever that means, I'm describing this from the "outside").

Bob's initiative therefore has the potential to offer something special, beyond the parts that Gary picked up in his reply. If Bob's able to pull off what he clearly seems to be thinking of, it would be more than yet another event where "non-racers" could meet, but instead a way to integrate them into the keystone DSA event of the year.

If you are interested in increasing the relevance of the DSA to those that don't (or can't) participate in competitive racing, that's gotta be on your mind. Now, you've seen the poll I started on the type of races that DS people participate in. It has garnered a few more votes than the poll at the top of this thread and I hope enough that they might begin to show interesting trends.

If you look at the votes (you need to log in and vote first to see them) you'll see that the number of people answered that they participate in more or less competitive races, is about the same as those that participate mainly in ad-hoc or fun-focused races, or that race irregularly. (The poll is about racing, so I'm sure it undereports the third category, that is those that don't race in any form).

The first conclusion I would draw from that is that dividing the world into "racers" and "cruisers" is missing something crucial. Instead, there are competitive racers, occasional racers or those racing more for fun than trophies, and finally those that don't race. (I'm sure people from all three groups go cruising as well, just with different intensity and focus).

The second conclusion I would draw from those answers is that among the DS owners there should be a large group that could be interested in attending an informal "race" with relaxed rules. Say, collision rules only, not the full racing rules. An event of that type could be a way to share experience, for example, by pairing people of different skill levels, and also possibly as a way to bring more people in.

Obviously, as has been pointed out, it would be cool if those organizing the regional events were to take a cue from Bob's initiative and made their events equally inclusive, because that would increase the geographic impact of his initiative.

Finally, it would be fun to pick up on Gary's suggestion and share all the info on whatever other events DS can join, because it's always nice not to be the only one.