Can BIFFA Help?.....

Following the spate of really light winds in the last couple of months, a handful of our new fleet members have asked about training on "Flying Fifteen Boat Setup" for light breezes. This afternoon, the VC will run a briefing for, I think, four new teams. Of course, this need must come up in all FF Clubs, but why have everyone recreate their own materials each time?? We immediately started wondering how BIFFA could help with materials, so that Clubs could run their own training like this more often, more easily and at higher quality.

The first idea we came up with was the FF Masterclass video with Steve Goacher and Phil Evans. It must be way past selling many more copies. It is still excellent material, but we thought it would be best (these days) if BIFFA could agree with the Copyright holder that it is split into "mini chapters" and put up on You Tube for everyone to use easily. We are doing our training today on a conference call link, so just having the video on hand is not what we need.

What other ideas do you have where BIFFA could help?? There will be loads .... Ideas please to datchetman@flyingfifteen.com.....

Coming Up!! ... 10,000 views on "datchetman".......

Since we lost the google based facility on the Club website, we have been using the new "datchetman" website platforms since November 8th. In a couple of days, we shall pass our 10,000th viewing. Any ideas on how we should mark that milestone?? I have one....

The Flush of Youth..... Sub 45 !!!

We had an anonymous comment left on the blog from someone asking if we could incent the next generation of Flying Fifteen racers to try the Loan Boat Program. Whoever you were, would you like to get in touch with me on datchetman@flyingfifteen.com ......?? We'd like to chat about what you had in mind....

Racing Sunday - Breeze Forecast.......

Nice breeze forecast for Sunday - 10-12mph Northerly, so maybe carrying a bit of windchill - still expect 6 or 7 degrees - nice....!! See you there.....

Flying Fifteen Mid-Winter Championships ....

Just a reminder that the Flying Fifteen Midwinter Championships are held at Burton SC this year, January 29th and 30th. How many are going?.....

As you will know, we offer a package to Winter Warm Up Competitors where they can race the WWU, keep their boat at Datchet, go to the Dinghy Show, and then race the Datchet Spring Open for one inclusive fee. For 2011, there was a clash for our Club on the normal weekend of our FF Spring Open Meeting - financially, an unmissable opportunity for the Club to run the 420 Open Championships - so our Flying Fifteen Open Meeting was delayed by a week or maybe two. Now I see that Bewl SC have leapt into this gap, and placed their Spring FF Open Meeting into the slot that was once the Datchet slot. Our value proposition for visitors to race the WWU and the Datchet Open looks rather open to question and Bewl get where they want to be - the 'kick-off open' for the National FF Fleet. Pity.... I assume the slot is now lost forever, but it just goes to show how much you have to keep on top of it......

New Flying Fifteen ... The Stensons' New Boat...

Richard and David Stenson have been sailing a Flying Fifteen from the Trial Sail program for the last few months - and very promising they looked too. Now we need to really look out - they have bought a 'new' boat - 3632. It's an Ovington Mk IX Smoothie, built I think in around 1998. The boat is in simply superb condition - it has been fitted out by P&B and looks great, inside and out. The hull especially looks tip-top. It has a red waterline and quite a lot of red cordage - very easy on the eye!!! The sails look in great condition too - Goachers, I think.

They have grey painted non-slip panels on the deck. It's very practical and to my mind it looks very smart. When I had 3644 built by Ovington in 1998, if you phoned Ovington you spoke to the great man himself, Dave Ovington. I called Dave and explained I wanted grey non-slip panels on the boat. "No", he said. "Have you thought through the weight implications? That much paint weighs 2 kilos..." I naturally said, "Come on Dave, it's inside the minimum weight, so who cares?"

The line fell silent for a moment and Dave said, "No, Richard. Not the absolute weight - think about the fact that it is distributed across the length of the whole boat and not a the centre of gravity...". In the end, 3644 had white decks.... And so does 3934.....

Searching for Mylar.....

The Admiral is away in Namibia on Safari - getting tanned and generally healthy looking - to make us all grumpy with envy at the Alexandra Palace Show. Just before he left, he called me to complain that he couldn't find non-Dom's article on the datchetman website about Mylar versus Dacron - it had disappeared. Basically, I had lost it !!! Mike had that way, just like he does on the first beat, of making me think quite possibly he was right.... Maybe it had disappeared.

Then we discovered the virtue that blindingly smart mathematicians like me (ha ha ha ha !!) often display - being one step ahead... Have you ever tried the "search" bar that I have put on the top right hand corner of the new 'datchetman'? (The site with the white background...) You use it just like a Google Search bar, but it only searches our fleet website. If you key "mylar" in there and click 'search', you'll see what I mean. Note that if it finds more than about half a dozen documents, there will be more pages. It lists the most recent first, and you click "older posts" to see the ones that came out even earlier....

DM

The Ovington Mk IX - Too Right....

Just seen the item on the ovington blog, but it's a very important point made methinks.
Just thought you'd be interested to know that whilst launching on Sunday, I was followed down the ramp by a couple of guys with their second hand fireball.
They commented on how nice the ff's look and asked how much they cost. When I told them a second hand ovi 9 was 6-8 thousand and I bought mine for 2, they were genuinely surprised and could not believe how much boat you can get for your money. Of course, I went on to say how competitive they remain and the low depreciation.
I therefore whole heartedly agree that the way to build big fleets is to highlight the costs of second hand boats (ovi 9's) and their ability to remain competitive.
I'm not there this Sunday, so see you in a couple of weeks.
Andy, 3378

Homage to the Ovington Mk IX....

The VC and I took lunch with the Rear Commodore, Mike Clapp, on Sunday. We had great conversation on Life, the Universe and Everything... to do with sailing. It turns out that the RC is becoming concerned with his sailing of the RS500, as he not infrequently comes ashore after one race, there being nobody to sail against. Handicap racing is not really racing, is it? You have to sympathise... It seems that our recent turnout of ten boats for a Club race has turned a few heads...He also voiced significant concerns about the market into which he can onsell his boat when the time comes - and what the true cost of ownership of sailing some classes really is.

What's this to do with us, I hear you say? Well, you know how the VC can be - the conversation took a sharp swing towards, "Come and join the Flying Fifteens then". The RC went straight to the list price of a new boat (I don't know why people do this, but they do...), which is insane as we all know. So we inevitably came to the subject of, "why don't you consider a Mk IX Ovi?" Mike's a great chap, does ever such a lot for the Club (and, behind the scenes, our Fleet). He is the man behind the Club Website's rebirth. He'd be a great man in our fleet and would turn out to race - if we could ever charm him across to the slip.

So I have tried to trap the essence of the Mk IX discussion in a new datchetman page - you will see the draft of it under "About Owning" on the black border of the photo above. Can you, especially you Mk IX owners, take a look and let me know if I have captured the gist of our argument. Then we can polish it up and try to promote our viewpoint by the time the Datchet Alexandra Palace team take the stand......

Race Report - Sunday 16th January....

A smashing breeze today and seven boats racing. We had Mark/Tony, the Humes, The Russians, the FC, The Millars, Andy/Andy, and Midnight Rog....no Admiral (Safari), no Linder/Sweetman, no Howard/Richard (University returns), no Vice Cap'n (Florida beach), no Mervyn (knee swollen) - but a great crowd got out for racing....

In race 1 the fleet had a great getaway with Mark/Tony immediately opening up a big gap (as they do), then The Humes a small bit ahead of The Russians, Andy Murphy in his shiny new boat, the FC, The Millars and Roger bringing up the stern. Then lots of overtaking and place changing in the sparkling breeze. The leading three teams were pretty evenly matched by lap two, the order being Mark/Tony, The Humes and then the Russians. The order of the next three being reversed though after a poor drop by Andy&Andy - so we had the Millars, the FC, and Andy&Andy. Roger fighting a lack of spinnaker kept slugging away. By the end of the race though we had more place changing - our heroes out front, but The Russians sailing their Valenkis off (go on, google it... you'll want to know...), very closely pipped the Humes. Then in the next group it was FC, Millars, Andy&Andy, Roger. So plenty of action there.

Race 2 saw datchetman arrive for coffee.... and from the lounge.... it was obviously exciting sailing out there. At the end of the sausage, although our heroes Mark/Tony were away and gone, it was incredibly close between The Russians, The Humes and the FC all rounding the lee mark on lap two within 20 seconds. Some great three-sail reaching followed, and Mark/Tony took the gun by miles. There had obviously been a right set-to behind, and at the gun it was The Russians, the FC and The Humes.

Looked a pretty good day....

VC&DM

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