Wished to be able to attend in both events but one has to be realistic: I think that my Moth sailing is not up to speed to attend a World Championship. On top of my "mostly non foiling jibes", I haven´t been out on the water for 4 month. Instead I had sailed with the DN in various regattas since the middle of January. Some 16 days in total so far of great fun, speed and comradeship. And also looking for another weekend of sailing on hard water due to the weather turning cold again. The "old" ice has not melted away yet. To get to the States for just one regatta is very time consuming and costly. I had done it once in the past but was not happy with the days of sailing versus travelling time/moonies. (DN Worlds at Lake Geneva with an interesting visit at the Melges boatyard when they were developing the Melges 24) I am following both events of course. For the Moth following it is very easy. One click (see my Moth linklist on the right) on the top link will present you all the latest blog entries. Smart feature Doug! With the DN North American Championship it is a bit more difficult. I can recommend the following sites:
Geoff Sobering
Kent Baker
Iceboating.net
Ken Smith
In between blog entries I am putting something together in my head which is about the similarities between the Moth sailors and the DN sailors. Good technical knowledge which is been shared quite openly. Maybe one day I will write an article about it. One thing for sure is that the Moth sailors are following the DN route these days. Many Moth sailors are not building their own boats anymore, instead they are buying themselves into the class. As I did with the Bladerider. And lately with my DN equipment from Sweden and Estonia. Whilst many years ago I was building my own hulls and planks and also tried to build one mast. But I realized that a big part of the speed comes from the preparation of the runners and it takes a lot of time to prepare them well. It was time consuming for me to learn about metal and how to work with it but I liked it. To work with wood, epoxy, carbonfibre all came much more easy. The fast Moth sailors are tinkering a lot with small upgrades, developing devices to fly higher or more stable. Prepping the foils with special coatings etc.
Going through the pictures (click on them and they extend) from the DN Worlds, I found the one on top very interesting also for sailors from both camps: Look at the bend of the 2 different masts. Both composite. One build in Sweden, the other in Poland. Very, very similar in their bend characteristic, though we do not see the fore and aft bending, which is also an important factor for speed. Some Moth sailors are actually discussing this bend characteristic but I think that with the Veal heel, the Moth has also made a quantum leap forward in speed and height. As did the DN with the unusual mast bend, possible only with the composite masts. Looking out the window today and checking temperature, the last picture might sum it up: Good bye for this season. I am the 2nd on the left.
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