Opti-Crack

Our friend Peter Huston has a nice little blog and he agreed to share this editorial with us. Nice!

So there was a big regatta for Opti's in Abino Bay this weekend. 120+ kids out sailing. Wonderful. Really?

There are some good points to Opti's - they are perhaps a decent boat for kids to learn the basics of tacking and jibing. But any kid that stays in this boat for more than two years is not learning what they should about sailing. Old Opti's also make good wood for beach bonfires.

Sure, a handful of kids come out of the Opti class and go on to Olympic glory. Like maybe two kids every 4 years. But alot more kids quit the sport at age 11, largely because they have Opti's shoved down their throat, usually by parents who simply don't know anything about sailing. Nothing probably much wrong with a kid sailing an Opti occasionally in a regatta, but as a steady diet, it's like feeding them McDonald's burgers and fries only.

Fundamentally, people are social creatures - of course, some will argue that regattas provide a social setting…blah blah blah. You want to know how to make an 11 year old girl hate sailing? Stick her in an Opti for more than a couple of hours. If you want more kids sailing, focus on the girls - the boys will follow. Young girls are hugely social - they want to be with their friends. If there is to be any chance of keeping more young girls in sailing, they need to be in double, or triplehanded boats.

What is it about putting a 10 year old (male or female) in a small, wet, uncomfortable, slow, ugly boat, isolated for hours on end from their friends, that is going to inspire the majority of those kids to want to stay in the sport? What is it about sailing a boat with an ancient rig design, that goes sideways as fast as it goes forward, that does not have a jib or spinnaker, that is singlehanded, which prepares kids to sail on bigger boats?

The evidence from the US Sailing National Junior Sailing Symposium about the attrition rate of 11 year olds OUT of the sport is overwhelming. What are the contributing factors to this attrition? One of them has to be overwhelming reliance on Opti's as THE training boat (see also Sabots on the West coast). Another factor is the far too structured CYA and US Sailing Training programs. I recently sailed with one of the CYA Training guru's - who pre-race bragged and boasted about various sailing adventures. During the race, that same guru had to be told over and over how and when to use the main traveller. That certain guru sure knew all the stuff one needs to know for a book test, but when it comes to actually sailing, well, he's got a ways to go to pass that test.

There is also overwhelming evidence of the lack of weekend club racing - especially high end club racing. See also diminished regatta participation in virtually every family class. One of the contributing factors for this decline is that more parents are driving kids to Opti regattas, and then doing nothing but standing on shore, or worse being helicopter parents on the water. A better alternative for everyone is to go sailing as a family in something like a Lightning or J22.

The future health of yacht clubs is directly tied to junior programs. And a junior program that relies on a really stupid boat as it's primary learn to sail boat is not helping the sport grow. Comments?

07/06/06