The Anarchists Cyberchat with Philippe Kahn

The Anarchists were recently given the opportunity to have a virtual sit-down with the MAN behind Team Pegasus, Philippe Kahn.

 It seems customary to give Sailor of the Year Awards to the pros and Olympic medallists, but it wouldn’t be too far fetched to give one to Philippe.  Here’s a guy who is new to the sport and has become world class in a very short time.  From distance racing in Maxi Sleds to successfully racing in the tough Farr 40, Mumm 30, and Melges 24 fleets, Philippe is doing it all.

Philippe, for the readers who don’t know about you, give us your background.  What do you do to afford all those toys?

I’m a high tech technologist and was fortunate to found three successful companies: Borland (NASDAQ BORL), Starfish Software (Successfully acquired by Motorola in 1998) and a couple of years ago, our new baby: LightSurf Technologies.  So the business successes have allowed me to afford sailing One Design as well as Supersleds.

I feel very lucky.  Sonia (my wife and companion) and I also are serious about returning to the community.  We sponsor young Olympic hopefuls.  In 2000 we sponsored Morgan Larson, and John Myrhdal.  We sponsor junior programs at the Santa Cruz and Waikiki Yacht Clubs as well as work with the Outrigger in Honolulu.  Our foundation can be found at www.lee-kahn.org and Team Pegasus can be found at www.pegasus.com   

How the hell did you get so deep into this sport?  What did you do for recreation before you decided to do this?

Before I decided to do this, I snowboarded and windsurfed, but mostly I worked hard at building these businesses for a couple of decades.  

From what you've seen so far, what are the best things about sailboat racing, and what are the worst?  What would you change about the sport?

The best part of buoy racing to me is One Design.  The worst part is the fact that there are too many games played with the “amateur/pro-sailor status”.

 The best part of offshore sailing is getting out there in the wilderness for days and nights with a great team.  The worst part is all the games played around the IMS rule as tied to major events such as Transpac.  However, all in all its great!  

Do you like the existing rules, especially those relating to professionals and advertising?

I think that it is difficult to have consistent rules on the International circuit.  When we competed in the Mumm 30 Worlds we could have only 2 professionals, but when we looked at some European boats, they were full professional teams.  We still did well.

However, I think that there is a challenge.  Bringing sponsorship to the sport is really important to accelerate the growth of the sport.  Team Pegasus is “self-sponsored” (read: “I write the checks”) however, we really want to see more sponsored teams and it would be really nice to see more liberal use of advertising.  

You’re relatively new to this sport, yet you have had great success come your way extremely fast.  How has this happened?

It’s quite simple: We train hard.  Last year I sailed 209 days.  When we go out sailing we really practice.  I take this seriously and in general I am more interested in the learning experience than in the result.  But as time goes by our results are getting better, even when we compete in a regatta with an incomplete team.  There is nothing that can’t be done with perseverance, hard work and good teamwork.  I’m having a lot of fun learning.  

It’s evident that you have put together stellar programs from top to bottom.  Who are the people that help make Team Pegasus go?

Initially Morgan Larson has been and still is the great architect of our success.  Morgan did two things really well: He was patient to work through the steep part of my learning curve and he helped recruit great team members.

Now with the new Pegasus 75 we have Zan Drejes managing the program and he is just the best at Turbo Sleds.  Brent Ruhne who’s really done an excellent job manages our Farr 40 program.  To coordinate everything Sydnie Moore, who is also an excellent sailor gets all the pieces working together.

 Now that Morgan is busy working on his America’s Cup program, the legendary Mark Reynolds is running the strategy for all of our One Design sailing.  That’s a great team!

The addition of Mark Reynolds as tactician seems to have put you over the top.  What has Mark brought to the program?

Mark is not only an exceptional sailor, but as good as he is, he lets the good sailors on the boat do their jobs without micro-managing them.  The boat is quiet, calm and composed. That makes a tremendous difference. 

You’re in the process of accumulating one of the world’s great Armadas!  Care to donate one of them, say the Andrews Turbo-Sled, to the Sailing Anarchy Foundation for the Corrupt and Weak Minded?  Seriously, can you give us a complete list of your fleet?  What the boats are, and where they live?

Well there is the new Pegasus 75, and that’s to be sailing mid-April, getting ready for Transpac 2001.  We have a few Farr 40s, but really race one seriously.  We like to two boat practice in Santa Cruz and Honolulu where we have homes.  So we have a couple of Mumms in Santa Cruz and a couple of Melges 24s both in Santa Cruz and Honolulu.

We are also building a new Pegasus 55, Andrews Design, at Goertz and we should have her sailing in August in San Francisco.  We do have a couple of tenders that follow the boats.  Bill Lee told me the other day: “You have more sailboats than anyone I have ever known, but the strange thing about it is that you use them all”.  And we sure do.  

We assume the new R/P sled is a development of Disney’s Pyewacket.  Can you fill us in on any differences?

Pegasus 75 is a new and different boat: It’s a bit longer, but it is skinnier. It’s a masthead rig with essentially non-overlapping jibs. No runners, just check-stays.  Quite innovative and different.  We think that she should be fast to Honolulu in her Transpac Configuration and later really fast in her Turbo configuration.  

Your existing Turbo Sled was designed by Alan Andrews, and the new sled is being done by Reichel/Pugh.  Can you walk us through your decision process when choosing a designer for a new project?

It was a tough decision to pick one over another.  I believe that both teams would have done a great job.  In fact we gave Alan the design of the Pegasus 55.

 With Pegasus 75 we were looking at matching Pyewacket.  We felt that because R/P designed Pyewacket, we were going to have a competitive boat.  With Alan we would have a really different boat.  Either much better or not quite as good.  We therefore decided that the upside of a much better boat was not what we were looking for.  We were looking to be competitive.  We’ll let the quality of the sailing decide who gets to Honolulu first.  

What do we have to do to get an invitation to get out on the new sled?

We’d be happy to take you out sailing in May/June when we are tuning up Pegasus 75.  I think that you’ll like it.  I saw the boat in Sydney where she is being built at McCognahy and she looks great.  We’ve put into her all that we’ve learned from Pegasus 70.

What’s next for the sailing world of Philippe Kahn?  Something bigger, something smaller?  Should the 1D35 fleet start to worry?  Do you have any plans or interest in helping to shape the direction of the sport through any type of committee position

The Melges 24 is new to us.  We are training this year working up to the world championships in November in Fort Lauderdale.  Its really a tremendous learning experience.  Between the Melges 24, the Mumm 30 and the Farr 40 and the SuperSled.  We’re pretty busy.  But you never know…. Morgan wants to get me out on the 49er and Mark Reynolds thinks that I should get a Star.  But that is really a different story…….