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Akarana 350


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Same here.

 

In days of declining fleets those boats that do arrive to need to have some loving, it's not hard.

Same with supporters and sponsors, they don't grow on trees so love the ones you have or risk losing them.

 

I'm not knocking the race, just think there are a few things to tweak for next years race. 

 

Is this symptomatic of a number of high profile races globally? e.g. S2H, MiddleSeaRace, and even sometimes (not always) the Coastal. All these events pride themselves on "how many entrants" they have, but often it's the 3-4 big megabuck campaigns at the front that get 99.9% of the coverage, and the 150 "also rans" might get a 1 line addendum,

 

--"It's tough going for the smaller boats still on the course" --- 

 

at the end of the 6 page rambling spread that digressed so far as to discuss in depth the line winner's owner's girlfriend's dog's swimming lessons, showed 15 pics of the big boats port/starboarding each other, one pic of some skipper's dyed n gel'd hair, and a night time shot of a triumphant overall line winner wasting a bottle of champagne.

 

Without googling - who can tell me who actually won the S2H last year? And I don't mean won on line (or in the protest room).

 

The Coastal at least used to have the cockle shell hero trophy for the poor bastard who battled it out in the smallest boat and actually crossed the finish line. Not sure they still do it, but basically, with the time cutoff now you have to sail a pretty good average VMG to get in before cutoff (unless I'm grossly mistaken) which means many many cruising boats sitting in the marinas are simply not gonna bother.

 

A350 looked like fun, though...

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Guest Saturday Night Special

Having been a Sponsors Rep for one of the Biggest Equipment companies in the Yachting world most Race organizers including the CC need to Jack up their ideas with after match publications on all fronts as what happens is all the lack of information is viewed as got your money 1st guys done end of story we don't care attitude .Sponsors money disappears, this is hard enough to reason out now as most companies have a budget and best promo gets dollar and in a declining sport its not just about the big boy who wins but about value for millage so you need full results a review of the event and a couple of human interest stories for all to be able to view.

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$$$ value for sponsors is the key and your statements echo the ethos of these events that occurred years ago .sh*t I can do that were the words used buy guys who had what a now outdated but did these races and they got miles of air time by PJ Montgomery theres always been the gun boat chasing a record or line honours and there always will be .But what happened to Thirsty Work,How did Truxton get caught where were the gains made By Gale force How did KIck go where was Start me up after the other boats finished ?

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As the wife and sometimes crew (well mostly, this race excepted!) of Start Me Up it is really heartening to see the thoughts of some of the crew.org posters here, thanks!  I feel like the little boats are now being acknowledged, great to see thank you.

 

The race is fantastic, and hats off to RAYC for organising it, well done.  And the ensured safely during the race was great.  I had not one worry while they were out, and one of my friends who did contacted RAYC and got a very prompt reassurance.  Well done, couldn't have done it better.  I have been thinking alot about cell coverage and how to boost it, and will start a different thread as it is quite interesting.  Something we will look into for the next race.  PW tracker is good, cost effective, just needs more cell reception to be more reliable which isn't PW's fault, just the fault of those of us who want to get away or race away from the masses!

 

To follow up on Cazzate's great write up of Thirsty Work, the skipper Sean actually had some sort of infection going on, which is why his feet worryingly swelled up.  He is fine now though I am pleased to say!  He will likely next be seen up at Bay Week.

 

Some interesting points and observations about sponsorship have been made too.  And I would like to say that here, we see lots of sponsorship going out, but not always being reciprocated.  If a company sponsors the race, in turn it would be great to support them too.  There was a case last year of someone marching into a chandlery demanding (not asking!) in a very rude way for sponsorship and got told no.  a) because it was rude, ask don't demand B) because the chap freely admitted that none of that group of racers would  really acknowledge them and wouldn't shop there anyway.  So why should they give sponsorship to them?  No.  At the end of the day it's a business, not a charity, and there's got to be a little bit of reciprocal support somewhere along the line, even a very big thanks and just buy a couple of screws or something for goodness sakes!  The company happily continue sponsorship, just not that time.

 

The prize table at the A350 consisted of 3 bottle of rum and some printed photos of some boats.  I will support that by having a quiet rum.... 

 

This was the inaugural race, hopefully they might get sponsors or trophies or a printed photo for each boat as a well done for finishing the race.  It's not about prizes, lets recognise what these guys can do.  And yes, I agree, where's the write up?  There's something great and interesting to write about each of them.  There wasn't that many yachts; it's not that kind of race. 

 

Start Me Up for instance; broke a kite shackle 5 minutes after start, kite went for a swim, crew up the mast to retrieve and still sailed well to finish two and a half hours behind a faster yacht that won the Shorthanded Division.  And did you know that the shorthanded division allowed for three crew?  Only three boats took that up.  Two of them finished in the top three, first and third - the other retired.  So Start Me Up actually finished 2nd on handicap 2 handed out of seven two handed boats, and did it with by far the smallest budget and smallest sail wardrobe.  What an achievement (although I accept I am a little biased!).

 

In contrast re sponsorship and prizes, our recent Sail Rock Race had a trophy for each winner of keelers and trailer yachts, and $400 worth of prizes from the named sponsor.  For a $10 entry fee too, and 12 boats I might add.  There were pictures of the prizewinners and sponsors on our FB page and will be a write up in the weekly newsletter also.  And now there's mutterings about no sponsorship for next year - these guys don't know how good they have got it here.  Both main Chandleries and there's a canvas place and a sail loft also who do lots of sponsorship, it is fantastic.  Our people need to go see the prize table at A350 to realise how good they have got it!  

 

And by the way:  if you are starting to wonder if you might be able to do this sort of race, just remember that SMU did this race with average sails and a minimum budget.  And they had a ball!  

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Most of what you guys are missing is on Facebook. The Audio update from Motorboat is great reminds me of the Whitbread Days. 

https://soundcloud.com/live-sail-die/akarana-350-audio-update-from-motorboat-2?fbclid=IwAR1kRODznUiMpvUVwTt1XjjQqTG6aDPbADkpSJCczEAu1tv1tPlAwIG_8co

 

There is also Video from the boats and lots of photos.

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Also, @SNS, Truxton and Motorboat got caught initially between Barrier and the Mokes, the wind shut down for about 4 hours, sloppy seas and no wind wasn't much fun. The rest of the fleet slowly brought the wind down, we could see them for the first time at the Mokes and they finally caught up by the Poor Knights after sailing in a lift all the way down. Was pretty cool with four boats in spitting distance rounding the Poor Knights finally in some breeze again.

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Guest Saturday Night Special

Most of what you guys are missing is on Facebook. The Audio update from Motorboat is great reminds me of the Whitbread Days. 

https://soundcloud.com/live-sail-die/akarana-350-audio-update-from-motorboat-2?fbclid=IwAR1kRODznUiMpvUVwTt1XjjQqTG6aDPbADkpSJCczEAu1tv1tPlAwIG_8co

 

There is also Video from the boats and lots of photos.

As i pointed out having been a Major player in Marine businesses sponsors rep I would not have been happy with the aftermatch wrap .Great Race well run publicity afterwards average ,Who gives a flying f*ck about individual stuff on facebook  its the public stuff that the sponsor looks at and the older non computer literate people with the money and I can name a lot who have and still dip into their pockets to pay out for sponsorship behind the scenes ,go tell them to look on face book and see what answer you get

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It's not individual stuff, it's all on the RAYC page and publicly available. Don't really care either way but there is a lot of good stuff on the platform. If you are not on it you are missing out, don't shoot the messenger.

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Wow....why all the negativity?   A few observations from the deep south.

 

  • kudos too RAYC putting a new longer distance coastal/offshore race into the calendar
  • the RAYC race tracker like all 'free trackers' is only as good as the network coverage....it is great to view but can't be relied on for position reports as soon as the phone is used for something else such as a social media post Instagram, soundcloud, facebook, myspace....oops I moved the kettle  blah blah.... it will drop out resulting in some very odd routing.
  • I think a great way to keep the followers informed are the  'after race' reports by crews...often that is where the gold emerges in my view. Retrospection is a wonderful thing
  • Sponsors - agreed that exposure publicity has to be timely, multi channel and not just of the leaders but of all the participants. Unfortunately, it would appear more difficult for the smaller boats in this instance to remain in full contact. If they are having difficulty, maintaining VHF scheds and contact then that is an issue.
  • how about issuing Garmin in reach mini's to every boat or similar for next time and setting the ping interval at a reasonable interval say 15 mins and getting a savy guru to display in real time...low network drop out and a real tracker that could be followed by the masses
  • Commenting on the after match wrap up is none of our concern as consumers unless we know the terms of any agreement between the parties...i.e. a waste of time what was agreed to be provided and what was provided - no doubt these things will be debriefed, hopefully with learnings for all. Although none of my business.
  • it was great to see from my perspective such boats as SMU, thirstywork and T-rex out to show that smaller boats can complete a fairly arduous course in some interesting weather
  • Overall I enjoyed following via both the RAYC site and social media...however, getting timely, accurate stories into print or other mainstream media is frankly a nightmare in this day and age due to content management by editors and general lack of available column space outside the 'main' sports
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Seems all the moaners are usually not the competitors, instead of going on about how sh*t stuff is look at the good stuff. Perhaps being a bit more positive toward your chosen sport would help. Some people seem to go out of their way to put a negative spin on what was a great event.

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Coverage would likely improve if we paid for it. Clubs need volunteers to run publicity, hopefully not those who are charged with fleet safety. Of course publicity could have been better but there is always a cost! Trackers cost! Web sites cost! Updates cost! This was a great event and using facebook, the Akarana web site and crew.org I found the coverage to be really good. Kept me up. Especially the run down from the Poor Knights. Roll on 2019 I plan to be there again.

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Great event. Everyone I know thought the coverage was excellent. My parents followed it from Aussie and even my grandparents from Nelson.

We had a great time and learnt a lot about the Motorboat II.

The racing among the 35fter was close.

Good to see the Truxton boys going so fast and sailing sharp. Well done.

Also good to see some smaller boats out there.

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Apart from reading on crew.org about the Akarana 350,who in the public domain knew this event took place??I do not buy news papers,only watch tv1 or 3 news/sport cannot remember seeing anything,if I go back to the coastal who was the sponsor??the old days of lindauer etc it made on tv. No big names no interest??

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I have some constructive criticism to add . We were asked to hold up our PFDs and tethers 15mins before the warning so the officials in the RIB could see we had them on board which is all good and reasonable .

 

Problem is the official wanted the oldest looking one opened up and the service cert read out . We had the main up breeze was quite fresh and the were boats everywhere .

 

Skip yelled out it was recently serviced and date and name of services was written in permanent marker and he didn’t want to unpack it . Official didn’t look impressed but those things are bastards to pack on land let alone playing dodgems at the pre-start .

 

So Could be a good idea in future for PFDs to be taken to briefing for checks by organisers but it’s still a grey area if you’ve serviced it yourself and don’t have a cert

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