When I wrote “low” I was thinking “advantaged" seeing my 32 was 114 and a Bristol 41.1 being 114 also and how unusual for a j/boat to be under rated. Water line alone tells you its quicker than a 32.
That being said I think what happens with J/boats is the buyers of them tend to be more advanced than your more “shits and giggle” sailors and is taken into account when being rated hence, my surprise when I saw the 120 rating. Now a rating in the 60s or 70s you’d have to be racing against some pretty crappy sailors to ever see gold and I feel your pain my brothers. Something in the 90s would be fairer I think for even the more advanced sailor.
Now the yarn:
Awhile back I was skipper on a Graves Constellation owned by a MIT physics professor our crew was filled with people who sailed all their lives all physics grads one had something to do with the math for gps and another developed the math for cl (wing math) oh and a Nobel prize winner. Needless to say we never had a loss. People were up in arms how unfair our rating was, our simple retort was “our crew has 150+ years experience”. Word got around others bought constellations well groomed sailors, one an olympic coach another America’s cup sailor, one guy has several world titles in various classes, we upped the game. They (constellations) now have their own class, own start and its very competitive.
That boat I was skipper on doesn’t win so much any more but a strong second. Now I’d like to think thats because I’m no longer racing but truth be told, the one boat that the olympic guy owns is loaded with ringers like Kenny Reed (at times) and North sails development team. That and maybe how old the crew is the average age being closer to 80 than 70 now.
Wednesday afternoon racing I doth think is taken to seriously its just for fun maybe up your abilities nothing more.
Me, I simply did it in my search for that philosopher stone of sailing, I’ll write when I find it…
bob
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