We’re a mere two months of 106-degree temps from the beginning of Lake Pleasant (LP) racing and one month from the scorching start of Tempe Town Lake (TTL) “fall” racing. Here’s a taste of what’s upcoming:
- AYC will have a meet-and-greet party for entrants and crew before the LP season begins. We’re thinking it would be a Friday after-work type gathering with beer and munchies to link entrants and crew—and just to have fun. More to follow.
- Rob Gibbs is resurrecting the Challenger Fleet for LP Fall, only he’s calling it the “Green” fleet. The Challenger Fleet was the creation of Patty Rosky and it helped introduce several sailors to the fun of sailboat racing. Now Rob has turned it Green and is turning down the pressure even more: now the starts are for fun, there’s no such thing as a protest, and they won’t even keep score. More information here.
- We will go ahead with a fall ASF Introduction to Sailboat Racing class. If you’d like to learn more about the game, from procedures to rules to tactics and if you’d like to get several hours of time on the water with oodles of starts, this is a good way to do it. More information here.
- Finally, here’s a short report on the results of a survey of race entrants and crew that I did in June. We found that roughly 25% of recent entrants and crew won’t be sailing this fall, which means we need to replace that many to maintain the entry level. We found that nearly everyone likes the racing. And we found that entrants and crew tend to connect this way: 1) because they know each other; 2) because someone refers them; 3) (and a distant last choice) because of the crew list. The survey also produced some good suggestions on how to improve the way crew and entrants connect.
If you’d like to see a more detailed copy of the results of the survey, e-mail me at mike@ferrings.com.
Meantime, of course, there’s the Heat Stroke Series for all of you not afraid of a little, mmmm, heat stroke.