Black and blue

People often ask what the different flag colors mean, especially on days like this. Here's everything you need to know about Hoofer flag colors.

Green means light wind, like today. Mainly for greenhorns and visiting parents, but it is possible to spice things up with creative use of equipment in ways it wasn't designed to be used.

Green/yellow: The wind is light but with storms in the area, so there's at least a chance of fun should one pop up.

Blue: The flag experienced sailors want to see every day. Unfortunately, we only see it about once a week at this latitude, even less in August. Heavy rating required (wind averaging >17 mph or unusually gusty).

Blue/Yellow: Blue with storms in the area, and it's probably warm and humid out too. Arrgh.

Blue/Red: For experienced windsurfers--wind is averaging >25 mph. Keelboaters should also look forward to blue/red, but for some reason, most don't. Maybe we're awarding skipper ratings too easily..?

Red: No sailing. unless you're clever (mainly applies to kboats). Always keep an eye on the radar, and if it's green/yellow or blue/yellow, position yourself on the far side of the lake and stay there. Then if a storm comes, you'll have to sail back! In so doing, you'll gain valuable experience (if you survive). This trick has been used in the past, although we're not sure it was actually done intentionally.

Purple: In days past, the practice flag meant beginners with no ratings could safely go for a float.

Finally: there is a secret color that means anything goes.

An example of "blue/yellow" conditions would be today's forecast for Honolulu: partly cloudy, 89 deg, wind NE 15 gusting to 23.

We had a day like that here once. I think.... back in 1999....

The long kiss goodbye

Now that C-Cup is over--and wild fun it was, except for the alkohol problem (as in lack thereof)--we can focus again on sailing.

For those who haven't heard the latest on the club's largest boat, Soma--a.k.a. the Cow Boat--there is discouraging news.

Having sat at the farm for the past year, and now in need of significant repair, Soma may be destined for recycling. (of course, big fibreglass boats aren't actually recyclable, but that's a topic for another post.) Soma was in decent shape at the end of the 2015 season, but instead of getting standard off-season maintenance, some overeager yahoos started major projects without consulting anyone first, and now the boat needs major repairs. Unfortunately, it looks like Soma might not get them because it's easier to accept new donations, even if they're of junkier boats.

This is bad news for everyone in the club, even if you've never set foot on Soma. Soma is a unique boat unlike anything else the club has. At first glance, it might seem better to have two T-10's than a Mull 34 and one T-10, but that's fallacious for two reasons: (1) Variety makes for more learning opportunities. What if all we had were Techs and J-22's..? (there are people who actually support that idea.) (2) T-10s are mediocre boats. Compared to Soma, a T-10 is like an old Ford vs. a custom Rolls.

25 years of Hoofer abuse has taken a toll, but Soma is well built, so what it comes down to is: are enough people willing to put time in to get Soma seaworthy again? Losing workspace at the farm doesn't help, but that's a reflection on the lack of HSC leadership. Unfortunately, certain club "leaders" (hi Mark G!) are eyeing Soma's trailer like vultures circling a dying horse. They also have another, more insidious motivation: by getting rid of Soma, they can (they hope) get rid of a few individuals who have Soma ratings by making sure that, once Soma is gone, those individuals never get skipper ratings on any other keelboats.

Welcome to Hoofers, where your money goes a...way.

Party of the fifth part

Commodore's Cup 2017 is under way! Alas, there don't seem to be many Yu Chen t-shirts around. However, we did have a new event in honor of things this year: The Pissing Contest! (photo at right)

To the amazement of some of us, many club members still don't seem to have a clue that a Hoofer instructor was run over and killed by the UW rescue boat a little over a month ago. But then, can paid "staff" really be expected to risk their jobs and income by publicizing something like that and potentially turning away paying *customers..?

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

A bigger question might be: Why should a cooperative of "students and community members working together" (that's from the club's own website) have staff to begin with? It's because some people don't want to participate unless they get paid for it.

Above is a shot of the sardine race. At least no one drowned today, although I saw at least one person get run over. Party on!

*a.k.a. general club members.

Idea for C-Cup

There's no additional news yet on the recent tragedy, and our previous post has pretty much been speculated to death, so here's an idea: Make Commodore's Cup a special event in honor of Yu Chen and as a kind of memorial to the recent tragedy.

The club could (and probably should) print up t-shirts with Yu's portrait, or at least his name. Maybe a nice shot of a windsurfer with text below or something like that, plus something that says C-Cup '17. Yes there was the memorial gathering, but that doesn't mean we can't do this too. It would reach a bigger audience and could also serve to bring awareness of the dangers inherent in sailing and other sports. If we could get news coverage, the event might also help to encourage a proper investigation into the tragedy (that should be happening already).

If you go to images.google.com and type "windsurfer art", you get some nice images that could easily be adapted for Hoofers. Photoshopping a good photo taken on Lake Mendota would also be an option, e.g. using one of the artistic filters. We're not art students but there are people in the club who are.

This would work best if club leaders like the idea and decide to go with it, but it doesn't necessarily require their participation. The idea was suggested by a commenter on our previous post.

Time's a wasting.

Another Hoofer death

JUNE 21 UPDATE: Here's another article on the incident. It begins, "The tragic death of a skilled windsurfer last month in a collision with a rescue boat on Lake Mendota turned a spotlight on the University of Wisconsin Lifesaving Station. The rescues performed by the station’s lifesaving crews, on the other hand, typically go unnoticed." Is the Cap Times suggesting that death by motorboat doesn't warrant so much attention or that it's a fair trade-off given all the "rescues" they perform..? In either case, we emphasize that there are one or two scenarios where it may not have been entirely the rescue boat's fault.

JUNE 14 UPDATE: More info here. The DNR and UW are refusing to release investigatory data and video and have refused to allow examination of the boat. Incredibly, the boat has apparently been put back into service already, presumably so active use will wash off whatever evidence remains. Almost sounds like corrupt public officials trying to protect themselves from liability.

JUNE 13 UPDATE: More details are trickling in about Yu Chen's death. Apparently he was run over by the "rescue" boat from behind, which seems to suggest that the motorboat crew were indeed at fault in this tragedy. Chen's family has retained an attorney to sue the crap out of the UW. WARNING—the above link gives some fairly graphic details.

JUNE 5—We hoped to have more details on the investigation by now, but here are the basics.

Last Wednesday, Yu Chen, a popular Hoofer sailor and former instructor, and a good friend, was killed by the Hoofer/UW lifesaving boat. That would be the 31 foot twin-screw "rescue" boat which weighs in at about 8,700 lbs. Yu together with his board probably weighed about 180.

The clowns at the Badger Herald worded it as follows: "a 43 year old man was killed after colliding with" the UW lifesaving boat. That makes it sound like Yu ran into the motorboat! What it should say is: "after being hit by the UW lifesaving boat". Harvey knows very well that sailboards have right-of-way over motorboats. (And now the Herald staff know too.)

The accident occurred around 5:45 PM. How is that possible? Evidently something was impairing the rescue staff's ability to navigate. Sunset is 8:32 PM now, so the sun couldn't have been in their eyes. Maybe Yu was in the water at the time and thus not as visible, but that's no excuse either. There simply is no excuse.

"UW lifesaving" has become "UW Lifetaking".

UPDATED JUNE 8.

Another T-10?

With the season fast approaching, the club has just acquired a new toy for the boys (and for the girls too, of course). Speaking of beautiful ladies, on the right is a photo looking up under the poopdeck of our newest keelboat, Siege. It is a Tartan-10 donated by Glen Gordon, an avid sailor and racer down in Waukegan, IL. Word is that the donation isn't official yet but will be soon. Even when formalized, boat donations often don't stick around Hoofers for long, either being sold off cheap to preferred club members or stored on the farm until they can be taken as a tax write-off.

The Tartan-10 is a bit of a funky design. It has a fractional rig with a small chute, the cabin top is flush with the deck (and thus disorienting for drunk people), and the cabin has zero headroom. That is to say, it ain't no cruiser. But then, alcohol is now verboten (pronounced: for boatin') anyway, right? On the plus side, the T-10 has a wide transom making it very stable downwind. Some consider the feel of a T-10 to be more like a J-24 than a typical large keelboat. It is lightweight (~7000 lbs) though not an ultralight.

One or two T-10's have been donated in the past and were not kept by the club, having been deemed less than ideal for the keelboat program. However, given the recent losses of several Hoofer keelboats, we can probably use another one. Even when we do keep donated boats, they often don't last very long. Most end their lives as victims of sailing incompetence or otherwise damaged beyond repair (e.g. Decoy, Toy Boat, Maria...). It's a miracle that Soma is still sailing, or hopefully will be. But hey, if a big guy like Glen can sail a T-10 for years without falling through the cabin top, maybe we can too!