Second Place in the Cranfield Regatta 2010

The Alumni Crew could not defend their title from 2009, coming in second behind a crew from Exeter University Business School.LBS's student crews came in 17th and 26th.

Cranfield Regatta site: http://www.som.cranfield.ac.uk/som/mba/regatta
This was the 19th annual Cranfield regatta, held on the Solent in Sunsail's fleet of identical Jeanneau Sunfast 37s.

Business Schools from all over the UK took part, along with teams from Rotterdam School of Management, and Smurfitt, Dublin. In all, there were a record 36 boats participating, 17 from Cranfield and 19 from other schools.

It was a much more competitive event than for the last couple of years, with strong crews from Manchester and Smurfitt battling it out for second place, and Rotterdam, Warwick, Henly, Portsmouth and a couple of Cranfield boats being there or thereabouts.

The winners, Exeter, were piloted by a hired "Sunsail" skipper, similar to the Bradford team who won in 2008. They won three out of the five races sailed, discarding one of the two other third places.

The LBS Alumni team managed only 3rd, 4th and 3rd on day 1, and a fourth in the first race on day 2, but salvaged some pride with a first place in the final race, after Exeter haad already secured the trophy. The relatively poor showing could well have something to do with taking strategic decisions on day 1 based on tidal data for mid August (more about this later!). Second place was down to consistent starts and upwind sailing, along with some very slick manouevres and good downwind speed.

Crew: Helm: Klaus Rasmussen, Main: Mark Buckle, Trim: Rob Cotterill, Trim - pole: Miranda Hall, Pit: Fiona Cotterill, Nav/grind/dowse: Emily Murphy, Mast: Thomas Von Othegraven, Bow: Veronique Leroy.

Unfortunately, this couldn't be achieved with an undamaged boat, after an incident with Manchester Business School during the second race pre-start.

The LBS Student 1 boat was helmed by Ben Grossman in his first regatta behind the wheel, with Howard Farbrother there as coach, and starting helm. They struggled on Saturday, with a 23rd and a 27th, but brought in a 12th and a 17th on Sunday to add to their one good result from saturday, a 13th.

For those who are interested, here's the regatta as seen from the LBS Alumni crew.



Race 1: The race started near Gilkicker point and we started well, with the tide pushing us over the line. We were stuck on starboard for a while, but managed to tack onto port and head over to our preferred right hand side of the course, where we believed there was slightly more tide helping us, as it had just changed. Unfortunately, with most of the fleet staying out, most of the fleet got the heavier breeze, and we were stuck with lighter airs in to shore. Which meant that when we got to the first mark we were lying sixth, and the supposed tide advantage had not materialised. The Manchester crew in 33 had done an incredibly good beat and were well ahead of the fleet at that point.

On the first downwind leg, the kite went up with a bit of a fumble with the sheet, but we still managed to overtake one of the boats ahead, on the way down to the buoy "Browndown". Rounding Browndown, we stayed out in the deeper water, getting the benefit of the tide which was now running strongly and managed to reach the top mark lying in fifth. Our super- fast spinnaker launch meant we overtook two boats while they were launching theirs, and we sailed well on the Island shore, keeping out of the tide in a steady third place. 33 came up behind us, forcing us into a luffing match so that we had to go up high to keep them out and then gybe, and ended up coming in third, behind Exeter and Smurfitt.

Race 2: From now on, all the racing was based around the Ryde middle bank and Osbourne bay, starting near the East end of the bank. During the pre- start, Manchester's helm decided to hook his nose behind our stern and round up. Unfortunately, he didn't bother giving us any warning, or allowing himself any control, and he ended up shunting our port pushpit with his bow's anchor guide, causing the pushpit leg to shear off and creating a crack in the fibreglass on our stern.

Totally uncharacteristically, we did not make a big fuss about it and enter a five minute long shouting match, but got on with the start. (Not much point in a protest - there were no witnesses, so as upwind boat, we'd probably have lost)

Another good start. This time we tried to get right to get into the tide while the pack were heading over the Ryde middle banks. We had a reasonable beat with reasonable wind, but once - again the left hand side paid, and the boats came screaming in from the left to leave us 7th or 8th around the top mark. A good hoist, and a run down onto the Osbourne bay sands. We stayed shallow by going relatively high and fast and then bore away. In doing so we overtook a lot of the competition. There were a lot of wind changes as we came up to Daks, the Gybe mark. We actually had to drop the spinnaker and go upwind on white sails to reach the mark, after a 45 degree shift.

We re- hoisted at the gybe mark, and with the new wind direction did not have to gybe. We staked in the shallows of Osbourne bay as long as possible before heading across the deeper waters towards the downwind mark. Putting in a gybe took us past a boat and came around the bottom mark, very close to the boat in third. Manchester had lead around the top and the gybe marks,a long way ahead of the following pack. But they headed towards the wrong mark, had to gybe late, and then scream down on a beam reach, to round it only just ahead. The other two boats ahead of us were - again- Smurfitt and Exeter.

On the last upwind, we again headed right, which went reasonably - got a nice header and then were lifted up towards the line. Unfortunately, we were headed just a few boatlengths from the line, and had to tack twice which allowed 6 to pip us to third place in the race. Smurfitt won, Manchester were second


Race 3: The most frustrating of today's three. The start was heavily pin- end favoured with 40 degree wind shifts, and (unfortunately for us) a sudden lull with a minute to go. This meant that our five - knot charge towards the pin end turned into a two- knot drift.. We still got there. We were still there at the right time, though, at least compared to the top boats in the field.

Deciding to go left for once, as our tidal strategies to the right had not paid off yet, we picked our way through the slower boats and made it to the top mark in second place behind Jeremy Renwick's "Cranfield 2" boat, who were having their race of the regatta. Our spinnaker was up and filling as we bore away from the mark, taking first place in the process. It was then a drag race down towards the gybe mark, Daks. Had to gybe at the mark, inside Cranfield 2. There followed a luffing match all the way to the down wind mark, which we came out of on top.

The drag race continued, this time on a fetch towards the buoy "Sunsail" on the Ryde middle bank. Confusingly, the tide which was "supposed" to be slack was reading a good knot and a half against us as we sailed up the bank. Exeter and Smurfitt tacked away to get into deeper water. We held off Cranfield. Smurfitt lost out. Exeter had overstood and fetched the mark really fast to arrive behind us. The line was further upwind from here. We were struggling with our boat speed - possibly because of the pressure of being chased.

We tacked away to put some leverage between us and the following pack. Which did not pay off. We had wind holes and very bad shifts as we reached the line. Exeter overtook. Cranfield overtook just as we were about to cross the line: all very frustrating. Manchester and Smurfitt were equally hurt, coming in 12th and 9th in this race.


The frustration of getting 3- 4- 3 was relieved somewhat when we worked out that Rob had used tide data from 10th August instead of 10th July. Which explained why Left was best in the first race and also why the "slack" expected tide was actually powerfully against us.

At the end of day 1, we were lying second, behind Exeter who had two wins and a third, and ahead of Smurfitt and Manchester who's third race disappointments had pushed them behind us. However, they both had two good results, so we needed to sail very well on Sunday when their discards came into play.

Day 2, Race 4: A bad start: well positioned but slow to head up and speed on. We went South of the bank, using the correct tide data - which proved to be the right option. It took us to the upwind mark in fourth or fifth, and we were unable to claw back more than the one position in the downwind. "Cranfield 5" sneaked across the line ahead of us, with Exeter and "Cranfield 16" ahead of them. Exeter's third bullet meant that they were unbeatable, and we had to concentrate on securing second place. Manchester were jsut behind us, but we could not see Smurfitt.

Race 5: Time to discard one of those 4th places: This was our most exciting race and also our first bullet. We started reasonably well, halfway down the line, and we chose to go over the bank and into the faster water on the South side. Smurfitt and Exeter both went North. Luckily for us, we got a couple of nice wind shifts, to again get to the top mark in 4th.

We had a terrible hoist: taking ages to get the spinnaker up. Luckily when it filled it was not twisted, and we got it sailing. Despite losing some places while the kite was flapping, we managed to pull them back relatively quickly on that leg. We had a big tussle with Warwick, who were upwind boat but would not keep clear when we wanted to head up. Once they did, we managed to put several boat lengths on them.

At the gybe mark, we put in a very fast, early gybe which gained us 2- 3 places. Exeter, for some reason carried on on the starboard gybe, rather than heading towards the mark. At the mark, we again went South of the bank, taking us to second place at the upwind mark. From here it was a drag race between us and Smurfitt all the way to the finish at Mother Bank: We went high to get past them and then held them off, rolling around, on the edge of being over powered and entering into Chinese gybe territory.

Smurfitt finished second, Exeter third and Manchester 5th after RSM.

Race 6 was postponed with 2 minutes to go as the wind shifted 40+ degrees, and after 10 minutes or so of waiting for the wind to settle, the committee called off the regatta, as they could not set a new upwind leg without moving the fleet, which meant that they ran out of time.

		Race
Position	Team	1	2	3	4	5	Total
1st	Exeter	1	3	1	1	3	6
2nd	LBS Alumni	3	4	3	4	1	11
3rd	Smurfitt	2	1	9	18	2	14
4th	Manchester	4	2	12	5	5	16
5th	Cranfield 16	6	6	5	2	9	19
6th	Cranfield 5	8	14	7	3	7	25
7th	Warwick	7	7	6	9	8	28
8th	RSM	5	18	14	8	4	31
9th	Cranfield 3	11	10	4	7	14	32
10th	Cranfield 2	10	11	2	13	21	36
11th	Alumni 2009	9	5	24	10	12	36
12th	Henley	13	22	10	6	10	39
13th	Bath 1	15	8	15	11	11	45
14th	Portsmouth	12	16	13	17	6	47
15th	Cranfield 11	1	17	17	22	16	51
16th	Cranfield 9	22	15	20	14	13	62
17th	LBS 1	23	13	27	12	17	65
18th	Imperial 1	14	9	19	24	24	66
19th	Bath 2	21	19	18	19	15	71
20th	Cranfield 8	16	29	16	21	19	72
21st	Cranfield 12	20	25	22	15	22	79
22nd	Cranfield 15	37	12	8	23	37	80
23rd	Cranfield 6	17	20	23	25	23	83
24th	Imperial 2	24	24	26	16	20	84
25th	Cranfield 10	19	23	29	27	18	87
26th	LBS 2	25	25	31	20	25	95
27th	Cranfield 14	37	27	11	26	32	96
28th	SAID	18	28	21	37	37	104
29th	Aberdeen	37	21	37	28	27	113
30th	Cranfield 4	37	31	28	31	26	116
31st	Cranfield 1	37	26	25	34	33	118
32nd	Leeds	37	32	30	29	30	121
33rd	Cranfield 7	37	30	32	35	28	125
34th	Cranfield 13	37	33	37	32	29	131
35th	Bath 3	37	34	37	30	37	138
36th	Ashridge	37	37	37	33	31	138

London Business School win the ABC Regatta!

Full results and the MBA Sailing league table at http://mbasailing.com/
(ABC home site: http://www.alumnibusinesscup.org/abca/Home.html)

On Sunday 20th June, London Business School finally brought home the Alumni Business Cup trophy for the first time since the school started competing in 1993. The London team has frustratingly finished second for the last three years, and managed to take the final step to first overall, thanks to some excellent upwind sailing, extreme crew hiking, slick manoeuvres and a great "onshore" performance, involving the King of Rock and Roll.

The 18th ABC regatta took place in La Ciotat and Cassis, near Marseilles in the South of France. Racing took place over three days in "Grand Surprise" 30- ft day racing yachts. There were five technical windward- leeward races and two coastal races. Twelve teams of MBA Alumni from as many schools competed for the trophy.

The crew see this as their most important event of the summer, because of the quality of the kit: these are pure racing machines, and the quality of the opposition.

The London Business School team consisted of Klaus Rasmussen (helm), Rob Cotterill (trim), Mark Buckle (pole trim/grind), Fiona Cotterill (pit), Biral Raja (main/bow), all of whom have been in the teams that came second in 2007-2009), Ed De Souza (main/bow, in his third ABC) and Paul Armstrong (mast).

The regatta was the most evenly competed for years, with five crews battling it out near the top of the rankings: LBS, last- year's winners IMD, 2007 winners Vienna, 2006 winners Insead and first- time entrants MIP, fresh from their second place in the Global MBA trophy in Athens.

Vienna, for the second time in three years, won the regatta "on the water", but had a poor result with the on- shore games, meaning that we and MIP overtook them in the overall.

Day one was all upwind- downwind technical races in variable to light winds. LBS started the regatta well with a close finish in the practice race, coming second behind Warwick, who got pressure and a nice header on their final leg towards the line. We'd reached the first mark in 4th, and overtook a number of boats with a smart gybe- hoist at the spreader mark. Unfortunately that result didn't count for the rankings.

Race 1, however did count, and was a bullet for us! memories are vague, but a top 3 start, some good shifts and that gybe- hoist again probably sum it up. Vienna, Insead (de Vries) and IMD followed us in.

In Race 2, we had a poor start, clawed our way back through the fleet, and actually got to third place before picking a few shifts badly and ending up in 5th, behind IMD, Insead (de Vries), Warwick and HEC. Vienna and eventually second place MIP also finished badly.

Race 3 was a great start at the pin end, and we were miles ahead at the top mark after a big lift in very light airs. Vienna and MIP caught us up on the downwind, but we still rounded the bottom mark ahead. The race committee shortened the course to finish at the top mark, just as the wind died completely. We struggled with wind holes and boat speed once under- powered. Both Vienna and Insead (deVries) got past us.

At the end of day 1, Martin De Vries' Insead boat was in the lead, with two 2nds and a 3rd. We were second with 1,3,5, while Vienna were looking dangerous with 1, 2, 8. once the discards started to kick in.

That evening proved to be our most important "race": the format of the event has two "onshore" competitions, which together count as one race in the regatta, but cannot be discarded. This year, we firstly had to fly model aeroplanes: Mark did well, throwing it low so it skidded along the ground, avoiding the fate of many whose planes gracefully completed an arc and came a long way back towards the launching point. The second event was to present a sketch or a skit based around the book "Le Petit Prince". We chose to go with making Fiona look ridiculous, with shoes on her hands, and brought on the King of Rock 'n' Roll himself. It made some sort of sense on the night, and won us second place in the onshore games behind MIP's impressively prepared presentation.

Day two, and Race 4 was a coastal passage race from La Ciotat to a mark halfway along the coast to Cassis. We had a poor start, and struggled for speed in the important few minutes of drag- race after the start, where trimming was difficult due to chop and windshifts. We came back as we exited La Ciotat bay, and then chose to stay out at sea, where we had a good lift and constant pressure, but had to sail away from our main competitors. The finish mark was placed a bit too close to the positions of the two eventual winners MIP and Vienna. We were 3rd, IMD 4th and Insead (de Vries) 5th, having been on the other side of the course when the finish was positioned.

Race 5 was another passage race to Cassis. We had an ok start in big seas. It was an upwind drag - race, with the crew hiking out like demons. We again chose to stay out at sea and sail by ourselves, meaning that we could focus on sailing low and fast through the increasingly choppy waves. We got a bit lucky, with two long lifts in a row. As we joined our competitors at the finish line, we were marginally ahead, but Klaus executed a lee -bow on Vienna, used our low and fast sailing to get "down on our line", and tacked as soon as we could stand the line on starboard. We were first, with the top three boats (2nd Vienna, 3rd IMD) crossing the line within thirty seconds of each other.

Race 6 - by now the wind had got up to the point that the committee banned the use of spinnakers - never popular with our power- hungry crew. We had a poor start, with difficulties keeping up with other boats pointing higher and sailing faster. On the downwind, we gained places by poling out our genoa; we gained more places with fast upwind sailing on the second leg, and were close to gaining the lead. To avoid collision, we let Vienna go around the top mark ahead of us, hoping to gybe behind them at the dog- leg mark. Unfortunately, Vienna slowed down and did not gybe, so we were "stuck" in the outside position resulting in the loss of two places to finish 4th behind IMD, MIP and Vienna.

At the end of day 2, we were just 2 points behind Vienna on the water, with 12 points, discarding a 5, to their 10 points, discarding an 8. IMD were just behind us with 13, discarding 10. We didn't know our onshore games results yet.

Day 3, was the day after the trauma of England's match against Germany in the town of Cassis, and a night- time delivery of the boat back to Cassis for some while the rest of the crew took the local taxi back to the hotel. The wind had really set in hard. The Audi Med Cup professional sailors, down the coast in Marseilles had their racing called off.

Race 7 was held with a sail plan: compulsory reefed main and storm jib! We started OK, at the committee boat end, but with flapping sails as we had to avoid boats luffing us up, as well as boats trying to barge in. After the start, IMD drove up Insead (Le Borgne), who drove us up, and we dropped several places. We were 5th on the first downwind, then gained to 2nd/3rd place on the second beat before hitting a major wind hole (from 30 knots down to something in the high teens), which was particularly painful given the tiny jib. 5th place behind MIP, Insead (LeBorgne), Vienna and Insead (DeVries).

So, on the water, we ended up with 1,(5), 3, 3, 1, 4, 5 = 17. Vienna had 13, discarding 8, MIP's win in the final race put them at 20 (discarding 9) ahead of Insead (De Vries) with 21 (discarding 7) and IMD with 22 (discarding 10)

However, when the onshore points were added in, we won, with 19 points to MIP's 21 and Vienna's 25. Next year, with luck and practice, we'll try to win it on the water!

Team	Skipper	Training	R1	R2	R3	R4	R5	R6	R7
LBS	Klaus Rasmussen	2	1	-5	3	3	1	4	5
MIP	Paolo Sito	3	7	-9	5	1	4	2	1
WU MBA	Stephan Luger	7	2	-8	1	2	2	3	3
IMD	Michael Ring	9	4	1	-10	4	3	1	9
Insead	Marteen de Vries	10	3	2	2	5	5	-7	4
Insead	Marc Leborgne	8	6	-10	9	6	6	5	2
HEC/Insead	Philippe Lerique	11	5	4	4	7	7	-10	8
Warwick	Chis Best	1	10	3	6	-11	11	8	10
Insead	Gilad Lederer	5	8	6	7	8	9	9	DSQ
Kellog/Insead	Ingrid Van Wees	6	-11	11	8	10	8	11	6
Harvard	Christophe Reuter	4	12	7	DSQ	9	12	6	7
Oxford	Daniel Seiderer	12	9	-12	11	12	10	12	11

TEAM	POINTS 8 RACES (1 disc)	POINTS 6 RACES -1	SAILING Ranking (Final)		ONSHORE GAMES	TOTAL POINTS	TOTAL Ranking (Final)
LBS	17	17	2		2	19	1
MIP	20	20	3		1	21	2
WU MBA	13	13	1		12	25	3
IMD	22	22	5		8	30	4
Insead	21	21	4		11	32	5
Insead	34	34	6		5	39	6
HEC/Insead	35	35	7		4	39	6
Warwick	48	48	9		5	53	8
Insead	47	47	8		9	56	9
Kellog/Insead	54	54	11		3	57	10
Harvard	53	53	10		10	63	11
Oxford	65	65	12		7	72	12

The Sunsail "Chiller" Regatta: 27 Feb 2010

Friday evening, and ten of us have gathered in Cafe Uno for Pizza, Pasta and Primitivo wine. It's going to be a cold February night, and we're sleeping in unheated 37ft yachts..... and we're wondering why the other five of our number decided to sleep in warm beds and come down to meet us in the morning.

Still, apart from the condensation on the outside of the sleeping bags things were not too bad, and Saturday dawned bright, albeit with some very threatening clouds and winds gusting to 30 knots.

The remainder of our crews arrived on time, the bacon butties were claimed from the Yacht Club and the skippers got briefed. We had two LBS boats - a strong crew with Klaus, aiming for honours and a relatively inexperienced crew with Rob aiming to be "not last".

LBS "Red" crew:

Klaus Rasmussen
Lee Bonham
Mark Buckle
Kath O'Sullivan
Fiona Cotterill
Miranda Hall
Julian Fox

LBS "Blue" crew:

Rob Cotterill
Praveen Abraham
Anselm Foxell
Sebastien Rodrigo
Lesley Gavin
Juan Camilo Saldarriaga
Joel Shinners

Major forfaits are due from Ed, who somehow couldn't get himslef out of his warm London bed to make if down to Port Solent.

With a very strong Spring tide a Southerly wind and no racing buoys, the committee boat took a long time finding somewhere to lay a starting line so that we could manage to race. Eventually the race began, and Rob found himself a long way back with 20 seconds to go before the start, and - worse- found Klaus just ahead of him, out of the running.

Klaus and crew tacked away onto Port straight away, and managed to claw their way back through the fleet. Rob and crew arrived at the top mark in ninth (out of 10), pulled back ground poling out the genoa on the down-wind, but not quite getting enough back to be able to overtake, and held that place to the end of the race.

Lesley and Rob shared the helming duties in race 1, and Joel had his first go at the front of the boat. Race two saw Joel on the helm for the start, and it was set to be a good one...too good. Our noses were poked over the line with 10 seconds to go, we had at least four others outside us who were also infringing, but were slapped with individual recalls rather than the general one that we were hoping for. We ducked back across the line and started back in the fleet.

It was a similar race to the last one, except the wind was dropping throughout. This time we shook out the reef for the downwind, and probably should have risked a kite on the second downwind leg, except for the inexperience of the crew and the occasional 25kt gusts that hit us.. In the end it was the same story as race 1: 9th, and challenging the two boats in 7th & 8th all the way. Overall we came in 8th equal, as the boats around us did not manage our consistency.

Juan managed to join us on deck for practice and a quick bite to eat before the second race, but made most of his contribution to the result asleep in the port cabin. Apparantly it had been a very good Friday night.

Team "Red" brought in a 4th and a 5th, to be 4th overall with stories of sprung spinnaker shackles, lost spinnaker bags and tacks that weren't tacks during the pre- start.

Still, a great day on the water. Sunshine on the Solent while London endured a downpour.

Looking forward to sailing with the rest of you!

2010 Calendar

Alumni Sailing Club : 2010 Calendar

Note: Events in Brackets are tentative and will only take place if organiser and skippers can be found. Any volunteers?

February

Sat 28th
Sunsai Chiller Regatta
Organiser: Rob

March

20-21
Sunsail Spring Series
Organiser : tbc.

Sat 20 -Sat 5
Spring Break Trip
Organiser: Student club

April

(17-18)
(Solent Quest)
(Organiser: tbc)

Thu 29th - Sun 2nd May
Event Organisers: Michalia, Mark, Johanna,Nigel, Lesley, Rob
Team organisation: Rob

May

(Thu 6- Sun 9)
(Industry Sailing Challenge)
Organiser: Tbc

date tbc.
Summer BBQ
Organiser: Johanna

June

Date tbc
Alumni Business Cup
nr Marseilles, France
Organiser: Biral

Sat 26
(Sunsail Scorcher Day)
Organiser: Tbc

July

Fri 9- Sun11
Cranfield Regatta, Solent
Organiser: Klaus


Fri 16- Sun 18
(Sunsail Summer Series)
(Organiser: tbc)

August

Fri 20 - Sun 22
Sunsail Summer Series
Organiser: Laura

September

? 23- 26?
Bocconni Regatta 2010
Organiser: Rob/Elena


October

Sat 2 -Sun 2
(Solent Quest)
Organiser: Tbc

Sat9- Sun 10
(Sunsail Autumn Series)
Organiser: Tbc

Fri16- Sun 17
Alumni Challenge
Organiser: Elena

November

(Sat 6)
(Sunsail Series Final)
(Orgainser tbc.)

? Thu 18?? Annual Dinner at RORC
Organiser: Tbc