Texas Challenge Cup

[budster]

The Texas Challenge Cup is a competition to determine the top yacht racing club in Texas. The format is one where participating clubs field teams to race in a number of selected classes, where each club's scores in those classes are totalled to determine a club's final score. Clubs consistently participating over the last few years are GBCA, LYC, HYC, and TCYC, although not too long ago, the Fort Worth Boat Club also participated. The 2009 version of this event is currently being organized with the date being the weekend of November 7th. The boats scheduled to be used are Sonar, J80, and PHRF boats rated between 68 and 78. The event is a great concept, but it typically runs into a few problems:

1.) Finding an acceptable weekend on which to run the event.
2.) Participating clubs tend to be those based on Galveston Bay, even though it is titled the Texas Challenge Cup.
3.) Selecting and finding boats to be used. Currently, each club is expected to provide its own boats, one each of the chosen designs. This, even though not every club has access to all the designs chosen.

The easiest of these problems to solve is probably the scheduling. The date should be announced early in the year to allow clubs sufficent time to prepare their teams and boats. A Fall event would allow sufficient preparation, and sailors would be in their best form. Perhaps it should be held annually on a set weekend in early November before HYC's Turkey Day Regatta.

Ideally, this event would attract teams from across the state, involving more than just the Galveston Bay clubs. In addition, the selection of boats should give every club a fair shot at winning. Getting wider statewide participation and solving the boat issue might be resolved using the following principles:

Set a deadline in the Spring, say March 31st, before which every club must announce its intention to participate. Along with a club's intent to participate, each would announce its own chosen design. Each club would then be obligated to provide enough boats for itself and every other participating club. Maintaining a round robin format would ensure equal boat performance. In this way, the burden of finding boats and ensuring fairness is dispersed across all the participating clubs.

A typical scenario might be:

TCYC - Sonars
LYC - J80's
HYC - Ensigns
GBCA - J105's
White Rock YC - Flying Scots
Fort Worth Boat Club - J22's
Austin Yacht Club - J24's

In this scenario, each club would provide seven boats of its chosen design, and would also field teams to race the other classes.

This is a great event. We should do everything possible to make it easier to facilitate, enhance fairness, and build it into a true Texas Championship. Texas has a lot of great sailors. We should be spending more time racing against them, getting to know them, and the boats they race.

Your thoughts?

Best regards,

Bud

[hayesrigging]

There is a published Deed of Gift for this race that spells out the current rules on boats.  With the field of boats we have to choose from it is always changing.  This used to be a great event and has a great potential but needs some new direction. 

Who is the organizing club this year??  Its only scheduled to be two weeks away and haven't heard anything yet.

Kevin

[Jim Powers]

GBCA is hosting this year. The clubs have a tentative format. Details to follow soon.