1968 Olympic games at Acapulco

Olympic Flame burns at Acapulco

MEX-I- CO, MEX -I- CO, MEX -I- CO, ENGLAND TAKES THE GOLD
by Bob Shanner, Editor

Rodney Stuart Pattison and crew, Iain MacDonald-Smith topped off their outstanding record of international success by winning six races in a row and finishing second in the final race for the Gold Medal at Acapulco, Mexico.

Gold winner Pattisson.

The British team, still in their early twenties, were disqualified in the first race in the XIX Olympiad, but were able to throw it out as the scoring system allowed the competition to count six of the seven races. Their superior boat speed and confidence in spite of their first race DSQ made it apparent to the other competitors and to the spectators alike that no less than a gold medal was in store for them.

Germany's Ullrich Libor won the Silver medal with a total of 43.7 points, with Conrad Reinaldo from Brazil taking a close third for the bronze medal with 48.4 over Carl Ryves of Australia, who had 49.1.

The United States representative, Robert L. James, Jr. and his brother David finished in tenth position with 97.4 points. The US team really got going in the last two races to overcome a dismal start. Like the British, they were DSQed in the first race, and finished 18th in the third race. They got moving, however, in the generally lighter air of the last two races and were even in first place with a beat and run to go in the sixth race before being passed to wind up in third spot. They were in second place all the way in the final race only to finish sixth when the wind shifted.

The big surprise to all at the Olympics in Acapulco was the wind. The first race started out with wind in the 10-12 mph range, which increased to 18 -22 mph in the next race, and then steadied to approximately 8 -12 mph throughout the five remaining races.

Before the sailing competition commenced on October 14, 1968 the Mexican

Path at Club de Yates shows Olympic sailing insignia.

Olympic Organizing Committee put on a magnificent opening ceremony which was superbly staged in the basin of the Club de Yates. The Olympic Torch arrived at the Acapulco airport and was taken to the Plaza Alvarez downtown, where it burned for the duration ofthe regattas. The fire was then taken from its bed by a Mexican Olympic swimmer who ran with it a short distance to the dock where it was presented to an ex-World Champion waterskier, Marco Morlett, who skied around the bay with the torch and then placed it at its site in the center of the dock at the yacht club. Olympic and Mexican flags were raised, followed by fireworks, balloons and brief speeches by the Mayor and by the Governor of the state of Guerrerro. The XIX Olympiad was off to a beautiful start.

The Club de Yates in Acapulco surely offered the best facilities in the world. The club had been in existence for years, but was enlarged and vastly improved by architects Mario Pani,Victor de la Laura and Antonio Recamier. An enormous anchor from a Spanish galleon sunk in Acapulco Bay leaned against a massive stone wall at the entrance to the yacht club, its gigantic curved base resting in a reflecting pool and its rusty chain looping along the stone wall and down a flight of stone steps into the club. The Clubhouse is a beautiful two-story building, cool and open, centered around a swimming pool and a garden that was ringed around with the flags of participating nations.

U.S. Support team. Tom Allen at left.

The Committee constructed long docks as bases for the Finn and FD classes and a jetty was dredged to handle the other classes. The additional land required for this jetty was donated to the Club for the Olympics by the residents along the shore, and was to be sold back to them with the new improvements at minimum cost after the Regattas.

Administrative offices, press offices and an infirmary were built adjoining the yacht club, as well as repair shops specializing in fiberglass, carpentry and sails. These buildings were to be later dismantled and shipped out to various Mexican villages to be used as schools. An International Jury building and class office buildings were also set up. Each competitor had a locker for storing sails and equipment as well as two "grumetes" or children to help service the needs of the skippers and crews.

The FD office was manned by Commodore Mario Collignon with Luis De La Pena, Pedro Martel and Teodoro Schultz from the Guadalaj ara FD fleet and was the most central office.

Most of the competitors had arrived about two weeks prior to the opening day ceremonies and had spent most of that time tuning up for the regatta.

The support team for the US consisted of North American champ, Tom Allen, and FD skipper from Los Angeles, Bernardo Martinez. They started to work on boat speed with Bob James, but David James became ill and this cost them about a week's valuable practice time.

The support teams from the various countries combined could have put on an Olympics of their own. The Pre-Olympic Regatta winner from last year, Pedro Casado came from Spain, Patrick Haegeli from France, Ralph Conrad from Brazil, Karsten Mayer from Germany, Fred Imhoff from Holland, Miguel Rabago from Mexico, and to top off the" suplente" list were the current World Champions from England, David Hunt and John Oakeley.

The competitors and their support teams met for the first time under formal race conditions in the Practice Regatta held on October 10. The winner was Hans Fogh and this according to the press made him the Olympic favorite. Results and positions at the different marks follow:

PRACTICE REGATA
POSITION AT THE MARKS

PLACE MARK2 3 1 2 1 FINAL 1 D D D D D D 2 KA KA KA KC KC KC 3 E KC KC KA K K 4 KC K K K K KA 5 K E E E KA K 6 SR US US US US BL 7 GO I BL K BL US 8 US I I BL E E 9 OE SR I F KZ KZ 10 BL BL F I KC H 11 I F K KC I KZ 12 I GO GO S KZ S 13 K KZ OE I H SR 14 KZ K KC SR S KC 15 B OE S OE I I 16 M S KZ KZ SR OE 17 D US KZ KZ GO I 18 US KC US H KJ MX 19 H B B KZ US KJ 20 S KZ KJ GO OE GO 21 KC KJ SR M KH G 22 KJ H MX B M PZ 23 G M M MX MX GR 24 KZ MX H PZ G KH
...

Race No.1 -October 14, 1968

Start 1st Race, Norway moved down to port end then tacked for a fan tastic start. Note U.S. on port tack about to foul. It appears from photo that if England had tacked she would have been clear, however, she went down the line to the mark, then tacked and fouled Canada who is in the center of this photo which was taken 5 seconds before the gun.

The first race of the Olympics got off exactly on time with the starting line about two or three miles offshore of Acapulco with the FDs and Stars assigned to the Red Zone, an area to the north of the other classes.

Another shot close up at the start shows clearly that one could not lay the line on starboard.

The wind was 10 -12 mph and the port end of the starting line was heavily favored. The majority of the 30 boats were near the port end, but could not lay the line. Norway took a port tack near the pin and hit the line with the perfect start - flat out on the trapeze at the gun and by the time the other boats tacked and got going Norway had a 75 yd. lead on the fleet. Hungary and Russia followed while Canada and England were at the line bumping into each other. Canada went too far out to sea while England crossed behind the entire fleet to go up along the coast to come in from dead last to sixth place at the first mark.

After this first mark it was obvious that the only approach to the windward mark was along the coast as the current out to sea was much stronger.

Norway could not point as high as England, Ger many or France, but was moving fast and on the reach passed over Russia, who was first at the windward mark and held England fairly well on the run. By this time the fleet had spread out and at the reach-ing mark first place Norway was nine minutes ahead of last place EI Salvador.

England got by Norway on the beat and it was all over as Pattison was much faster while Germany out-pointed Norway to finish in second place.

Austria buried by huge Acapulco swell.

Bob James fouled out at the starting line when he hit the transom of another boat and was protested by New Zealand. He played around with boat speed for awhile before going in to shore and later filed his formal protest against the Race Committee for setting the poor line.

It was too bad that Bob James was not around at the finish as he could have protested the finish line as well as the starting line. The line set was just the reverse of the starting line. Here the leeward end was heavily favored and it was over 1/4 of a mile long in contrast to the extremely windward favored and much too short starting line.

Hong Kong's Neil Pryde found this out to his grief when he went to the wrong end of the finish line and from a certain 11th place finish dropped to 13th spot, most unlucky.
Thus went the first race, characterized by poor lines and several protests and DNFs.

Canada protested England and Portugal protested Germany. The jury threw out the latter saying their protest flag was not flown in time. The English boat in turn protested Canada, but oddly enough it was not heard on the grounds that England had no standing, having already been disqualified.

Dead-on at the windward mark.

The sixteen man International Protest Committee was up to 11:00 P.M. on the protests before retiring and saying they would not hear the English protest.

It was an unfortunate start to the regatta, as the Mexicans probably had the best equipment ever used in a regatta. In addition to the great onshore facilities, they had excellent communications. Giant colored balloons floated high above minesweepers near the marks showing the way to the bouys. Everywhere the hard work of the Mexican Navy was in evidence. Why the International Jury, who was brought in at great expense, did not see to it that the start of the race was delayed ten minutes in order for the Race Committee to set a proper line was a mystery. The Jury boats were all over the course during the races but too often the apparent activity on their part seemed to be to drive off the press and spectator boats. Results and positions of the first race follow:

REGATA No.1
POSITION AT THE MARKS

PLACE MARK2 3 1 2 1 FINAL 1 SR N N K K K 2 N KA KA N N G 3 KA SR K KA KA N 4 G G G G G KA 5 MX K SR SR SR SR 6 K MX MX F F F 7 KH F F MX MX KZ 8 F KH D KZ KZ D 9 D S KH KH D MX 10 S D KC D KC M 11 VI KC S KC KH KC 12 KC KZ KZ E M E 13 M M E M E KH 14 KZ BL M S BL S 15 E VI BL BL S GO 16 US E VI VI I BL 17 PZ US OE GO VI I 18 I OE I I GO H 19 BL I US PZ OE VI 20 H PZ GO OE PZ OE 21 OE GO PZ H Y Y 22 GO H B Y H PZ 23 KJ KJ Y GR B GR 24 GR GR H B GR B 25 B B GR KJ KJ PR 26 Y Y KJ PR PR 27 PR PR PR P P 28 RI P P SL SL 29 P RI RI RI RI 30 SL SL SL

England in 6th - but not for long.

Hills of Acapulco rise in the background of windward mark.

Race No.2 -October 15, 1968

The James brothers before the start of the first race.

The wind was about the same as on the previous day, but blew more after the start and was in the 12 mph-18 mph range.
Bob James had a beautiful start at the flag end of a square and adequate line, followed by Norway, Aus-tralia, Portugal, England and France. Holland was the first boat to tack over to shore on port, while England went over at about 50 yards away on the starboard start. James held until 150 yards before going over, as he was prevented from an earlier tack by the boats following him.
At the reaching mark England had the lead for good, followed by Norway with the US in 11th position, be-low the mark and reaching up without a spinnaker. Most of the boats had already set the spi on this reach, but those without did not lose much time.
On the windward mark at the end of the triangle, it could be seen why England was the lead boat. They were pointing higher than anyone and yet footing faster. They had a 1:10 lead over Norway, who in turn was 40 seconds over France, who was followed 15 seconds later by Germany.

The English had a foul-up with the spi with the sheet getting caught by the tiller and yet had it up and pulling in 22 seconds -about the average set of the other sailors when they had no problems.

The last boat at this mark was Indonesia, who arrived 28 minutes later and set their spiin 40 seconds.

At the finish, England had a 2: 15 lead over second place Norway. Bob James, after losing three boats on a jybe at the mark, picked up six boats to finish ninth.

Germany is dressed for Acapulco.

The finish line in this race was changed to a two-flag system, with a marker at each end of the line instead of one mark and the committee boat, which confused most of the sailors. England didn't want to take any chances, and since they had such a lead, finished through both lines!

Indonesia finished last in this race, 30 minutes after Pattison, and yet they lost less than 30 seconds to the first Star boat to finish. The Stars had started 10 minutes after the FD and sailed the same course.

England finished with a net gain of 29 minutes ahead of the first place Star boat. And just think, they used to start the Stars ahead of the Flying Dutchmen.

After the race, Bob James said that he felt he would do better in lighter air. He felt his boat speed was slightly behind that of Brazil, Germany and Norway, but equal to that of Russia, New Zealand and Denmark.
The results are:

RESULTS OF RACE TWO

TOTAL
PLC PNTS POINTS K Pattisson, Rodney 1 0 0 N Lofterod, Bjorn 2 3 6 G Libor, Ullrich 3 5.7 5.7 F Cheret, Bertrand 4 8 18 KA Ryves, Carl 5 10 15.7 SR Rvalov, Lev 6 11.7 19.7 BL Conrad, Reinaldo 7 13 33 KZ Smale, Geoffrey A. 8 14 53 US James, Robert L. Jr. 9 15 51 GO Cochius, Hans-Jurgen 10 16 35 H Verhagen, Ben 11 17 39 D Fogh, Hans 12 18 29.7 KH Pride, Neil 13 19 36 E Duque De Arion 14 20 36 OE Geiger, Karl 15 21 45 KC Green, Roger 16 22 37 Y Anton, Grego 17 23 48 PZ Jwinski, Andrzej 18 24 50 I Massone, Carlo 19 25 46 PR Torruella, Juan 20 26 55 GR Andreadis, George 21 27 54 MX Villasenor, Lorenzo 22 28 41 VI Thompson, Rudy 23 29 52 KJ Plant, William DNF 35 71 P Rodriguez, Sena 24 30 60 RI Gunawan, John 25 31 63 SL Aguilar, Mario DNF 35 66 M Gomory, Paul DNF 35 49 S Kolni, Peter DNF 35 53 B Maes, Christian DNS 36 64

The Start of Race 2.

Meanwhile, back at the Scoreboard. ..

Race No.3 -October 16, 1968

This was a lighter day with the wind blowing about 8 knots and with the sea conditions much smoother. The current measured 0.75 knots.

Norway in a spi duel.

The pin end of the start was slightly favored and all had a good start except Germany who had to go out to sea before tacking on port. Canada and Austria went out to sea and England went out to cover about halfway to the windward mark.

This race was all England and they had a big lead that got bigger with every mark.

The competitors were now trying everything to catch the English. Smale of New Zealand had sails that were yellow and looked 15 years old. Others were switching everything around to try to increase their boat speed to match the British.

In this race some sailors reported seeing sharks and Bob James almost sailed across a large turtle.

The only othereventful happening was that the large P. and O. liner Arcadia appeared on the horizon, but was held up from entering Acapulco Bay by the Mexican Navy from 2:00 P.M. until 6:00 P.M. so that she would not interfere with the race course in any way.

A good move on the part of the Jury, but not very popular with the ship's passengers, who were done out of a day's sight-seeing in Acapulco, as the ship steamed out a little later that evening.

As usual that night there was a tropical storm with heavy rain but the following morning was always hot and bright.

Results and positions of the third race follow:
Winning boat time -1 Hour, 53:27; Last boat 2 Hours, 11:55.

REGATA No.3
POSITION AT THE MARKS

PLACE MARK2 3 1 2 1 FINAL 1 K K K K K K 2 KA KA KA G G G 3 KC KC KC KA KA KA 4 G G G KC KC BL 5 S BL BL N N KC 6 BL S S BL BL E 7 GR D D D E N 8 N GR GR E KZ D 9 D KH N S S S 10 E M KZ KZ D KZ 11 MX N US SR US OE 12 KH I M US SR MX 13 US KZ MX MX MX SR 14 M OE KH GO GO Y 15 OE US E GR KH US 16 SR E I KH OE KH 17 Y MX OE H GR GO 18 I SR Y OE H I 19 PZ Y GO M Y H 20 KZ F SR Y M GR 21 H GO F F F F 22 F H H I I M 23 GO PZ PZ KJ KJ VI 24 VI VI VI PZ PZ KJ 25 B B KJ B B PZ 26 PR PR B VI VI B 27 P KJ PR P P P 28 KJ P P PR PR PR 29 RI RI RI RI RI RI 30 SL SL SL SL

Jam-up at the mark.

Canada's Roger Green in the foreground.

Race No.4, October 17,1968

This was the lightest day of the series so far, with winds 7 -10 mph and just what Bob James was hoping for. To his dismay, however, he turned in his worst race with an 18th place finish.

Again England was untouchable and sailed from what seemed to be a very poor start into a wire to wire finish. Perry Alford timed their tacks and they ranged from 5 to 6 seconds. It was apparent that Germany, Brazil and Australia had a real battle going on for the silver and bronze, and that if England could stay out of trouble, they would lock up the gold.

REGATA No.4
POSITIONS AT THE MARKS

PLACE MARK2 3 1 2 1 FINAL 1 K K K K K K 2 G G G G G G 3 KH KC KC BL BL BL 4 KC Y BL KC KC Y 5 Y BL Y Y N KC 6 BL KH N N Y N 7 S S S KH KH D 8 M N KH D D KH 9 P P D S M F 10 N KJ P M S E 11 KJ D F F F M 12 D M KJ KJ GO KZ 13 B F M E E GO 14 F B B GO H S 15 GO GO KZ KZ KZ B 16 SR KZ E H KJ OE 17 E E GO US US H 18 MX SR OE P B US 19 KZ OE US B OE GR 20 OE US MX OE I KA 21 US MX H VI MX KJ 22 VI H SR GR P MX 23 H I VI MX PZ SR 24 PZ VI PZ PZ GR I 25 I PZ I SR SR PZ 26 GR PR GR KA VI P 27 KA GR PR I KA VI 28 PR KA KA PR PR PR 29 RI RI RI RI RI RI

Geoff Smale & crew with Lawrence of Arabia headgear.

Race No.5 -October 19, 1968

We had gone over to Mexico City on the lay day -a city of over 7 million where traffic is madness at best -to see some track and field. The Games were great. We talked with some reporters who said that Mexico equaled or surpassed the 1960 Games in Rome and those of Tokyo four years ago in every way. Our gripes were the mosquitoes at Villa Coapa and a six hour wait at the airport to get back to Acapulco.

A weather forecast was posted each day for the sailors and for this race day it read, "Wind -12 knots at 160°, current 60° at 0.6 knots with calm seas -the temperature which had been about 34°C. was at 29.8°C."

The wind dropped just after the start and most boats carried crews inside. Pattisson took a rather poor but safe start as this appeared to be the day for Peter Kolni of Sweden who was first at the windward mark closely followed by the Green brothers of Canada. Brazil seemed to be going very fast, but fell from 3rd place to 10th on the last leg of the triangle. They couldn't be held on the beat, however, and jumped up to 5th place before the final run.

Class secretary, Perry Alford, and Jane Shanner interview Bob James.

On the reach after the windward mark Pattisson jibed really fast and good and went on the inside route to the mark. Other boats wanted to go higher and higher and so when they got to the reaching mark England had passed four boats and was in the lead for good once more. Canada finished a strong second and looked good to move into contention for a medal, as they were now only six points away from third place.

At the docks most sailors agreed that all were doing a good job of sailing but that the British just had too much speed in the normal conditions.

Roger Green said, " I've sailed against Pattisson seven times before and he has never gone so fast. He can go to the wrong place, make poor starts and still recover -anyone else would be out of the race."

The positions follow:
Time for Winning boat 2 H, 11:28 Time for last place boat 2 H, 39:42

REGATA No.5
POSITIONS AT THE MARKS

PLACE MARK2 3 1 2 1 FINAL 1 S K K K K K 2 KC KA KC KC KC KC 3 BL BL F N F BL 4 F KC I F BL F 5 K OE OE BL N S 6 KA S S E I N 7 G I N OE H I 8 Y G E I OE KA 9 E E G US E KZ 10 I F BL KA S E 11 OE Y Y S US MX 12 H MX US G G D 13 MX H KA H KZ G 14 US N KZ KZ KA H 15 KZ KZ H MX MX US 16 N US MX Y D OE 17 P GO GO D Y Y 18 GO KJ D GO GO SR 19 GR PZ KJ SR SR GO 20 PZ D GR GR GR GR 21 KH KH PZ KH KH KH 22 D P P KJ M B 23 KJ GR M M B M 24 VI SR KH B KJ KJ 25 SR M SR PZ PZ PZ 26 M VI B VI VI VI 27 B B VI PR PR PR 28 PR PR PR RI RI RI 29 RI RI RI SL SL SL 30 SL SL SL

The Green Brothers.

Race No.6 -October 20, 1968

For this race the wind was about 8 knots from 240°. This was probably the lightest most shifty day with the wind sometimes dropping as low as 6 mph.

The US and Portugal took beautiful starts with France, Germany and Australia really watching each other to protect their positions.

Sailmaker Jangkind (in hat) supervises Holland's entry.

After having sailed in last or next to last in the first three races Portugal reversed themselves and held the lead after the first two marks. They lost on the spi run and went from 1 st to 5th. On the next beat they lost another twelve places to finally finish a disappointing 19th. Spectacular sailing while it lasted!

The US took the lead from Portugal and would have had a 2nd, but France got past when Bob James looked down to see his jib sheet out of the fairlead so that his crew Dave couldn't pull in his Genoa on the tack. Bob said he had sufficient speed to hold France, but England was just too fast. Each time he tried to cover them they just pulled away.

The 6th race was interesting because England in the light air had a net gain of 9 minutes over the Star boats. The slowest FD lost only about six minutes to the fastest Star over the same course. The winning boat -1 H, 29:05.

The results follow:

REGATA No.6
POSITIONS AT THE MARKS

PLACE MARK2 3 1 2 1 FINAL 1 P P US K K K 2 US US F F F F 3 F F K US US US 4 GO GO GO H H KA 5 PZ K P GO KA H 6 K KA KA KA GO GO 7 KH PZ H I I Y 8 KA H I D KZ KZ 9 H KH PZ Y D I 10 D D B KZ Y BL 11 Y Y D BL BL D 12 B I Y B B OE 13 I B KC PZ PZ B 14 N KC BL KC OE S 15 KC S KH S KC MX 16 KZ KZ N P MX KH 17 S BL KJ OE S PZ 18 BL N KZ MX KH KC 19 KJ KJ OE KH P P 20 SR SR S KJ KJ E 21 MX M MX M M G 22 M MX M SR E KJ 23 OE OE G E SR SR 24 E E SR G VI VI 25 PR G E VI G M 26 G PR VI PR PR PR 27 VI VI PR RI RI SL 28 GR GR GR SL SL RI 29 RI RI RI 30 SL SL SL

Race No.7 -October 21, 1968

Final race-start 1300 -- number of boats 30 -- wind 11 knots increasing to 13 knots --direction 135°--sea with medium chop -- temperature 28.5°C.

Brazil, Portugal and the US had a fast start at the flag end of the line which was beautifully set and slightly favored. Unfortunately, Brazil was over early and got called back. The US boat went over to port tack after about 30 yards and looked to be the win-ner at this point. The James brothers had finally found the right combination of sails and were no longer changing things around trying to get 'tuned'.

Mexico had difficulty and was stalled on the line while Austria's Karl Geiger and Norway's Bjorn Lofterod made their usual superior starts.

The British team was at the windward end out of trouble but with a weak start, away from the best end of the line and removed from any other boats.

Russia started in the middle of the line ahead of Germany who was almost last and only ahead of El Salvador. At this stage, Germany had dropped both the silver and bronze medals and it looked as if the fighting was between Carl Ryves of Australia, Norway and Cheret Bertrand of France for overall second and third places.

At the first mark, however, Brazil had a fairly close lead on the US after a nice long port tack up the beach, followed by Russia and Neil Pryde of Hong Kong. England was in 11th place and the boats all reached to the second mark or buoy #3 without spis. Pattisson was much superior on this reach and at the end of the leg moved into 6th place.

The competitors all jibed at the mark and set their chutes to complete the triangle. It took the US 35 seconds to have the chute set and pulling with the crew in place. England had an outstanding set in 12 seconds flat! Norway's set was closer to the average with 18 seconds, although they had their chute up before the mark and made a spinnaker jibe.

In the beat to the windward mark the wind shifted markedly to the South and Germany who had been 18th now moved into 10th place in contention for a medal once more.

Brazil FD passes Brazil Star at the mark.

The Star start had been delayed but they finally started while the FDs were at the reaching mark and they had about a ten minute lead by the time the first FD rounded the leeward mark. This was Brazil, who caught all but three Stars on this beat and came in over the top of about six Stars near the mark when they caught a ride on a wave and surf-planed over the group beating to the pin. James was close behind but did not make it ahead of the Stars, and was consequently backwinded and fell way off the pin. By the time James passed the Stars they were on the reach so he was carried out from where he had wanted to go on the dead run and thereby lost even more time.

This let England catch up and soon they passed the US but could not catch Brazil who was off and running with a three minute lead. On the last beat England made up some time, but Reinaldo was really going and won the last race handily by 2:08 ahead of second place England.

REGATA No.7
POSITIONS AT THE MARKS

PLACE MARK2 3 1 2 1 FINAL 1 BL BL BL BL BL BL 2 US US US US K K 3 SR S S KA US KA 4 KH KH K K KZ KZ 5 S SR KH KZ KA N 6 GO K N S S US 7 Y GO GO KH G G 8 KA KA KA Y Y S 9 N Y KZ N N KH 10 K OE OE G OE GO 11 F N SR GO GO OE 12 OE F Y SR KH SR 13 GR KZ F OE SR KC 14 KZ KJ KJ KC KC Y 15 KJ GR G F E GR 16 H M KC E GR E 17 MX H M GR F I 18 M G GR MX MX F 19 D MX H VI VI MX 20 G KC MX D H KJ 21 P P P H M H 22 KC D I M D M 23 B I E P I P 24 VI B VI KJ P VI 25 I VI B I KJ B 26 RI E D B B PZ 27 E RI RI PZ PZ PR 28 SL SL PZ RI RI RI 29 PZ PZ SL SL SL SL 30 PR PR PR PR PR

U.S. team loses ground in ducking behind the Stars.

Lucky Brazil makes the mark ahead of the Stars.

The US had more hard luck and went out to sea too far to get knocked down while Australia, New Zealand and Norway were all lifted up to push the US back to a 6th place finish.

The regatta was now over and won. Horns blew and flares were lit as England was escorted back to the docks. It was England Gold, Germany Silver, and Brazil Bronze.

FD docks at the Club de Yates.

That night the closely guarded Caleta Hotel where the participants had been housed was opened to all - friends, wives, sweet-hearts and well-wishers - even a rather motley five piece Mexican street band which the noisy celebrants had dragged into the main dining room to perform for them. Their musical repertoire was limited, to say the least, but whenever they stopped they were showered with pesos, this led to dinner rolls, then silverware, then cushions from which their appreciative audience graduated to chairs. No one was hurt, but the Management had had enough and the bewildered-looking band was thrown out. When last seen the band was loaded into an old jeep and with as many nautical merry-makers as could hang on, went oom-pah-pahing into the night.

The closing ceremonies of the colorful Olympiad were held at the Club de Yates. In late evening after the sun had set, contestants marched into the field, circled once and stood beneath their flag. A small stand was erected at the club end of the field for the speakers and the winners. Mexican girls in bright native costumes carried the medals on pillows as they led the winners to the stand. When he received his medal the winner's flag was hoisted and his national anthem played.

Acapulco was barely over but already there was talk of Kiel in Germany only four years away.

OFFICIAL RESULTS OF THE 1968
OLYMPIAD IN ACAPULCO

1 Gt. Britain Rodney Pattisson DSQ-1-1-1-1-1-2 3 2 W. Germany Ullrich Libor 1-3-2-2-13-21-7 43.7 3 Brazil Reinaldo Conrad 14-7-4.3-3-10-1 48.4 4 Australia Carl Ryves 3-5-3-20-8-4-3 49.1 5 Norway Bjorn Lofterod 2-2-7-6-6-DNF-5 52.4 6 France Bertrand Cheret 5-4-20-9-4-2-18 68 7 Canada Roger Green 9-16-5-5-2-18-13 79 8 New Zealand Geoffrey Smale DSQ-8-9-12-9-8-4 84 9 Sweden Peter Kolni 12-DNF-8-14-5-14-8 96 10 United States Robert James Jr. DNF-9-14-18-15-3-6 97.4 11 Spain The Duke of Arion 10-14-6-10-10-20-16 101.7 12 E. Germany Hans-Jurgen Cochius 13-10-16-13-19-6-10 103.7 13 Yugoslavia Grego Anton 19.17-13-4-17-7-14 106 14 Hong Kong Neil Pride 11-13-15-8-21-16-9 108 15 U.S.S.R. Lev Prvalov 4-6-12-23-18.23-12 108.7 16 Denmark Hans Fogh 6-12-DSQ-7-12-11-DNF 113.7 17 Holland Ben Verhagen 16-11-18-17-14-5-21 116 18 Anstria Karl Geiger 18-15-10-16-16-12-11 116 19 Italy Carlo Massone 15-19-17-24-7-9-17 120 20 Mexico Lorenzo Villasenor 7-22-11-22-11-15-19 121 21 Hungary Paul Gomory 8-DNF-21-11-23-25-22 146 22 Greece George Andreadis 21-21-19-19-20-DNF-15 151 23 Belgium Christian Maes 22-DNS-25-15-22-13-25 158 24 Poland Andrzej Jwinski 20-18,24-25-25-17-26 165 25 Virgin Islands Rudy Thompson 17-23-22-27-26-24-24 172 26 Jamaica William Plant DNF-DNF-23-21-24-22-20 175 27 Portugal Orlando Sena 24-24-26-26-DNF-19-23 178 28 Puerto Rico Juan Torruella 23-20-27-28-27-26-27 186 29 Indonesia John Gunawan 26-25-28-29-28-28-28 199 30 San Salvadore Mario Aguilar 25-DNF-DNF-DNS-29-27-29 205

OLYMPIC SAILING 1968
by Bob James

Our editor, Bob Shanner, asked me to write a few words about the Olympic sailing in Acapulco. He said I could write about most anything I wanted, so I've taken liberty and just jotted down impressions, thoughts, excuses, hopes, and maybe some facts about Olympic Sailing 1968.

First of all, how did Dave and I earn the opportunity to be members of the U. S. Olympic Yachting Team and race the Flying Dutchman in the XIX Olympiad in Acapulco? I want to emphasize here at the outset, that getting there was tough and we managed to do it; but it was not tough enough to prepare us for the top competition and give us a chance at a gold medal. I will treat this subject in more detail later in this article.

We started working seriously toward the Olympics as a goal in October 1967. Since Dave was a new member of our team, we had a good deal of practicing to do before we could handle the boat effectively. We spent the fall and winter weekends working on our equipment and sailed as much as the weather would allow. We went to the Mid-Winters in February and were 3rd U. S. boat behind Bill Roberts and Tom Allen. At the Nationals we were 2nd U. S. boat behind Chris Chatain, but terribly close. Allen, Roberts and Turner were also fast, and we knew that these were the eastern skippers that were going to give us the most trouble at the trials. We really didn't know about the West Coast contingent at the time because the "big names" like Scott Allan. and Earl Elms hadn't competed with us yet. In the North Americans we were 4th U.S. boat behind Tom Allen, Ted Turner and Chris Chatain. Now, we knew the score. The boats that were really competitive were the same as at the Nationals -Allen, Chatain, Turner and Roberts. The trials worked out to be very close between all of us except Ted who had bad luck right from the outset and never recovered.

The thrill of winning the F .D. Olympic Trials and being selected to participate in the Olympics is one that I can't describe. We returned to Gloucester, Virginia from San Diego and the place was "buzzing". The phone was ringing all the time, there were interviews, the local civic organizations and Chamber of Commerce. The York River Yacht Club honored us with a special party and the Governor of Virginia declared Saturday, the 28th of September, "James Brothers Day in Virginia."

We traveled to Acapulco on the 29th, and on the 30th we put the boat together and began sweating. Acapulco is undoubtedly the most uncomfortable spot in the world that time of the year. If you do anything, sweat pours. We began sailing on the 1st of October and found the conditions out on the water very pleasant. As long as there was a breeze, and there was one most of the time, sailing was enjoyable. We "brushed" a little with Conrad from Brazil that day and were going as fast as he was. We tried to "brush" with two Spanish boats, but they were apparently conducting secret trials and wanted to have nothing to do with us. We would start with them and sail for a short while then they would go head-to-wind and roll their genoas -I couldn't figure it out.

The next couple of days Dave and I stayed very close to the bathroom -the local disease, commonly known as "Montezuma's Revenge" HIT US HARD. I recovered fairly well by the weekend, but Dave retained an infection, and upon Dr. Stuart Walker's recommendation (Stuart was middle man on our 5.5 entry) he rested for the next week. The result of all this was that we didn't practice enough. Tom Allen came to Acapulco as an alternate and he had his boat there to work out with us, but Dave and I were only able to sail against Tom a couple of days. This was not enough to really experiment with a number of sail combinations and find the best for the local conditions.

The Opening Ceremonies

We flew to Mexico City on October 12th and participated in the opening ceremony with the others on the U. S. Olympic Team. This was a thrilling experience indeed, and since I'm sure most of you readers saw it on television, I won't elaborate anymore. The opening ceremonies for the yachting events were on the 13th in Acapulco, and these were also very impressive. The Olympic flame was transported from Mexico City and a torch was lighted at Acapulco. There were speeches, lots of flag raising, fireworks, cannons, and other things to liven up the occasion.

The Racing

The official races began on October 14th with the wind blowing from the west at 12 to 15 knots. The race committee set a line which was almost impossible to lay on starboard so everyone packed the port end. A few of us saw we couldn't lay the pin, jibed, and attempted to go across on port -well, we didn't make it. New Zealand came aboard; and since they were still on starboard, we were out. There were many fouls and Canada protested Great Britain who won the race by some 3 minutes after starting last. Great Britain lost the protest and the race, and like us, started the series with a throwout. Everyone knew after this race that Rodney Pattisson had tremendous speed up-wind and down. He proved this in the remaining races of the series by winning five straight and getting a second in the last one, in winds ranging from heavy to light air during the series. He was forced to start conservatively and keep out of trouble because of his DSQ, so he just kept his air clear and stayed away from other competitors as much as possible. His speed was so great that he was able to win easily.

Our series was pretty poor, as can be seen in the final tabulation. We didn't have good speed in the beginning of the series and took chances to catch up which did not payoff. I'm sure you know the feeling well if you've raced the F.D. Speed is very important; and when you don't have it, you find out about it pretty early in the race, in fact, usually right after the start. You try to improve the speed by changing sail trim and making other adjustments under your control, and then as a last resort after getting pretty far behind, you start taking flyers. This may payoff when you are sailing against less experienced people, but in Olympic competition the leaders usually know the right way to go and trying to out-guess them is usually unsuccessful. Knowing that my speed is poor affects me in a lot of ways (just ask Dave sometime), but the net result is that I sail the boat poorly. Maybe I get "psyched up" or whatever you call it. We've all heard the saying, "There is nothing that makes a skipper look better than a fast boat." Well, I think it should be said that, " A fast boat makes a better skipper" because he has confidence in his equipment and he concentrates on sailing the boat as he should.

Our speed improved as the series proceeded. We experimented with sails and found a good combination for the Acapulco conditions. We may not be fast again until we sail in Acapulco; but I can say that in the last couple of races we were going almost as fast as the British and that's pretty fast. We had some bad breaks in the last couple of races, but our finishes of 3 and 6 were very much better than the earlier ones we had. We managed to finish the series in 10th place which we are not at all happy about, and there are about 28 others that competed with us that are stating similar feelings about their final standing.

The Conclusions

Now, I think we must address ourselves to answering two important questions before completing this article: namely, why were the British so fast and what should we do in the U.S. to make us more competitive in international events? I've thought about these questions pretty much since the Acapulco experience, and I'd like to pass on some of the conclusions I've drawn.

First of all, I think Rodney Pattisson and lain MacDonald-Smith were the best team sailing the F.D. in Acapulco. They had tremendous spirit, confidence, and everything else it takes to be ready for such an event. They had prepared themselves by spending more time practicing than any of the others and were handling the boat extremely well. Their tacks were unbelievably fast -some observers said 3-5 seconds and their spinnaker sets were taking 5 seconds or so. Both of these times were better than anyone else's and are maybe half the time it takes us to do these things. Obviously, you can't win races with just good tacks and spi sets, but I think we should use these examples as an indication of how well trained this team was. This training led to other things which you can't check with a stopwatch -namely, good boat balancing, steering, sail trimming and everything else that goes into making the boat move through the water fast. Sure, they had good equipment, but I think the teamwork was just as important. The basic equipment used by this team was similar to that used by a good many others in the event. They had a Bob Hoare boat, Musto main, Banks genoa and spinnaker and the rest they developed themselves. This boat had so many small differences to make it more sailable that I can't possibly mention them all here. I would doubt very much that Rodney and Iain sat down one day last winter and designed this layout. I would guess that it was developed during many hours of use and practice.

There is another important factor leading to the success of the British -the competition they had sailed against in preparation for the Olympics. They had to beat the 1967 World's Champion, John Oakeley, the 1964 Silver Medalist, Keith Musto; and many other top sailors to get to Acapulco. Only one person in our trials had even sailed in the Olympics or the Worlds before, and that was Harry Sindle, who represented the U. S. in the 1960 Olympics and the 1965 Worlds. High level competition is extremely important, and big events offer the best testing ground to evaluate performance. The British team had both conditions right in their back yard. They knew that Oakeley was the best in the world in 1967, and beating him was probably enough to win a medal in 1968. It appears to me that most of us in the top dozen positions in the Olympics are about where the British were in 1967. This is based on the performance of the New Zealand and Brazilian teams who finished 2nd and 4th in the 1967 Worlds, respectively. Now, what can we learn from all this? What must we do? I think we must concentrate on developing our own equipment and not just copy the British and other international competitors. If we copy them and use their equipment, we're always going to be a year or so behind them. They aren't going to put their newest developments on the market until they are tried and proven; and by the time they are available to you and me, they are obsolete. I have seen this happen several times with masts, booms, sails and boats over the past three years. We need to apply some of the powerful design talent and technology existing in the U.S. to these problems and develop boats, spars, sails and other equipment that have the potential of providing better performance. Next, the individual teams must train more and become better F.D. sailors. Out of the great number of F.D.'s in this country, we should have fifteen or twenty teams that are "hot" instead of five or so as is more often the case.

Finally, we must test our performance by competing internationally more frequently. We must have representatives in every big international event, and these teams must be selected after rigorous eliminations. Did you know that the U.S. representative in 1969 Worlds in Holland next July will probably be the 1968 National Champion because it will be too early to have a 1969 Nationals? I think there should be special eliminations for this World Championship and all such events where everyone knows what is at stake, how much support the USISA and other sources are going to provide, and everything else that is pertinent. By the way, I think enough money should be provided to cover all expenses and make it possible to ship one's equipment to the site. This is mandatory if we are going to prove anything. We have the Mid-winters, Nationals and North Americans each year; and if we can't select a team from one of these on a timely basis, then I think we should hold special eliminations. These representatives must be teams that are going to stay with us so that they can pass the information along to the rest of us and act as trial horses.

In summary, we must develop, we must train, and we must test. Let's come up with a few surprises which others will copy instead of the other way around. Let's work harder at sailing our boats and then, let's try like" HELL" to get to the best testing grounds -the international events. Who knows, maybe a U. S. Team will win a Gold Medal or a World's Championship. I'm willing to try, are you?