Mudbox

PA Schedule

Wed, 01 Oct 2008 16:10:38 Z

This is the schedule as I as I currently have it.

Tuesday Afternoon

I am picking up Malene & Andrew from NWR - Newark Airport at 13:25 (CO 77) and driving to Wall Street. Pia & Michael are arriving 13:05 so perhaps pick up everybody?

Wednesday Afternoon

I am picking up Ina & far from NWR - Newark Airport at 14:45 (SK909)

Thursday Afternoon

I will drive from New York to Philadelphia. I have rented a minivan and will be able to sit 6 people. Destination will be the hotel:

View Larger Map

Thursday Evening

We will eat dinner at The Moshulu restaurant on the waterfront.

Friday

The day is free to roam around the city of Philadelphia and see some of the many sights. There are many things to see immediately around the hotel. Take a look at this map and click images to see random snapshots.

Some things are serious:

Other things are .. well .. not .. so serious:

There will also be a chance for Andrew to get a real pretzel and possibly find the city’s best cheesesteak

Saturday

The day of the wedding. There should be plenty of free time for those who do not have hair appointments ….

Sunday

The expectations are that the New York party will head back to the city. Katie and I will stay an extra day in Philadelphia so either somebody else will have to drive – or – we can get some Amtrak tickets directly from Philadelphia – 30th Street Station to New York – Penn Station. The trip takes between 1:15 and 1:30 depending on the exact train.

Pia & Michael are flying back from Newark – NWR around 21:00. Probably best to just take a train from Philadelphia – 30th Street Station directly to the NWR AirTrain.

Monday

Katie and I will drive back to New York.

Thursday

Ina & far are flying back from NWR at 17:20 (SK904).
Malene & Andrew are flying back from NWR at 20:55 (CO 76).

I will be working that day so cannot drop people off at the airport, so we will probably arrange cars for the trip.

HomePage

Sun, 28 Sep 2008 13:43:48 Z

If you are here then you are probably looking for the USA 702 wiki .. that is the only thing with content.

Temp page with PA Schedule

Unloading Images

Sun, 27 Jul 2008 18:59:32 Z

General Stuff
Home
About Me
About The Boat
Mini Links
History Of Updates

Written Stuff
Picking A Boat
2005 Bermuda1-2

Photo Stuff
Unloading Images
Shipping Images
Build Images
2005 MYC J24 Regatta
2005 Bermuda1-2 Start

Video Stuff
J24 Regatta in NY Harbor
Bermuda1-2 Shark Video
2005 Qualification Sail

Map Stuff

Check out all the minis in North America! Let me know if there is anything to add or correct.

Hobie33 Stuff
Looking for the old Hobie33 website? That website is still online, but is has been moved here and is no longer maintained.

Contact Stuff
Got something to say? You can contact me via email, carrier pigeon, or simple telepathy if you wish.

Copyright Stuff
Creative Commons – Baby!
Just let me know if you you want to use anything from this site .. and of course .. attribute it back.

Some images of the boats in the container and after they were taken out. The red boat is 703 which is also going to the East coast.

And yes .. the boats were very tightly packed in the container.

News

Sat, 26 Jul 2008 13:50:19 Z

07/23/2008

The boats are out of the container! Yes it is true .. they are finally seeing the light of day (the rain of Dolly). Got some photos of 702 sitting in the yard in TX. ~~Will post them tonight.~~ I put up a page with some of the Unloading Images that were taken in TX.

06/21/2008

Just ran across two images of the 2005 Bermuda1-2 Start and decided to post them.

05/24/2008

The boats (702 and 703) are finally in the container and should be on their way to Rotterdam as I write this. Finally .. progress!

04/04/2008

Got more pictures of the boat. Created Shipping Images and put the pictures there.

03/29/2008

Contemplating names … Frogger seems to be in the lead at the moment.

03/26/2008

Got two additional images of the boat from Adrian. ~~I added them to the Build Images page.~~ I put them onto the newly created Shipping Images page.

03/20/2008

Took the list of minis compiled by Adrian and plotted it using the Google Map API. The map is in the menu on the right.

Container Shots

Sat, 26 Jul 2008 13:44:54 Z

General Stuff
Home
About Me
About The Boat
Mini Links
History Of Updates

Written Stuff
Picking A Boat
2005 Bermuda1-2

Photo Stuff
Unloading Images
Shipping Images
Build Images
2005 MYC J24 Regatta
2005 Bermuda1-2 Start

Video Stuff
J24 Regatta in NY Harbor
Bermuda1-2 Shark Video
2005 Qualification Sail

Map Stuff

Check out all the minis in North America! Let me know if there is anything to add or correct.

Hobie33 Stuff
Looking for the old Hobie33 website? That website is still online, but is has been moved here and is no longer maintained.

Contact Stuff
Got something to say? You can contact me via email, carrier pigeon, or simple telepathy if you wish.

Copyright Stuff
Creative Commons – Baby!
Just let me know if you you want to use anything from this site .. and of course .. attribute it back.

Some images of the boat in the container. The boat in the first shot is actually 703 … but does show how tightly the boats were packed.

2005 Bermuda1-2 Start

Sun, 22 Jun 2008 21:51:17 Z

General Stuff
Home
About Me
About The Boat
Mini Links
History Of Updates

Written Stuff
Picking A Boat
2005 Bermuda1-2

Photo Stuff
Unloading Images
Shipping Images
Build Images
2005 MYC J24 Regatta
2005 Bermuda1-2 Start

Video Stuff
J24 Regatta in NY Harbor
Bermuda1-2 Shark Video
2005 Qualification Sail

Map Stuff

Check out all the minis in North America! Let me know if there is anything to add or correct.

Hobie33 Stuff
Looking for the old Hobie33 website? That website is still online, but is has been moved here and is no longer maintained.

Contact Stuff
Got something to say? You can contact me via email, carrier pigeon, or simple telepathy if you wish.

Copyright Stuff
Creative Commons – Baby!
Just let me know if you you want to use anything from this site .. and of course .. attribute it back.

Two photos of the 2005 Bermuda1-2 Start. Nice hat – eh?

About Me

Mon, 26 May 2008 13:49:42 Z

General Stuff
Home
About Me
About The Boat
Mini Links
History Of Updates

Written Stuff
Picking A Boat
2005 Bermuda1-2

Photo Stuff
Unloading Images
Shipping Images
Build Images
2005 MYC J24 Regatta
2005 Bermuda1-2 Start

Video Stuff
J24 Regatta in NY Harbor
Bermuda1-2 Shark Video
2005 Qualification Sail

Map Stuff

Check out all the minis in North America! Let me know if there is anything to add or correct.

Hobie33 Stuff
Looking for the old Hobie33 website? That website is still online, but is has been moved here and is no longer maintained.

Contact Stuff
Got something to say? You can contact me via email, carrier pigeon, or simple telepathy if you wish.

Copyright Stuff
Creative Commons – Baby!
Just let me know if you you want to use anything from this site .. and of course .. attribute it back.

So what can I write about myself.

The Beginning
I have basically been sailing since I was born (well, since I was 6 month old anyway). Of course the first couple of years I really did not contrbute a lot but at least I was hanging out in the cockpit getting used to the montion of the sea and learning to swear like a proper sailor.

I grep up in Denmark and followed a fairly normal sailing path for that area. First sailing with my father on his boat and then when it was time to set out on my own I got an Optimist. I sailed and raced the Opti in the local sailclub almost every day. After the Opti I switched to an Yngling and raced and taught on that for a few years. Then I had the good fortuned of skippering a 1/4 Tonner for a season in some offshore races.

I then sailed other peoples boats for a while which was good. Got a chace to play around on large Swans, ULDBs, various Js (24, 44, 105), some one-offs, 12meters and what not …

Single Handed
At this point I was (and still am) living in the US and worked a ‘real’ job – it was time to get my own boat. At this point I really wanted to get into singlehanded offshore sailing. Dont get me wrong, racing to Bermuda on a J44 is great fun, but I really wanted to ditch the 11 other people. So, I went out and got a Hobie33 and raced that for two seasons to try and determine if I linked this single handed sailing nonsense.

I did.

Picking A Boat

Mon, 26 May 2008 13:48:24 Z

General Stuff
Home
About Me
About The Boat
Mini Links
History Of Updates

Written Stuff
Picking A Boat
2005 Bermuda1-2

Photo Stuff
Unloading Images
Shipping Images
Build Images
2005 MYC J24 Regatta
2005 Bermuda1-2 Start

Video Stuff
J24 Regatta in NY Harbor
Bermuda1-2 Shark Video
2005 Qualification Sail

Map Stuff

Check out all the minis in North America! Let me know if there is anything to add or correct.

Hobie33 Stuff
Looking for the old Hobie33 website? That website is still online, but is has been moved here and is no longer maintained.

Contact Stuff
Got something to say? You can contact me via email, carrier pigeon, or simple telepathy if you wish.

Copyright Stuff
Creative Commons – Baby!
Just let me know if you you want to use anything from this site .. and of course .. attribute it back.

The arguments below are based on my uneducated, not-based-on-facts, subjective opinions – I encourage you to disagree.

How I decided on which boat to get, ordered it, and got it shipped to the US.

Which Type Of Boat

Deciding to get a new boat was the easy part. Deciding which boat to get … that was
a whole different issue. I brieﬂy considered two boat types in addition to the mini. The first was the Holby Quest 33 which Iʼve always though was a great boat. But it is expensive .. quite expensive. The other boat was the Annapolis 30. This looked like an interesting design and a boat what I would be able to take other people out on. But it was not designed for singlehanded sailing and I really did not want to get into another situation where I was buying a boat from a yard that was trying to start up. Good thing too .. as of this writing, the ﬁrst A30 has still not been built. So I went with the Mini. I have been looking at minis since I lived back in Europe and was actually considering buying USA 175 back when it was for sale.

Which Type Of Mini

Deciding which type of mini to buy.

Proto or Series?

For me this was clear .. I wanted a production (series) boat. The prototypes are a bit faster but also a lot more expensive and complex. The series design gives you 90% of the performance with 10% of the cost/maintenance/complexity (depending on who you ask the numbers will change a little .. but the general consensus is clear).

The TamTam

The TamTam is (was?) a new design by Magnen. It is an aggressive design striving for lots of power and low weight. The boat was supposed to be build in Canada which seemed like a big plus since I am located in New York.

Things were looking good for the build. They had the first boat built, the had the designer working there as well as other noted mini sailors.

Images of the TamTam

I signed a contract for the TamTam back in 2006 – even met with the owner of the yard in Newport to go over the details – but the yard shut down before any boats were delivered. To this day the status of the project remains unclear, but I don’t think they will ever go into production. They missed their chance.

The money were eventually returned but it was a bad experience and set me back over a year in terms of getting my boat.

Other Designs

I once again took stock of the series minis designs that I liked. The boats I seriously looked at where (in no particular order): TipTop, Ginto, Zero, and Pogo2. All of these boats are build in Europe (in France except the Zero which is build in Spain) so there would be logistics problem with shipping the boat and a language barrier to overcome.

Images of the Ginto and the Zero

The Pogo2 is a Finot design and is considered by many people to be the de-facto series design. There are lots of Pogos sailing around in Europe, and most of the top sailors pick the Pogo2. Lots of time has been put into fine tuning the Pogo2 sails and there are training camps in Europe where the top sails get their Pogo2s up to speed.

Images of the Pogo2

As a result – the Pogo2 typically wins the series class in major regattas.

TipTop vs Pogo2

Deciding between the two designs.

In the end I narrowed it down to either the TipTop or the Pogo2. The following are the criteria I used to decide between the two boats. Be aware that these are my uneducated, not-based-on-facts, subjective opinions – I encourage you to disagree.

Images of the TipTop

Track Record 

I don’t think the Pogo2 is an inherently faster boat, but the record clearly shows that the Pogo2 wins more than any other series design. Personaly I think this is a result of the sailors that are sailing the Pogos and the training programs/camps set up. Never the less, it is difficult to argue against the record and it clearly states that the Pogo2 wins more than the TipTop.
Winner: Pogo2

Cockpit

The Pogo2 has a very shallow cockpit and rounded sides. I did not like this. The TipTop’s cockpit is a bit deeper and the side are vertical. The cockpit floor is also flatter as there is no box in the back of the boat.
Winner: TipTop

Cabin Entrance

A lot of people like the Pogo2 entrance and say it is easier to get in and out (which I am sure it is), but I think the TipTop entrance provides better protection (less rain in the boat) and also provides protection for instruments mounted on the bulkhead. Note: the rules regarding the cabin entrance were changed in late 2007 after I made my decision regrading this. As a result the TipTop cabin entrance had to be modified. I don’t know if the Pogo2 entrance was modified.
Winner: TipTop

Tillers

I have yet to hear from a single person who does not think the Pogo2 two-tiller setup is uncomfortable.
Winner: TipTop

Hull

Actually I think the Pogo2 and the TipTop have a lot of similarities, but the TipTop is a bit more powerful and a bit more like the TamTam.
Winner: TipTop

Auto Pilot

The TipTop has a below deck autopilot hookup that can be engaged and disengaged from the cockpit (other series designs have the same thing). The Pogo2 does not. The pilot ram is either permanently attached or mounted in the cockpit.
Winner: TipTop

Sails

Much more development has gone into the Pogo2 sails than the TipTop. I am sure I could go to any of the major lofts in Europe and get excellent Pogo2 sails .. not so with the TipTop.
Winner: Pogo2

Interior

I like the “pantry” and “navigation station” setup in the TipTop. I don’t really know why I like it. The Pogo2 has a similar – but removable – setup that I don’t like. Crazy? Maybe … I also figured it would be easier to create stacking racks inside the TipTop than in the Pogo2.
Winner: TipTop

Rig

The rig is very similar on the two boats and I don’t think one is better than the other. Winner: Its a tie.

Responsiveness & Communications

The TipTop sales manager speaks and writes excellent English and has been prompt when responding to emails. The Structures yard? I have never gotten a reply from them …
Winner: TipTop

Conclusion?

In the end I decided to get the TipTop.

Logistics

Getting the boat to the US.

I had previously been in contact with Adrian from North American Mini Transat (NAMT) about possibly buying a Zero and having it shipped to Rhode Island. I contacted Adrian once more to find out if he could be talked into arranging the purchase and shipping of the boat to the US. I figured he was already importing Zeros so he was already juggling Container.

As it turned out, Adrian did not need much encouragement to pick up the TipTop ball and run with it. Within a few weeks I was signing a contract and he started the process of getting two new TipTop’s sent to the US. Now it was just a matter of waiting.

To be continued …

Old

Mon, 26 May 2008 13:43:12 Z

12/17/2007

Just got some build pictures from the yard (via Adrian). Sorry for the poor quality .. me thinks the TipTop guys need to get themselves a new camera! The pictures are on the Build Images page.

11/18/2007

Added a link to Nathan’s website http://www.withoutletters.com on the links page. Nathan is the new owner of USA 680.

00/00/00

The beginning of the world …

J24 Regatta in NY Harbor

Tue, 08 Apr 2008 23:35:25 Z

General Stuff
Home
About Me
About The Boat
Mini Links
History Of Updates

Written Stuff
Picking A Boat
2005 Bermuda1-2

Photo Stuff
Unloading Images
Shipping Images
Build Images
2005 MYC J24 Regatta
2005 Bermuda1-2 Start

Video Stuff
J24 Regatta in NY Harbor
Bermuda1-2 Shark Video
2005 Qualification Sail

Map Stuff

Check out all the minis in North America! Let me know if there is anything to add or correct.

Hobie33 Stuff
Looking for the old Hobie33 website? That website is still online, but is has been moved here and is no longer maintained.

Contact Stuff
Got something to say? You can contact me via email, carrier pigeon, or simple telepathy if you wish.

Copyright Stuff
Creative Commons – Baby!
Just let me know if you you want to use anything from this site .. and of course .. attribute it back.

This video was taking on a lazy summer evening when we had our first ever “Unofficial BB Regatta” in NY Harbor. The sailing was terrible .. the race was fun .. and I got a chance to play around with my helmet cam. And yes – we did win – and we got a cheesy little trophy which matched the event well.

Warning if you consider yourself a good sailor don’t watch this video. You may need a gallon of eye bleach afterwards. But it was a lot of fun!

Oh and the lack of spin pole is actually because the boat did not have one .. though one of the other boats thought that was a super-secret trick of ours.

The full Quicktime version can be downloaded from Revver.

About The Boat

Tue, 08 Apr 2008 23:34:17 Z

General Stuff
Home
About Me
About The Boat
Mini Links
History Of Updates

Written Stuff
Picking A Boat
2005 Bermuda1-2

Photo Stuff
Unloading Images
Shipping Images
Build Images
2005 MYC J24 Regatta
2005 Bermuda1-2 Start

Video Stuff
J24 Regatta in NY Harbor
Bermuda1-2 Shark Video
2005 Qualification Sail

Map Stuff

Check out all the minis in North America! Let me know if there is anything to add or correct.

Hobie33 Stuff
Looking for the old Hobie33 website? That website is still online, but is has been moved here and is no longer maintained.

Contact Stuff
Got something to say? You can contact me via email, carrier pigeon, or simple telepathy if you wish.

Copyright Stuff
Creative Commons – Baby!
Just let me know if you you want to use anything from this site .. and of course .. attribute it back.

There are two general types of Minis: the “protos” and the “series” designs. The “protos” are all out carbon wonders with canting keels, water ballast, and just about any other tweak or innovation you can imagine. The “series” designs are production runs and are made from glass-fiber (no carbon allowed), have aluminum masts, fixed keels, and no water ballast.

USA 702 is TipTop which is a Manuard designed “series” mini. Manuard is know for designing very powerful prototypes and has himself competed very successfully in the Minitransat several times. The Picking A Boat page has info on why I choose the Tiptop.

As far as I know the TipTop is Manuard’s first series design. It is a relatively new design with about 30 boats build so far. The builder of the TipTop design is Voiliers Bepox which is located in La Rochelle, France. If your French is better than mine then you can read all about them on their website.

The basic boat spec (as taken from the builder’s website):

Boat                                    Sails
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Length:         6.50 m  (21.32')        Main:          26 sqm (280 sqf)
Width:          3.00 m  (9.84')         Genoa:         22 sqm (237 sqf)
Draft:          1.60 m  (5.25')         Jib:           14 sqm (150 sqf)
Weight:       *1,050 kg (2,315 lbs)     Spinnaker 1:   75 sqm (807 sqf)
                                        Spinnaker 2:   40 sqm (430 sqf)
(*) +/- 5%                              Code Zero:     28 sqm (301 sqf)

The minis are quite small (hence the name Mini .. duh!) but they are designed to sail across the Atlantic in fairly severe conditions. Because of this they have a number of safety features such as an escape hatch, dedicated area for the life raft, they must remain floating event when filled with water.

One of the sights that are associated with Minis is the stability test, where the boat is healed 90^o and a weight is suspended from the mast. Under these conditions the boat must right itself. Below are two images from http://mini650.de from his stability test.

Also take note of the orange foils (keel & rudders). The rules specify that these must be painted fluo orange .. but of course we all know that the real reason to do this is that orange is fast!

Shipping Images

Sat, 05 Apr 2008 11:19:09 Z

General Stuff
Home
About Me
About The Boat
Mini Links
History Of Updates

Written Stuff
Picking A Boat
2005 Bermuda1-2

Photo Stuff
Unloading Images
Shipping Images
Build Images
2005 MYC J24 Regatta
2005 Bermuda1-2 Start

Video Stuff
J24 Regatta in NY Harbor
Bermuda1-2 Shark Video
2005 Qualification Sail

Map Stuff

Check out all the minis in North America! Let me know if there is anything to add or correct.

Hobie33 Stuff
Looking for the old Hobie33 website? That website is still online, but is has been moved here and is no longer maintained.

Contact Stuff
Got something to say? You can contact me via email, carrier pigeon, or simple telepathy if you wish.

Copyright Stuff
Creative Commons – Baby!
Just let me know if you you want to use anything from this site .. and of course .. attribute it back.

Some more images from Bepox. These are of the boat getting ready to be shipped to the US.

History Of Updates

Fri, 04 Apr 2008 22:43:28 Z

General Stuff
Home
About Me
About The Boat
Mini Links
History Of Updates

Written Stuff
Picking A Boat
2005 Bermuda1-2

Photo Stuff
Unloading Images
Shipping Images
Build Images
2005 MYC J24 Regatta
2005 Bermuda1-2 Start

Video Stuff
J24 Regatta in NY Harbor
Bermuda1-2 Shark Video
2005 Qualification Sail

Map Stuff

Check out all the minis in North America! Let me know if there is anything to add or correct.

Hobie33 Stuff
Looking for the old Hobie33 website? That website is still online, but is has been moved here and is no longer maintained.

Contact Stuff
Got something to say? You can contact me via email, carrier pigeon, or simple telepathy if you wish.

Copyright Stuff
Creative Commons – Baby!
Just let me know if you you want to use anything from this site .. and of course .. attribute it back.

Recent Updates

07/23/2008

06/21/2008

Just ran across two images of the 2005 Bermuda1-2 Start and decided to post them.

05/24/2008

The boats (702 and 703) are finally in the container and should be on their way to Rotterdam as I write this. Finally .. progress!

04/04/2008

Got more pictures of the boat. Created Shipping Images and put the pictures there.

03/29/2008

Contemplating names … Frogger seems to be in the lead at the moment.

03/26/2008

Got two additional images of the boat from Adrian. ~~I added them to the Build Images page.~~ I put them onto the newly created Shipping Images page.

03/20/2008

Took the list of minis compiled by Adrian and plotted it using the Google Map API. The map is in the menu on the right.

Older Updates

12/17/2007

Just got some build pictures from the yard (via Adrian). Sorry for the poor quality .. me thinks the TipTop guys need to get themselves a new camera! The pictures are on the Build Images page.

11/18/2007

Added a link to Nathan’s website http://www.withoutletters.com on the links page. Nathan is the new owner of USA 680.

00/00/00

The beginning of the world …

USA 702

Thu, 03 Apr 2008 22:19:17 Z

General Stuff
Home
About Me
About The Boat
Mini Links
History Of Updates

Written Stuff
Picking A Boat
2005 Bermuda1-2

Photo Stuff
Unloading Images
Shipping Images
Build Images
2005 MYC J24 Regatta
2005 Bermuda1-2 Start

Video Stuff
J24 Regatta in NY Harbor
Bermuda1-2 Shark Video
2005 Qualification Sail

Map Stuff

Check out all the minis in North America! Let me know if there is anything to add or correct.

Hobie33 Stuff
Looking for the old Hobie33 website? That website is still online, but is has been moved here and is no longer maintained.

Contact Stuff
Got something to say? You can contact me via email, carrier pigeon, or simple telepathy if you wish.

Copyright Stuff
Creative Commons – Baby!
Just let me know if you you want to use anything from this site .. and of course .. attribute it back.

Welcome to the amazing super-spider-monkey website for USA 702. Trying out a Wiki as the CMS for this site. Lets see how it goes.

Recent Updates

07/23/2008

06/21/2008

Just ran across two images of the 2005 Bermuda1-2 Start and decided to post them.

05/24/2008

The boats (702 and 703) are finally in the container and should be on their way to Rotterdam as I write this. Finally .. progress!

04/04/2008

Got more pictures of the boat. Created Shipping Images and put the pictures there.

03/29/2008

Contemplating names … Frogger seems to be in the lead at the moment.

03/26/2008

Got two additional images of the boat from Adrian. ~~I added them to the Build Images page.~~ I put them onto the newly created Shipping Images page.

03/20/2008

Took the list of minis compiled by Adrian and plotted it using the Google Map API. The map is in the menu on the right.