Issue 56, July-August 2018

Has your winter been more spinach & feta than olympic triangles?. Do you look forward to the sausage in your full english more than the downwind leg?

With September Sprints looming there's no better way to rid yourself of the Augustus Gloops. In the words of Willy Wonka "Terrific pressure is building up, the suspense is terrible".

Start preparing boat, body, mind; as the prep flag will be raised before you know it. Or start the season on a wing and a prayer with a boat full of corroded parts and you'll get to meet our new rescue boat crew members - that'll be nice.

Before the new season kicks off there are some events and new procedures you need to be aware of so please read on.

And remember there's no bad weather, just the wrong clothes.

Boyd Newton, nearly half of 'Da Easy Crew, Editor.

Important Info

Please look into the following as others may be relying on you to do so:

Dubious Info

Check your sails before the new season. I was shocked to find one of ours only has two corners remaining. What happened, I've no clew!

New Members

We are lucky to grow the BSC family once more.

We look forward to seeing you on the water soon.

"Roly and several other yachties came to our club from Middle Harbour Yacht Club back in 2000. This group went on to form the basis of the Balmoral Sailing Club Cruisers group, still active today. Roly has been the convener and Class Captain of this group, now much smaller in number, for quite a number of years.

Middle Harbour’s loss has certainly been our gain however, with Roly being a key part of our Club’s infrastructure management for many years - more often than not, working behind the scenes for our benefit.

Roly’s work for the club extends from co-ordinating clubhouse maintenance to keeping our club boats ready for action each Saturday. In addition, Roly is a frequent volunteer on one of our Safety boats on race days and has been active in helping design the safety boat handling course for new volunteers.

Not one to suffer perceived fools or incompetents easily and sometimes prone to the odd whinge, Roly has achieved much for the club through several terms of board membership

On the clubhouse side, Roly’s practical knowledge of engineering, buildings and project management gained through his working life has been utilized to the benefit of the club.

Whether painting out change room showers and toilets or laying down a new coat of varnish on the clubhouse floor, making up new boat racking or removing balcony railings or pulling in favours from previous work colleagues to get us new cupboards or a new BBQ, Roly has been a key player in our clubhouse maintenance program for many years.

With regard to our club boats, Balmoral, Hunter Bay and Eric Hart, Roly has been instrumental in maintaining these vessels in a state of readiness for the past three years. During this time, he has forged new relationships on our behalf with both Clontarf Marine and Northern Beaches Marine - the outcome being our Start and Safety boats are always in good shape.

More recently, work overseen by Roly has seen the serviceable life of these boats extended by a further 5 – 7 years, meaning a considerable long term saving to the club.

So Roly has been a key contributor and worker for the club for nearly 20 years.

I think it is entirely appropriate that his efforts, on behalf of our club, be formally recognized by us conferring the honour of Life Member to Roland Whittel-Webb."

Graham Hanna
Commodore, BSC

Know someone we should recognise?

Email Boyd details of someone quietly working away behind the scenes.

That may be the question - but the answer is "Yes I will help".

Our Commodore, Graham Hanna, has taken care of canteen goods purchasing for the last ten years and the time has come to hand this over to someone else.

You may know that Liz and Graham moved from Sydney to Bonnells Bay on Lake Macquarie so it has become difficult to continue with this job and commute to Balmoral for sailing each week.

To help with the role we have a Campbell’s Cash and Carry account with access to both branch pickup and online delivery. Easier still is an established shopping checklist with stock type, quantities, pricing and specials notification.

Here is an opportunity for one of our members to simply carry on with the purchasing task as set up by Graham or to review our processes and stock type then modify as determined to make it your own.

Think you can help?

Graham can answer any queries and help you transition into the role if you're ready to take the plunge.

Please contact Graham
e: commodore@balmoralsc.com.au
p: 0413 290 451

Thank you.

New season introduces electronic race sign on procedure.

BSC's website has an online form available from a day before the race that can be used from your home computer, tablet or smartphone. To cancel a previous sign on there is a separate online form.

On each race day there will be two tablets available at the club if you prefer signing on there.

Help will be available at the club for the first races in September and October.

Whale's Tales pioneering Editor, turned Editourist, sends this from the other hemisphere...

Thought you might be able to use a few pictures of Junior Sailing in Spain for Whale's Tales. The kids were showing the same enthusiasm as at BSC and also had to manoeuvre between the big boats to get back on shore.

Interestingly the boats were all stored, tied down in a parking area or in racks out in the open. Members’ cars, however, were all parked under shelters.

Keep up the good work.

Cheers,
Sue Halloran

I was first put in a sailing boat when I was a baby - a very long time ago. Through these years I have been a member of five different sailings clubs around Sydney. Three on Upper Sydney Harbour, one on the main harbour and the other on Pittwater. I’ve sailed Flying 11’s, sabots, Lasers, Tasars and keelboats and enjoyed competing in World, Australian and State Championships. Even winning some of these when I was a child.

Most recently I sailed a North Shore 310 with my husband but a couple of years ago we decided we really liked small boat sailing better. Earlier this year, he bought the one man Aero. I love being on the water but this boat wasn’t for me so when he joined BSC I decided to volunteer for the rescue boat team.

It was great to turn up for the first time at BSC and meet Anita and other members of the club who were so welcoming and friendly and made me feel part of the team/club immediately.

I love being on the rescue/start boats – it’s a fun way to spend a Saturday afternoon. The sailing conditions at Balmoral also make it interesting. The calmer conditions of the bay are great for less experienced sailors and the sound provides a good challenge for the more experienced with the swell and stronger winds.

Balmoral Sailing Club keeps information regarding club members, such as contact details, boat storage and emergency contacts in a database developed by a club member. Among other things this information is used to keep track of boat storage and to invoice members for annual fees at the beginning of each season.

Australian Sailing also stores information on all club members and issues an Australian Sailing number which is required to sail in any Class Association event. To-date information regarding club members has been entered into the Australian Sailing database manually by one of our club members.

To avoid double handling and to give each member responsibility for their own information it has been decided to give each member access to the information held in the Sailing Australia database and for them to be responsible for the accuracy of the information held. In the longer term the club will rely on the information held by Australian Sailing and will discontinue its own database. It is expected that these changes will lead to a number of benefits for the club.

To commence this procedure each club member will receive an email in the next week or so giving details how to access their information held by Australian Sailing. In the case of family memberships the email will be sent to the family member who normally receives the annual invoice. When you receive this email you are asked to follow the instructions in the email to access your information and check that the information held is accurate and update any information required. In many cases you will note that your date of birth information is incorrect and you are asked to pay particular attention to it and correct it where necessary. On an ongoing basis when some of your information, such as address or email address changes, it will be your responsibility to log in and update it. For family memberships the designated family member will be responsible for verifying and updating information held on the members of their family.

Your cooperation in this will be much appreciated and should lead to less work by your Board and a more accurate database.

Cyborgs sidelined in new class rules

If introduced at BSC I may be in trouble with my titanium spine, phakic intraocular lenses and a shoulder full of bioabsorbable screws. Luckily for me these rules apply to the next America's Cup.

From the America's Cup website:

There’s a curious clause in the new class rule for the AC75 boat to be sailed in the next America’s Cup. It reads: “There shall be eleven crew members, unless reduced by accident, who shall all be human beings."

Emirates Team New Zealand’s technical director, Dan Bernasconi, chuckles at its mention. “It’s a little bit tongue-in-cheek”, he says.

“But you never know. People are always looking for the last bit of performance to get out of the boat. Whether anyone would turn up with a crew full of androids, who would know?” he says.

From a team that came up with “cyclors” in the last Cup, they certainly didn't think it would be so out-of-this-world for someone to invent cyborgs for the next.

Those are the kind of outside-the-square notions that Emirates Team NZ has had to think of when devising the document that defines how the new foiling monohull is built, and who will sail it, in the 2021 America’s Cup.

More links to the America's Cup: