Compasses

Asked to choose among jewelry, lingerie, chocolates, or furs for a Christmas present, Karen chose... ...compasses!  These nice Suunto F-135 compasses removed from one of the beautiful sailboats that Jimmy Carolla maintained will replace the ratty hard-to-read ones on Mercedes.

Karen is giving me wonderful Christmas presents, too - a Makita 9237C rotary polisher, wet/dry sandpaper, polishing compound, and marine wax!  Exciting - really!

According to Paul Elvstrom

Danish sailor Paul Elvstrom passed away this month at the age of 88.  Often regarded as one of the best sailors the sport has ever witnessed, his preparation for racing and his ethical philosophy about competing make Paul a sailor I greatly admire.  Here's a short article in Sailing World written by Dave Perry about some of Paul's coaching truisms.

Paul Elvstrom racing with his daughter.

Schedule

I started a schedule document in calendar format for next season, and it's linked near the top of the Schedule page.  I will keep this updated as more information becomes available.  The current version of the document will always be the one linked, and the date listed in upper right corner of the document will identify it.  If you want this document in a different format than Excel, let me know.

Lindy Thomas

Karen and I had the honor to meet Lindy Thomas at the Chicago Yacht Club awards ceremony last night in which Lindy was inducted in the Lake Michigan Sail Racing Federation Hall of Fame.  He is an energetic, articulate, funny, fascinating character.  And at 88 years old, he moves a lot better than I do!  He has sailed and raced on sailboats of all kinds all over the world.  He told us some stories of the history of the Thomas 35 - the sailboat that he created.  He remembered having our boat when it was new and sailing it in the Race to Mackinac in 1993.  He has competed in 41 Mac races (so far)!  We want to try to sail with him sometime either on ours or on the Thomas 35 he sails out of San Diego, where he lives now!  

Follow!

I moved the "FOLLOW BY EMAIL" widget up to the top of the right column to make it easier to find.  Doing this sends you any new post in an email message.  Cheers!

Strictly Sail

I guess Strictly Sail can no longer make a go if it strictly sailing, so it's an embarrassing conglomerate for the exhibition now called Chicago Boat, RV & Strictly Sail Show.  Kind of ironic that "strictly" is still in the name.  It's at McCormick Place, January 11-15.  Karen and I are thinking of attending Saturday and maybe Sunday.

Lindy Thomas Hall of Fame induction

In the December issue of their news magazine, the Lake Michigan Sail Racing Federation writes that Lindy Thomas will be inducted in the Lake Michigan Sailing Hall of Fame as part of the Chicago Yacht Club Honors Ceremony on Wednesday, December 14, 2016, 6:30 pm CST, at Monroe Station.  The ceremony honors Chicago Yacht Club members who have made significant achievements in sailing.  Cost is $25 per person, including appetizers and two drink tickets.  Call 312.861.7777 to register for the event.

It's meaningful to me because Lindy Thomas is the namesake behind Thomas Marine and the driving force in creating the Thomas 35.

December issue of Lake Michigan Sail Racing Federation  (48 pages long!)

Safety at Sea courses

US Sailing offers safety at sea courses that are conducted by sailing professionals and cover a comprehensive set of safety topics applicable to offshore distance racing as well as coastal sailing.  They are offered as 1-day and 2-day sessions that also include on-the-water training.  It looks like the 1-day courses cost $180.  Organizing bodies of big races like the Chicago to Mackinac race recommend these courses.  There are interesting locations scheduled in the next several months, like San Diego, Long Beach, Boston, and Annapolis, but also Chicago and Muskegon.  The events close to home are:

• January 14, 2017 (1-day course) - Chicago, McCormick Place (this is held during the Strictly Sail exposition)
• March 11, 2017 (1-day course) - Columbia YC, Chicago 
• May 6-7, 2017 (2-day course) - Muskegon YC, Muskegon

Safety at Sea course listing and curriculum

I'm going to attend either the January or March offering.  We could car-pool if you want to join in the fun!

TED talk on sailboat racing and design

I gave a TED-style presentation at Whirlpool a few years ago about about how competitive sailboat racing applies to user experience interaction design (my field).  Thought you might get a kick out of the imagery and the parallels I tried to draw.

Winning definition of user experience design

Tall ship "Mercedes"

The tall ship "Mercedes", not to be confused with our humble short ship "Mercedes", was recently visiting in Liverpool.  She is a square-rigged brig, built in 2005 as a replica of old merchant mariners.  Her home port is Amsterdam.  I don't want to hear any complaints about sail handling work, what with only 1 mast and a maximum of 3 sails flying!

New slip

West Basin Marina called us yesterday and said that "on the waiting list, our name has come up for a slip for next season". So, it looks we will have Mercedes slipped at West Basin, avoiding the transit under two bridges to get to the lake! Yay!

Logofont

I'm thinking about this font for the boat name. Mercedes is my nickname for Karen, and named after Edmond Dantes' fiancee in Count of Monte Cristo.  I'd like to evoke a kind of old European look.  This uses a gold gradient, thematically for the gold treasure that Edmond discovered on the island of Monte Cristo after he escaped from the Chateau D'If prison.  The ripples on the bottom of the letters remind me of water.  Any thoughts?

Update:  I just received a proof copy of the logofont graphic from the nice people at SignsSpecialists.com.  It includes the accents on the second and third "e", to be historically accurate!  This might distinguish Mercedes Dantes from the car company a little!  Here it is:

Spin pole

Instead of the nice Caribbean ocean view I found, Karen substituted one of her favorite pictures on the blog for a background image - a carbon fiber spinnaker pole.  (It's her Christmas present!)