Team Racing Today
Team racing is growing in popularity among sailors who enjoy the fast-paced action and challenge. Team Racing regattas are often held amongst universities and secondary schools that field teams in the Intercollegiate Sailing Association and the Interscholastic Sailing Association. Additionally many yacht clubs compete against each other in team racing regattas. Team racing is particularly strong in the UK, the birthplace of the sport. There is also an annual British Universities Sailing Association Team Racing Championship, contested by 32 teams after several rounds of regional qualifiers. UK schools are also active with annual championships organised via the British Schools Dinghy Racing Association, which caters especially for private independent schools, and the National Schools Sailing Association.
Because team racing must be conducted in equal boats the most popular boats for team racing are one-design dinghies or keelboats. The Optimist, 420, Vanguard 15, Firefly or Flying Junior are the dinghies most frequently used for team racing. Also, for keel-boats, the Sonar is becoming popular and is used in the yearly team race format Kirby Cup regatta. In the UK the Firefly, a 12 foot, two-sailed dinghy, designed by Uffa Fox, is the most commonly used boat. The Firefly is ideal for team racing because it lacks high performance features such as spinnaker and trapeze that can hinder team racing tactics, is highly manoeuvrable, and easily handled by women and juniors.
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Famous quotes containing the words team, racing and/or today:
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—Chinese proverb.
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—Barbara Ehrenreich (b. 1941)
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—Christopher Hope (b. 1944)