Survey says

Fonte: Sailing Anarchy

Past performance is not indicative of future results!

Ten years ago I started this survey in an attempt to determine if one-design sailing was truly in decline as most have claimed. More specifically I wanted to quantify the change in some way. The result has been this annual one-design survey, that isn’t strictly limited to one-design classes. While a ranking of the top 25 classes in North America gives each of the classes a measure of their market share, the One Design Index below gives a better picture of how sail boat racing in general has done over the last ten years. The index is simply the sum of the attendance numbers for each year’s top 25 championships in North America by number of boats. Unlike the ranking the index does not use three year averages.



The chart shows that attendance levels have slightly decreased over the last ten years. A linear trend line shows a decrease of a little over three boats per year on average. That may not sound like much until you consider that the US population, which comprises almost all of the results, has increased by 0.97% per year, based on US census data from 2000 and 2010. Of course the available coast line has stayed more or less the same and access to it has likely decreased.

Not surprisingly many of you will see a similarity between this trend and that of the US stock market over the last ten years. As time goes on we may see that sailboat racing like many other expensive pastimes is more affected by the economy than anything else. The chart below shows the S&P 500 index from 2002 for comparison.



The One Design Survey Results for 2011 are included below followed by an explanation of how the ranking is calculated.
Class 2009 2010 2011 3yr Average
1 Laser Radial 142 (NJ) 93 (TX) 141 (NJ) 125.33
2 Sunfish 76 (SC) 88 (NY) 93 (RI) 85.67
3 Laser 104 (NJ) 67 (TX) 68 (NJ) 79.67
4 Thistle 83 (CT) 98 (MI) 53 (FL) 78.00
5 Flying Scot 74 (WI) 50 (MS) 74 (CT) 66.00
7 Lightning 65 (NY) 75 (NJ) 56 (MI) 65.33
6 E scow 46 (WI) 68 (NJ) 79 (MI) 64.33
8 Albacore 50 (ON) 47 (ON) 69 (ON) 55.33
9 MC scow 51 (OK) 71 (GA) 45 (NY) 55.00
9 C scow 71 (WI) 38 (NY) 56 (IN) 55.00
11 J/22 37 (TX) 51 (NY) NA 52.00
12 Hobie Cat 16 54 (ON) 49 (NV) 49 (FL) 50.67
13 29er 41 (ON) 55 (ON) 50 (ON) 48.67
14 Snipe 44 (FL) 61 (MD) 38 (MI) 47.67
15 Formula 18 36 (ON) 51 (WI) 53 (MA) 46.67
16 Vanguard 15 45 (NY) 56 (RI) 26 (TX) 42.33
16 A-Class Catamaran 42 (FL) 43 (MI) 40 (FL) 41.67
18 J/24 . 44 (MX) 48 (MA) 30 (NS) 40.67
19 505 69 (CA) 23 (IL) 27 (NY) 36.67
20 Lido 14 47 (CA) 42 (CA) 29 (CA) 39.33
21 Star 47 (CT) 42 (CA) 28 (FL) 39.00
22 Butterfly 38 (MI) 49 (MI) 28 (MI) 38.33
23 Ensign 30 38 (MI) 44 (NY) 37.33
24 Etchells 31 (ON) 42 (CA) 38 (MA) 37.00
24 Inter Club 55 (NY) 21 (MA) 35 (MA) 37.00


Let me review the un-scientific method for determining this list of the top twenty five one-design classes in North America. What I have done is taken the number of boats competing in each class North American or National Championships for each year. The location of the championship is also included. I think this is a good measure of relative class size and activity. To rank the classes I use the average number of boats over the last three years. Classes don’t technically need to be strict one-design so long as all the boats are designed to a rule and not a handicap.

This list has some notable exceptions. The first is that there are no junior classes on the list. I define a junior class as a class that has a maximum age requirement in their rules. Both the 29er and the Butterfly slip under the bar on this one.

I have also not included ice boats. If I had the DN would be at the top of the list every year and is by far the world’s most popular ice boat.

I have excluded jr classes and ice boats not because I have any inherent prejudice against them but because you don't need a survey to tell you what classes are at the top of these segments of the sport. As I mentioned the DN is the top ice boat every year and since it is sailed on a different surface than soft water boats they are not really in competition with the classes on this list. A similar thing is true with jr classes. There is a small number of them and it's relatively easy to figure out what jr boats are most widely sailed.

In my opinion the list that I've presented here is where the class warfare is taking place. These classes are more or less in direct competition with one another for market share in the one-design racing world.

Send comments, corrections and complaints to Roger Jolly, and comment in the forum here.