Busy Year Ahead For Mailspeed Marine

With the London Boatshow a distant memory now (unfortunately not the case with the snow that affected the first half of the show, mind you it's not the same snow, but you know what I mean)and the National Boat and Caravan Show starting today (why not pay a visit to our stand and say hi to Billy and Jeff stand 1012 in hall 1) you would have thought the events were all over and done with until Southampton boatshow, not the case. Here at Mailspeed we have a full events calender to keep us busy all year. Here is a brief glimpse of what we will be up to this year;

Feb - Boat and Caravan Show at the NEC Birmingham (from now until the 28th of feb)
March - The British Leisure show at Windsor race course
June - South Wales Boat Show
June - Beale Park Thames Boat Show
August - Cowes Week
September - Southport 24hr race
September - Southampton International Boat Show

It looks as though it's going to be a busy year for our events team, hopefully we will see you guys at one (or more) of these events over the year.

If 2010 looks busy then it's nothing compared to 2011, we have plans to attend more major boat shows than this year and some exciting new events as well.

Watch this space for more info on all of these events in the coming weeks.

Keep up to date with the latest news and offers from Mailspeed Marine on our twitter page.

The Fast and the Furious

It seems that the sailing world has rejuvenated the battle to be the biggest, fastest and the best over the last few months. After watching the amazing multihulls racing for the America's Cup Last week there have been several press releases announcing new record attempts and racing ventures.

Bruno Peyron has announced that he intends to re-launch "The Race" Three times holder of the Jules Verne Trophy and creator of The Race, the non-stop crewed race around the world without outside assistance and without limits. After several months of studies and some careful thinking and after consulting the main potential competitors, a second edition of the race around the world for the giant G-class boats is therefore planned for 2013-2014, starting from a port in Southern Europe.

"The Race" has only been run once so far and was seen at the time by many people to be a step too far and unsafe, however much of the technology developed by the boats that entered is now integral in the new breed of round the world racers. The overall winner of the race the first time round was the Maxi Cat Club Med which was skippered by Grant Dalton has already shown interest in taking part.

My most prominent memory from the race was the revolutionary Team Phillips boat skippered by Pete Goss which was as it turned out a step too far on the technology stakes as she lost a large part of one hull (if my memory serves me correctly this was during sea trials and the boat was recovered, but never made the race, but please correct me if I'm wrong).

The team behind the Vestas sail rocket (Pictured) have also announced that they are going to be building a new version of the sail rocket to finish the job of setting the outright world speed sailing record. The new craft will be an evolution of the innovative concept upon which their original craft was based.

The new boat is being built in the VESTAS R&D facilities at East Cowes on the Isle of Wight. It will incorporate many features to make it more versatile and practical to sail at world record speeds in a wider range of winds and sea states. The team will launch the new boat in East Cowes in time for the British summer and hope to carry out testing in the UK over the following months. If initial trials go well, the team will endeavour to bring the world record back to UK waters.

Thanks to Yachts and yachting and Yachting Monthly for the initial news story's and image.

J CLASS REGATTA 2012

“A spectacular yachting event is coming to the UK”

The J Class Association is pleased to announce outline plans for a series of spectacular regattas in England during 2012 - the Olympic Year. This will be the first time in history that more than four of these imposing yachts will race together in a fleet.

The outline plan has received a positive response from J Class owners and event planning is now proceeding. Many yachts in the fleet are now preparing to be on the start line for these 2012 events.

FALMOUTH
The first regatta will be based in Falmouth, Cornwall, hosted by the Royal Cornwall Yacht Club. Races will be held in the bay and along the coastline.

SOLENT
The second regatta will be based in the Solent, the traditional home of J Class racing in the UK during the 1930s.

ROUND THE ISLAND
The last race will be held over the original course around the Isle of Wight, for the 1851 Hundred Guinea Cup Race, which is now known as the “America’s Cup”.

This J Class event will attract many thousands of spectators. There are numerous headlands and vantage points close to the race courses for viewing this spectacular fleet.

To learn more about this event and the J-class yachts click here for the J-class association website

The Huge February Sale is on!

Well it's taken weeks of work and prep but we are now pleased to announce that the February sale is now up and running on Mailspeed Marine with massive savings across the board it's well worth checking out.

There are great savings to be had on EPIRBS, Stereo units, instrumentation, GPS, Antifoul, winches and loads more so there should be something for everyone. Don't worry it's not just bits and bobs we can't sell we have some big name brands in there such as McMurdo, Garmin, Gill, International Paints, Lofrans, Lewmar and Plastimo.

So what are you waiting for go and save yourself some serious money, but you'll need to be quick because as the name suggests it all ends on the 1st of March.

Time for the talking to stop and the sailing to start!

After what seems to have been endless court battles and arguing between one team and another the opening event for the 33rd America's cup is due to take place this Sunday the 7th of Feb with the opening race taking place on Monday the 8th.

I for one lost interest in all of the legal wranglings about the cup races and the boats involved long ago and I wonder quite how many people will be put off attending the event in Valencia or watching on TV or online. It certainly won't have done anything to allay the elitest perspective of the sport of sailing to the non sailing public, (2 multi millionair professional sailing teams arguing about how big their boats are in the middle of a recession).

Then there are the boats themselves 2 90ft flying machines of the like never before seen. The America's cup is always a platform for testing new designs and ideas and pushing the limits of engineering to the limits (and beyond) but these machines are really something else, featuring canting masts the height of a 17 storey building, optic fibre sensors in the carbon spars provide the crew and support team with real time data on the stresses and strains on them.

The racing is sure to be impressive with these 2 beasts flying around the course in Valencia but I can't help but think the event is goin to turn into an out and out drag race rather than the tactical tit for tat mind games that have made the Cup matches of recent years so intriging, having said that maybe these new super fast super sexy multihulls will spark the imagination of non sailors?

Lets just hope it lives up to the hype and the build up and we see some great racing at what is without doubt the biggest sailing event in the calendar.

Full steam ahead

This morning the RYA were officially handed the keys for the new £4 million develpment centre at Osprey Quay, Portland, Dorset. This new centre is intended to provide a central role in the build up to and during the Olympic sailing events in 2012. Providing the British team with a ultra modern facility to train from, this should also provide our sailors with the advantage of training at in and around the waters where the Olympic reggatta's are due to take place.

This new facility and all that comes with it combined with some very promising results over the weekend from the international regatta in Miami, the British sailing team will be tough to beat come the summer of 2012.

On a rather larger scale Franck Cammas and his crew of the 105 foot Groupama 3 Maxi Triamaran set of on their 3rd attempt on the Jules Verne Trophy (the round the world sailing record). The current record for the 21,600 mile course is held by Bruno Peyron and his crew is 50 days 16 hours and 20 minutes. That certainly is full steam ahead!Good luck to Franck and his crew.