So is that because the best guys are just plain better.
Because climate change has produced more favourable winds?
Because travel is cheaper and we can access more favourable speed locations?
Just more sailors so there are more in the pointy end of the bell curve.
Is it the equipment?
Or combinations of all?

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Ian K said..
So is that because the best guys are just plain better.
Because climate change has produced more favourable winds?
Because travel is cheaper and we can access more favourable speed locations?
Just more sailors so there are more in the pointy end of the bell curve.
Is it the equipment?
Or combinations of all?

Good questions. Some could be possibly answered, other much less so (how do you measure "getting better").

As a side comment (sorry for yet another "explanation"): distributions do not depend on number of people. If more sailors are "in the pointy end of the bell curve" (whatever that means) the distribution will change. And it is very unlikely that the distribution of max speed in a competition follows a normal distribution (bell curve). Any time you have a boundary in what you measure (as for max speed), and the boundary is approached by a large part of the measurements, the resulting distribution is skewed, and no longer normal.

New gear is faster.... it brought up the speeds of the average sailor so now there is less difference between the best and the average.
New gear is faster...the best are going incrementally faster, but have accumulated much more knowledge and experience, have gained weight, are still using state of the art gear.
Old gear is not as fast.. against peers using new gear....but against the 90% rest, still faster.

I've just remembered that on GPS Speedsurfing you can look up your stats and compare them to other individuals plus your peers, and narrow that down to weight and age groups. You might be able to specify the spot as well.
The bad news is my membership has lapsed so I cant look it up, the freebie usage doesnt include stats.

It has been an enjoyable read for the most part. I'm just a newbie here from the Netherlands (Europe). I enjoy GPS sailing since I started again in 2013 and bought a bunch of older falcons and some new free-race Gaastra-Phantoms. Some might say, why do GPS-(speed)-surfing on slalom gear, but hey that's what we do right? Yes I still love my good old Falcon speed, capable of doing much better speeds than my skills reach. That much of the introduction.

15 years is almost the difference between my Fanatic Falcons 2007 and my current iSonic 2019. Man, those falcons were really quick, at least the ones with flat bottom (speed (66), 80 and 105). I also had a 124 that had concave and was comfortable but not fast. So flat and narrow are fast, regardless the age of the board.

Mast-track position and strap positions, thickness of the board all moved backwards over time and also need different sails/pressure (low/forward) points. I did own a series of 2015 iSonics (w54, 87, 107, 120) and I think they are faster than the 2019 series (50, 63, 72, 83) that are more comfy. Wider at the back with cut-outs to control the width. So the average speed and gybing becomes a bit better compared to the older ones.

I never owned sails from 15 years ago. I jumped from the Gaastra F1 total-flow ('97) to Gaastra Phantoms (2012). I never had any big sails in the 90's just a Mistral Stinger with a course-slalom pro 4.7 and 6.2. With all the gear that I have now, I have a lot more sailing days. Did the sails get faster? I doubt, but again more controllable with stable pressure point. So what changed the most? I would say the (carbon) fins, especially the larger ones with specific flex/lift/control for the bigger boards. Again make it a lot more controllable. So we go faster with less wind with more controllable gear, but it hasn't improved greatly our top speed results right?

So what makes us go faster? More wind, better angle, flatter water and guts. Yes, less drag as well, but how much drag can we reduce compared to those ultra narrow needles with short asy fins and our aerodynamic sails nowadays? For the most of us, it is skill as well, not just on sailing but also on trimming. Do we take enough time to learn our gear? Even Vincent keeps his old sail and board because he knows it well. I can say that I need several years to learn and trim my gear. Not enough sessions, too much variations. So I change gear after 5 years.

GPS is pushing myself at any time. Getting direct feedback on my session, if my current run is faster than the top 5 that I already did is pushing me and my material. Get's me energized and pushing me to my limit. Is GPS another dimension to the sport? Definitely yes. It's an individual sport that all of a sudden gives a method to compare me against others, locals friends, PRs. It should not become an obsession to pursue and forget all about the fun of the sport. I admire the ones hitting the top ranking consistently.

Do the absolute numbers go down over the years? Really don't know. The biggest limiter for me is myself and the time I'm able to spend on this great sport. Even though I just turned 50 years old/young, I don't have the strength now that I had 15 years ago. Perhaps when I put more effort in that, I might improve a lot more than buying newer equipment.

Since there are too many variables, we should ask if there could be a Luderitz Classic challenge. Not on the top/record day, but on a consistent one before or after. Same rider only changing 1 thing at the time. Let's ask Ben Proffitt to do an idiots guide to speed-surfing part 2 with various (classic) gear. We might be surprised about the outcome. Sails/masts might be the trickiest part since they do wear the most and might introduce (safety) risks. I would go flat-out on an old board or fin, but do you trust the old sail/mast? Only then we'll know the answer to this topic.

So here my stats over the years from www.gps-speedsurfing.com/mygps.aspx?mnu=GraphMySpeedStats

Not so much differents in trend 2s, 10s, 500m, avg. Only the nautical mile is different since at my home spot it is normally too narrow to pursue this score...
Compared to the average peer I continue to improve. Not sure why 2021 and 2022 are missing...
Stil did not hit the 40knots mark as you can see, almost there...
www.gps-speedsurfing.com/?mnu=user&val=342902&uid=7469

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PhilUK said..

this only means that Berkeley is not a particularly good venue for speed, even by Bay Area standards.

JRobbins did a lot of speed sites exploration, trial and discovery in the late aughts. in venues more conducive to speed, his numbers from that era (as posted to GP3S) are still among the top ones.

AAnderson in the mid twenty-teens posted numbers in the mid-30s (knots) in more favourable locations (Candlestick, Haskins, the Delta).

JRathle also in the mid twenty-teens posted good speeds in other venues, and did 37+ knots off Crissy Field (GP3S spot record, if i remember correctly)

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duzzi said..

Yes it is. I think the main problem with speed is that any venue has sort of an upper speed limit. You can push it up ... but the room for improvement gets thinner and thinner (just look at word speed records.)

BTW: Lot's of references to the San Francisco Bay in this thread ... well, the Bay does not have a single real speed spot. Chop is everywhere, and as a result I never seen 5x10 more than 31-33 knots. From anybody, including VERY good sailors who spent a season try to brake 35 and never made it. (And there is no 500 meter strip to talk of in the area.) Go back 10 years and it was the same 31-33 knots. Go back 14 and I clocked (by magic) a few 2 seconds 36. That with a HSM GPS 4 cams that was built, and sailed, like a tank. The limiting factor is obviously not the equipment.

agree that any venue has a sort of upper speed limit.

as for the subject of the thread, current gear (vs. that of 8-12 years ago) has made it easier for me to approach that limit more easily and consistently. presumably my skills and smarts have improved as well, but age also takes a noticeable toll.

as for the Bay Area, true also that it has no single real speed spot and that 31-33kt 5x10s are what mostly will be accomplished. but there have been some ~35s (Jean at Crissy, Avery at Bodega, and Boris at Sherman) even if "blue moon" events.

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boardsurfr said..
.A couple of guys from the SF area post to GPSTC in the summer, and they have speeds that are impressive for current US standards - but they would be beaten by just about anyone on a decent day at Lake George, Albany, Mandurah, and many other spots in Oz.

question: does the "they" i've bolded refer to the SF area sailors, or to the speeds they manage to achieve in the SF area?

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Roo said..
Loads of speedsailing on the Columbia River in Oregon, only place in the USA where 40knot plus speeds have been achieved for the last 15 years. Speedsailing isn't dead in the USA.

speed sailing isn't dead in the USA; but it isn't exactly thriving, at least in the GPSTC/GP3S formats, judging by amount of posting.

i know of a good number of people who regularly sail with a GPS, some on slalom, some on freerace kit who don't bother with the sites or posting. most don't really care for all the 2s/5x10/NM etc. stuff, and they just care about the biggest number a multisport GPS watch will show them. they "compete" against themselves and/or their launch buddies showing each other what the watch says.

others would be keen to participate in something like the GPSTC/GP3S formats but are put off by some of the complexity or simply the lack of "approved" devices (hello GPSTC!)

bottom line, the U.S. participation in GPSTC/GP3S is in decline. just look at 2021 on either site. on the GPSTC, the USA team did not post a score during July or August. put differently, during the two longest months of the summer there was not a single day where two members of the team across the entire country sailed and posted a result.

Yes. Nailed it! This: Venue speed limits.

The gear has been good enough in the last 10-15 years to hit the venue speed limits on the best days by the best sailors.

My feeling is that we dont really go much, if any faster, but many do it more often in a bit less than optimum conditions.

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WindFlyer said..

PhilUK said..

this only means that Berkeley is not a particularly good venue for speed, even by Bay Area standards.

JRobbins did a lot of speed sites exploration, trial and discovery in the late aughts. in venues more conducive to speed, his numbers from that era (as posted to GP3S) are still among the top ones.

AAnderson in the mid twenty-teens posted numbers in the mid-30s (knots) in more favourable locations (Candlestick, Haskins, the Delta).

JRathle also in the mid twenty-teens posted good speeds in other venues, and did 37+ knots off Crissy Field (GP3S spot record, if i remember correctly)

I posted that in response to LeeD saying we didnt have any old data. We do, even at his local spot hence that post. My post was nothing to do with the actual speed reached itself (as a measure of a sailors skill) as top speed varies massively by spot. I asked him if there were any other websites where people post speeds, at that spot, to compare. Seems not.

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WindFlyer said..
others would be keen to participate in something like the GPSTC/GP3S formats but are put off by some of the complexity or simply the lack of "approved" devices (hello GPSTC!)

I chatted with one of our GPSTC members a couple of days ago about this. He was one of the most regular posters, but stopped almost entirely last year. One major reason is that his GW-60 pretty much stopped working. He has plenty of other GPS watches, always uses one when he sails, and is currently thinking about buying a new $600 GPS watch because it has some decent functions for regattas. But he cannot post from any of these watches, not even "informal" posts.

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WindFlyer said..
bottom line, the U.S. participation in GPSTC/GP3S is in decline.

There are a few other reasons for this, too. A couple of top guys on our team who posted on a regular basis in the past pretty much stopped windsurfing due to injuries. Another regular poster switched to winging, and only speedsurfs when conditions are much better for speedsurfing than for winging. In Corpus Christi, which used to have many slalom sails on the water in March just a couple of years ago, they were a rather rare sight this year. Again, both "aging out" and switching to winging were a factor (although there, the switch to winging sometimes followed a few years of kiting).

But in the NJ area, where one of our team members has been quite active in recruiting new speedsurfers and getting them to post on GPSTC, it seems the problem is lack of available approved devices. Posts go down over time as GW-60s break, and once there's just one guy with a working approved device left, he usually stops posting, or even bothering to go out on slalom gear in conditions that are better suited for freeride gear.

There are a couple of things that could make posting to GPSTC easier. One of them is informal posting that does not count for ranking from non-approved devices. But nothing has happened on that front in the last couple of years. The other would be to use software filters to eliminate over-stating of speeds from watches that are less accurate, and don't provide accuracy estimates. The Coros watch seems to be quite successful in this by using the difference between doppler and positional speed, together with optimized filters. The results seems to be that calculated speeds can often be low by 1/2 knot (for 2 seconds), but (almost?) never too high. That approach could be also used in software for other watches.