VLC-MXP-PMO Sep 25, 02:32
Our advance team has been in Trapani on and off over the past several months laying the groundwork for the rest of us.
Now our Ops and Shore teams have been in Trapani for over a week. The Marketing and Sailing teams arrived for the most part Thu and Fri. Over the weekend the stragglers, like myself, are making our way to TPS. (Sorry, some of you know that I have a bit of a shorthand fetish for using airport codes and other three-letter abbrevations for the sake of time and brevity. Trapani does have an airport -- TPS -- but most will fly in and out of the much larger PMO -- Palermo -- which is about an hour's drive east of TPS.
There should be some practice sailing for our guys over the weekend, and by Mon morning our team will be back in full swing. There is plenty going on this coming week before the racing begins on Thu. Stay tuned!
These TPS Acts may be the last "roadshows" for AC 32. Next year all three Acts are in VLC. The '06 schedule should be finalized while we are in TPS. It now looks like Act 10 will be a match racing Act in May, and then we will have a double-Act in June -- the same match/fleet format and schedule as TPS and MMX (yes, that is Malmö's airport code, but everyone flew into CPH).
The exhibition regatta that ACM had originally planned for Lake Geneva (GVA in SUI) next Aug appears to be off; likewise the idea of an AC event of some sort in CHN in Sep or Oct 2006. Why?
Next year some teams want to continue training in VLC into the fall months. And ACM is in a cost-cutting mode. But I and a number of others inside and outside our team think there needs to be at least one other event for the Cup teams, in AC yachts, during the long gap between Act 12 in Jun '06 and the final Act (the Fleet Race Regatta) in VLC the first week of Apr '07. That's nine months without any formal racing! If not, we risk losing much of the promotional momentum that we will have built up with these pre-regattas.
So our next post will be from TPS, where most of the team members and regatta officials are being accommodated on two cruise ships. That should be interesting and no doubt will provide some grist for our Acts 8 and 9 blogging mill.
It is hard to find the time to blog during these regattas. We are busy with other duties, and the workday often runs from 0500 through midnight. Also, we don't have round-the-clock internet access like we do in VLC between home, office, and even the ESP mobile phone. Regardless, we will do our best to give our rapidly increasing readership a daily taste of the Acts 8 and 9 behind-the-scenes action.
In the meantime, take a look at this insightful post about TPS on the Victory Challenge (we even have three letter codes for all the teams, but won't bore you with those here) website by our old friend, Bert Willborg. It is interesting to read how he, as a Swede, compares and contrasts TPS with MMX.
Bert, Victory Challenges p.r. man, has not had an easy weekend given the problems they had with their mast yesterday. Tough break, no pun intended. We're all wishing them a "speedy recovery" and hope they will be set to go and none the worse for wear when TPA LVA 8 begins Thu.
Looking west over Trapani (foreground) to the racing area in the waters
between Trapani and the Egadi Islands (background). Beaut!
Now our Ops and Shore teams have been in Trapani for over a week. The Marketing and Sailing teams arrived for the most part Thu and Fri. Over the weekend the stragglers, like myself, are making our way to TPS. (Sorry, some of you know that I have a bit of a shorthand fetish for using airport codes and other three-letter abbrevations for the sake of time and brevity. Trapani does have an airport -- TPS -- but most will fly in and out of the much larger PMO -- Palermo -- which is about an hour's drive east of TPS.
There should be some practice sailing for our guys over the weekend, and by Mon morning our team will be back in full swing. There is plenty going on this coming week before the racing begins on Thu. Stay tuned!
These TPS Acts may be the last "roadshows" for AC 32. Next year all three Acts are in VLC. The '06 schedule should be finalized while we are in TPS. It now looks like Act 10 will be a match racing Act in May, and then we will have a double-Act in June -- the same match/fleet format and schedule as TPS and MMX (yes, that is Malmö's airport code, but everyone flew into CPH).
The exhibition regatta that ACM had originally planned for Lake Geneva (GVA in SUI) next Aug appears to be off; likewise the idea of an AC event of some sort in CHN in Sep or Oct 2006. Why?
Next year some teams want to continue training in VLC into the fall months. And ACM is in a cost-cutting mode. But I and a number of others inside and outside our team think there needs to be at least one other event for the Cup teams, in AC yachts, during the long gap between Act 12 in Jun '06 and the final Act (the Fleet Race Regatta) in VLC the first week of Apr '07. That's nine months without any formal racing! If not, we risk losing much of the promotional momentum that we will have built up with these pre-regattas.
So our next post will be from TPS, where most of the team members and regatta officials are being accommodated on two cruise ships. That should be interesting and no doubt will provide some grist for our Acts 8 and 9 blogging mill.
It is hard to find the time to blog during these regattas. We are busy with other duties, and the workday often runs from 0500 through midnight. Also, we don't have round-the-clock internet access like we do in VLC between home, office, and even the ESP mobile phone. Regardless, we will do our best to give our rapidly increasing readership a daily taste of the Acts 8 and 9 behind-the-scenes action.
In the meantime, take a look at this insightful post about TPS on the Victory Challenge (we even have three letter codes for all the teams, but won't bore you with those here) website by our old friend, Bert Willborg. It is interesting to read how he, as a Swede, compares and contrasts TPS with MMX.
Bert, Victory Challenges p.r. man, has not had an easy weekend given the problems they had with their mast yesterday. Tough break, no pun intended. We're all wishing them a "speedy recovery" and hope they will be set to go and none the worse for wear when TPA LVA 8 begins Thu.
Looking west over Trapani (foreground) to the racing area in the waters
between Trapani and the Egadi Islands (background). Beaut!
by TFE
