PHRF Multihulls Take Lake Erie by Storm

            Just one look at the  anxiety and exhilaration on the faces of my crew and I know why I like racing multihulls.  Reaching at 17 knots under chute into the first mark of the Green Island race on Lake Erie, brings out a flood of emotions!  Racing in our F-24 trimaran, Summer Storm, we had just caught some of the stragglers of  the PHRF Monohull fleet as we broad-reached into the mark.  Green Island was the mark, but on this particular day and it looked like a floating parking lot.  Thanks to the great perch fishing  provided around it's shores,  every conceivable type of fishing craft anchored at our turning bouy.  We now had to power jibe and round the island with six monohulls and seven multihulls, which included various Stillettos, Dragonflys, and one very large Condor 40 wilst picking our way thru the fishing fleet.  How in the world did we get in this predicament?

            It all started three years ago when Deb and I bought our F-24 trimaran.  We had raced our Hobie 18 catamaran as a one-design for many years, and had hoped to race our new boat one-design as well.  But, despite manufacturer boasts, there would be no one-design racing for our Trimaran, at least not yet!  We also had racing friends who had purchased a Dragonfly 25 and shared our same predicament....nowhere to race their cruising multihull.  It just so happens that Deb and I both serve on the US Sailing Multihull Council.  Our chairman at the time, David Hahn, recognized the need for of assimilation of larger cruising multihulls into the mainstream of sailboat racing, and put Gino Morrelli, a well known designer, to the task of establishing a national PHRF rating system.  This would prove to be an impossible task, as multihull racers tended to be loyal to their own rating systems, such as FOMA or MASF.  Also, PHRF is a performance based handicapping system which relies heaviliy on race data analysis.  The result being that ratings for a given boat may vary from area to area, based on typical weather conditions and types of courses raced on.  In turn, these numbers are administered by the local handicapping committees who are committed to the needs of their racers.

            David further requested that some numbers be drawn up and put to the test in parallel to already existing rating systems and on a trial basis in areas where no rating system for offshore multihulls existed.  As Area E representative and with some self interest, I volunteered along with Trey Ritter, Area K representative, to test the PHRF multihull rating system in our home waters.

            Racing multihulls using PHRF on Lake Erie made sense to me.  I was familiar with the concept of PHRF, having crewed intermittently on a monohull  for several years.  Also, the Inter-Lake Yachting Association has a well established and lengthy race schedule available to its member clubs.  All the races have great venues, well organized race committees, and great race parties. 

            First, I made the necessary contacts at the I-LYA Spring meeting and met with the local handicappers committee.  Fortunately, the PHRF-LE committee was willing to work with me on this endeavor.  Initially , there was some concern that multihulls would want to compete against the monohulls for established PHRF trophies or race against the monohulls on the race course.  The handicappers were absolutely not interested in establishing PHRF numbers for multihulls.  As volunteers, the handicappers felt they already had too much work trying to establish equitable ratings for the monohulls

and the new sport boats were already giving them fits!  It was decided that the Multihulls would race under the auspices of  PHRF-LE with members paying dues and utilizing their clerical services, but the multihull racers would have to establish their own ratings and process their own applications.

            We set about the task of adapting the PHRF-LE rules for racing/cruising multihulls.  Multihulls could not meet current PHRF-LE rules without some modification. In addition, we identified the  need to develop and establish a system for issuing temporary PHRF certificates on short notice or even at the regatta site, if needed, to encourage new racers to participate.  Our goal was to make it easy for multihull sailors with little experience to get into the game.  It was also important to have bull sessions to provide beginner skippers with the knowledge to get started.

            Our next task was to make contact with race organizers in an effort to establish a race schedule.  Most race committees were glad to have us as race participation had been on the decline in recent years.   But there were a few individuals who looked at the multihull sailors like men from Mars......crude, raucous, blue collar worker types who would not fit in with the genteel racing fraternity.   We had no interest in ruffling any feathers....we would only go where we were wanted!   Realizing that we would be few in number, we only designated five races as multihull races  for our first season.  Our purpose was two fold.  First, we wanted to make sure we had a multihull fleet at each designated race.   Second, we wanted to have a member of the PHRF-LR Multihull rating committee available at every race to act as a liaison with the host race committees, to issue temporary certificates on short notice and handle any rating questions that may come up.  Our aim was to please.  We wanted to make it as simple as possible for the Race Committees to work with us.

              Now the multihull handicap committee was faced with establishing a way to assign numbers or ratings to multihulls racing on Lake Erie.  This was especially difficult because PHRF ratings are based on analysis of race data which we did not have.  In addition, PHRF is a class and with out class rules there is no way to establish a standard  allowing us to compare like boats.  We turned to our PHRF-LE group to form a committee to review the class rules and eliminate or modify those rules as they would  apply to multihulls.  For example,  we changed the equipment rule requiring mandatory life lines to mandatory jack lines and harnesses.  Meanwhile, the integrity of a the multihull as a racing/cruising class boat was maintained. 

            To our surprise,  we found other organizations, such as Northwest Multihull and San Francisco Bay Area Multihull Association,  already had PHRF rating systems in place.  Lake Michigan PHRF and Lake St. Clair were working toward the same common purpose.  We also looked to the US Sailing PHRF committee for help.  They took PHRF-LE Multihull under their wing and offered us their immense experience and knowledge.       

            Now that PHRF-LE Multihull class rules were established, we set about the task of coming up with numbers for base boats.  We looked to other areas that had already been using PHRFand we looked to Gino Morelli who was trying to establish some national numbers. As I said before, this proved to be an impossible task.   We also looked for help from Trey Ritter, a Corsair dealer in Chicago.  We also sought help from Marcus Walkinshaw, cheif handicapper of NWMA and Joe Sludzinski  of  BAMA,  who have been doing this for a number of years.   Marcus Walkinshaw had even established a conversion formula to take US Sailing Portsmouth Numbers for multihulls and convert them to PHRF numbers.  The strength of PHRF is in the local handicapping committee that adjusts the base numbersunique to a given area. The use of other data bases would only give us a starting point to be in the Ball Park, not at a specific seat. Now we were ready to establish some PHRF numbers or where we?

            It became evident quickly that we had to start the system with some assumptions and parameters on some established standard boats. We needed a boat to work around to establish our system. We choose the F-27 Corsair because it was a production boat that was popular in our area and had a Portsmouth Number. Well, multihull sailors never leave anything alone so finding a non-modified F-27 was difficult if not impossible on Lake Erie. So our first set off assumptions was to apply penalties through the Handicap Committee on changes from a set of established specifications. A base boat if you will and established base numbers. For example the committee establishes a number of 60 sec/mile for F-27 right from the factory and if you have an extra sail they subtract 9 seconds and so forth for any modification of the base boat. The assumption is you don't change something to make the boat go slower. Since weight is sensitive we assume you will be racing with three adults and meet the class rule definition of a race/cruising boat, cruising being the operative word. Any changes must be reported to the handicap committee. The last assumption that brings the numbers in line is that it was observed through race data analysis that the F-27 is just a little faster than a J-35 a high performance monohull-hull with a established PHRF-LE number. We did not get into the debate of a time on time system verses time on distance. The idea was to be a part of PHRF-LE and they used time on distance. Now we were ready to send out application forms and issue  certificates.

            We also approached each race committee so that they could be familiarized with multihulls and answer any questions. A concern for us was that we would not be treated the same as the rest of PHRF starts. As it turned out the typical race would become this starting sequence of the MORC fleet, PHRF A, PHRF B, PHRF C, PHRF D, PHRF E, and PHRF Multihull. It has been most Race Committee's habit to start us last. This makes it interesting as we work are way through the fleet but starting first puts us away from possible problems, if the course is long enough. On windward/leeward courses, a reaching mark for the multihulls helps spread the boats out. Respect for the racing rules has not been a problem and generally the only concern at first was for the monohulls to learn how to judge exceleration of a multihull compared to another monohull, but that was also true of the new sport boats. The effort to meet prior to the season helped the initial meeting from both a competitor and race management perspective.

            If you think every thing was coming up roses that was not the case all the time. You always have a few individuals that are not satisfied. They feel their rating is unfair or someone else's rating is wrong. But at the end of the season almost everyone had won a race and the fleet's finishes corrected where within ten minutes. When asked if we should be using another system the answer was simple, we where racing something we where not doing before. Our acceptance was growing to a point that a few of the races started to offer overall PHRF flags between the monohulls and multihulls. We even had a special trophy rededicated at one of our larger events the Mill"s Trophy race. It supported 3000 people at its pre-race party last year alone Even the hundred year old Bay Week, another tradition on Lake Erie, was the site of the Great Lakes PHRF Multihull Championship which drew boats from Lake Michigan, Lake St. Clair, and Lake Erie. The coming of age was through Dr.Toney Hammer's, of Lake St. Clair PHRF, efforts organizing PHRF Multihull system to be able to race in the Port Huron to Mackinaw.  

             Deb and Kim pulled off an impressive jib and we flew toward the next mark Starve Island reef light. Life was good and I thanked those who worked to establish PHRF-LE multihull. Many good rating systems are out their but for us low tech types, PHRF is really simple to use and understand. The best part is that the race committees are comfortable with PHRF giving us starts at their established races. The multihulls can score with the host clubs existing scoring programs. We found that rafting to a monohull solves dockage problems. In fact since we are light in weight most skippers prefer us to a heavier boat. We are a part of the sail racing scene on Lake Erie not some outside group creating or asking for allot of special requirements. In fact we now have the problem that the  group is getting to many invitations to current PHRF races and our numbers are not great enough to attend them all. PHRF Multihull may not be for everyone but it's opened the doors on Lake Erie that will stay open now. No matter what system may be used in the future multihulls will no longer be the Black Sheep of sailing in our area.