October 14, 2023 • 62 mins
Welcome to Navy Sports Central - The Official Podcast of the Navy Sports Nation!
Today, we're charting a course through the world of offshore sailing - a sport where Navy holds an impressive 15 NCAA Championships. Joining me on this maritime adventure is Warren Mazanec, a fellow classmate from '84 and a seasoned veteran of the offshore sailing team. He will provide invaluable insight into the intricacies of the sport. We're unpacking everything from the roles and responsibilities of the crew to vital maneuvers and race tactics, giving you a complete insider's view into the entire program at the Naval Academy.
We'll also navigate through the world of professional sailing and the evolution of the America's Cup, comparing boat designs and discussing the sport's growth. Finally, we'll reflect on Warren's time with the Zeiberger crew and his passion for making sailing a family affair.
Of course, we've also got our Question of the Day and Mid Watch segment, so please join us for what promises to be a very fun and informative episode!
Related Links:
- Navy Offshore Sailing win Storm Trysail Club Offshore Regatta
- Offshore Sailing Takes 3rd at Shields Trophy Regatta
We want your answer to our Question of the Day. Here is the one for this episode:
On how many occasions has the Navy Offshore Sailing team won the Kennedy Cup in consecutive years?
A. Once
B. Twice
C. Three times
D. Four times
Give us your answer on the Navy Sports Nation Group Facebook page.
Follow Navy Sports Central wherever you get your podcasts:
On how many occasions has the Navy Offshore Sailing team won the Kennedy Cup in consecutive years?
A. Once
B. Twice
C. Three times
D. Four times
Give us your answer on the Navy Sports Nation Group Facebook page.
Follow Navy Sports Central wherever you get your podcasts:
Check out the Navy Sports Nation group page on Facebook!
Music is provided courtesy of Audio Jungle. Artists featured in order:
Music is provided courtesy of Audio Jungle. Artists featured in order:
- Seven In Music (Intro)
- Alexiaction (Deep Dive)
- Loka Music (Deep Dive Pt. 2 Lead In)
- Artlss (Question of the Day Lead In)
- Cinematic Alex (Closeout Music)
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Karl (00:14):
Hi everybody, my name is Karl Darden and I'd like to
welcome and thank all of you forjoining us today on Navy Sports
Central.
I'm your host and this is theofficial podcast of the Navy
Sports Nation where we take adeeper dive into Navy Sports.
Last week was a little rough onthe mids as the Army-Navy Star
Series got underway.
They suffered a couple ofreally tough setbacks in both
men's golf and sprint football,so I'll give you a quick update
(00:35):
on how those two contests went.
Meanwhile, the football teamlooks to make it to and a row
after a hard-fought win overNorth Texas.
They are on the road to take onCharlotte University this
weekend, a team that is muchbetter than their current 1-4
record.
And today, in our deep divesegment, we'll be talking about
a sport where Navy owns 15 NCAAChampionships and will be joined
by an awesome guest who willhelp us learn more about it.
We will also have our questionof the day and mid-watch
(00:56):
segments, so please stay with us.
Alright, so glad to have youwith us here today on Navy
Sports Central, whether this isyour first visit or your regular
listener.
Thanks for taking the time.
I'm going to keep the sportsupdate kind of short today
because I want to get into thedeep dive segment.
(01:18):
The sport we'll be discussinghas been on my list for a while.
I just needed to track down aguest with the expertise to talk
about the program, so you'lldefinitely want to stick around
for that Now.
You all heard me say in theopening that the Mids got off to
kind of a rocky start in theArmy-Navy Star competition.
The men's golf team looked tobe in a pretty good spot after
their four ball matches lastweek.
They won all of them to take a4-0 lead going into the singles
(01:40):
matches on Saturday.
That meant they needed to pulldown two more points in the
remaining seven singles matchesto earn the star.
Unfortunately, they were onlyable to come up with one and a
half.
The matches tied 5 and a halfto 5 and a half after those
seven singles matches werecompleted and Army ended up
taking the star in the playoff.
So no doubt that stung quite abit.
But this is a very young team.
(02:01):
In fact I was surprised tolearn that there are no seniors
on a 10-man squad.
It consists of three juniors,four sophomores and three
freshmen.
So from here on the men's golfteam will be competing in a
series of invitations as theywork their way towards the
Patriot League championships inApril.
By then they'll be much morebattle tested and hopefully
they'll be able to get somemeasure of revenge against Army
(02:23):
when the time comes.
The sprint football team alsocame up short on the road
against the Black Knights.
This was your typical defensivebattle.
I mean, when these two teamsget together, it is a very, very
low-scoring game, and this yearwas no different.
I mean, I think in terms oftotal yardage there was only a
difference of about four yardsbetween the two.
I think Army had 225 and Navyhad 229, something like that,
(02:48):
but it all came down tobasically turnovers.
Navy was driving down for whatlooked like it was going to be
the go-ahead score, butunfortunately Army came up with
an interception and they wereable to score a touchdown with
about 47 seconds left in thegame.
That pretty much did it.
If the Mids win the rest oftheir games, they could wind up
facing the Black Knights in theCSFL championship game, just
(03:08):
like they have the last twoyears, and no doubt they'll be
looking to fix what went wronglast week.
I do want to end on a positivenote, though, so I'll finish up
by saying it was great to seethe football team earn a
hard-fought win over North Texaslast week.
The defense recorded a schoolrecord eight sacks.
One of those came courtesy ofsophomore Raider Luke Parris.
He forced a fumble that theMids recovered and converted
(03:28):
into a touchdown, and that gavethem the cushion they needed to
get the win.
Finally, the men's rugby teamtook on Life University in a
very close game.
Life is a private school inMarietta, georgia, and they have
an excellent program.
In fact, the Mids had neverbeaten them in the years that
they competed as a club team,but this time around Sean
McLeaney came through with a try, with Navy trailing 14-13 in
(03:48):
the second half.
The kick put them up 20-14, andthe defense made that stand up
for the rest of the game.
So the Mids are now 6-0 in thefall with five games left.
And that includes Air Force andArmy.
What I don't get is that Armyis not designated as a star
match, and I'm pretty sure theyplay again in the spring, but so
far that's not a star matcheither.
If it was, that would make it atotal of 26 for the year, and
(04:09):
right now that number is stillstanding at 25.
So I guess I'm not sure what'sgoing on there.
Alright, that's going to do itfor our sports update.
Stick around, because our deepdive segment is next.
Okay, we are back.
(04:37):
When I started the Navy SportsNation blog three years ago and
followed that up with thispodcast in 2021, one of my
stated goals was to shine thespotlight on the sports at the
Naval Academy that tend to flyunder the radar.
Those would be the ones besidesfootball, basketball, baseball
and I would put lacrosse inthere as well.
So that's what we're going todo today.
In the opening, I shared thatthe Naval Academy has won 15
(05:00):
national championships in thisparticular sport.
Now, I'm not sure if any of youwere trying to guess which
sport it was when I said that,but if you came up with offshore
sailing, you would be correctTo tell you the truth.
You could fit what I know aboutthis sport into a small shot
glass and still have plenty ofroom for a generous amount of
alcohol.
So that's what.
I've got an awesome guest tohelp me out.
He is my classmate from theclass of 84 and he was a member
(05:22):
of the offshore sailing team allfour years Following graduation
.
He joined the submarine forceand later came back to Annapolis
to teach mathematics and tolead the summer sailing program,
and during that time he playeda pivotal role in developing the
mid-seamanship and leadershipskills.
So I'm very happy to welcomeWarren Mazanek to the podcast.
So, warren, I really appreciateyou joining me today.
One of the reasons I wanted tofeature offshore sailing is
(05:44):
because I don't know that muchabout it, so thanks for taking
the time.
Warren (05:49):
Oh, thank you, Carl.
This is a great opportunity andyou're right, there aren't many
people who know a lot about theoffshore sailing team and the
things that they've been able toaccomplish, so I appreciate
this opportunity.
Karl (06:01):
Yeah, no problem.
So now, sailing is not a sportthat most mids are exposed to
prior to arriving at the NavalAcademy.
Was that true in your case, ordid you have sailing experience
before getting there?
Warren (06:12):
So there's formal sailing experience and then
there's, you know, sort of youthknocking about in boats.
And when I was a freshman inhigh school my father moved us
to Cape Cod we're here as aprincipal of a high school and
so I started sailing on thelocal ponds with sunfish and
lasers and met some sailingfriends who belong to the yacht
(06:35):
club and I go along as crew andrace with them and you know
weekend races or some of the onedesigns.
But at the Naval Academy theoffshore team is sort of
although it's a varsity sportkind of a club level entry point
in that on the intercollegiateteam, just like with football
and baseball, there are bluechip recruits.
(06:58):
They do recruiting, theyidentify people.
Most of the people who come tothe Naval Academy and end up, as
you know, all American skippersand crews come out of formal
sailing programs at yacht clubsfrom you know very early on.
Just like in swimming, whereyou start at you know age four
(07:19):
or five and you progress throughthe ranks, sailing is very,
very similar.
In offshore sailing it'susually people who raced with
family or friends, haveexperience on the water.
Maybe they were a sailingjunior but didn't quite reach
the level to make theintercollegiate team but want to
continue their sailing.
(07:39):
And so the offshore team isthere and in our day it was made
up of a fleet of the Navy 44foot yalls, which are all the
same design and donated boats.
So I started out, like I said,doing the club thing with
families and friends on the Cape, the person that I was working
(08:03):
for in high school.
I went to 90 foot schooner andmy sophomore year of high school
he asked if I would sail withhim down to the islands to start
the winter charter season andthey flew me home.
I went down the springtime andI came back.
So that was my first offshoreexperience.
What happens that his brotherwas Dodge Morgan, the man who
(08:24):
built American promise and setthe record for the first solo
nonstop around the world sail.
And my junior year of highschool.
On our way down to the islandswe ran into Hurricane Lucille,
ended up getting dismasked itand spending several months in
(08:44):
Marsh Harbor in the Bahamasdoing refit and getting the boat
ready.
And then I came home, finishedup my junior year and came to
the Academy and I was able toleverage that offshore
experience into getting on tothe offshore team.
So that's how I got there.
Karl (09:02):
Hey, nice having some time off in the Bahamas before you
finished up schooling, I guess,huh.
Warren (09:07):
Well, there was.
It was called the CalvertSchool back then and there was
no internet or anything.
But you know, they sent you offwith a couple of boxes of
materials and you would do selfstudy.
Somebody would proctor theexams for you, put them in an
envelope and mail them in.
That's how you got your grades.
You know, looking back on itfor increasing the odds to get
(09:32):
into a surface Academy, that wasprobably not a smart move, but
it was a lifetime experience.
So you know, my parents were onboard and I took advantage of
it.
Karl (09:44):
Wow, that's awesome.
So it sounds like I mean,obviously you had a little bit
of offshore experience beforegoing in and that's really what
kind of appealed to you about it.
Let's talk a little bit aboutthe types of boats that are used
.
You mentioned the 44 foot y'alland, by the way, the last time
I was on a Naval Academy y'allwas the end of Pleabes summer
(10:04):
but I'm curious to know thedifferent types of categories
that you guys competed in whenyou were offshore sailing.
Warren (10:15):
There's two basic kinds of fleets.
One is a one design fleet.
There are several thousand J24sand J105s and Pearson Flyers.
They have a fleet organization.
They maintain rigorspecifications.
(10:36):
So technically when everybodygoes on the water they're
sailing an identicallyperforming boat.
Then it becomes really easy.
The first one across the finishline wins.
The other kind is when there isa rule, a design rule like the
12 meter rule.
You do all the calculations fora sail area draft and all the
(10:57):
thousands of things that go intothe design.
The answer has to equal 12meters.
The box can look like anythingyou want it to look like.
The goal is to make the fastestboat for specific conditions
and it equals the rule.
There are rating rules.
You can race with a variety ofboats and the attempt is to give
(11:20):
them a rating so that, like agolf handicap, at the end of the
day, if you have a 25 handicap,then you get 25 bonus points.
If you're golfing againstsomebody who's a five
handicapper, you get 20 morepoints towards leveling the
field than he does.
That's kind of like how therating systems work.
(11:43):
There are two objectives too.
You can spend both sets.
You can spend a lot of money,but to make the sport
competitive and affordable toaverage people who want to race
sailboats.
One design sailing is veryappealing because typically your
local fleet will one year sail.
Everybody will buy a main sailand they'll do a group buy and
(12:05):
the price will be good.
Everybody sails with the sameset of sails and they rotate
through.
Better sailors typically end upon top, but it allows average
sailors to go out and have funand be marginally competitive In
intercollegiate.
They're much smaller boats,typically two or three person
crews.
(12:26):
They're singles and all theboats are identical.
All the sails are identical.
Again, it's whoever is fastestaround the course wins and
there's no calculating differentboats against each other, right
?
Karl (12:41):
Okay, I was wondering if you can kind of understand it.
Offshore sailing crew.
I was wondering if you couldjust kind of run down first of
all how many people are in itand then secondly, just a real
quick thumbnail sketch on theirpositions and responsibilities.
Warren (12:56):
Certainly so.
As you would imagine, itdepends upon the size of the
boat.
Some of the very large 80footers go offshore with 20, 22
people and there just seems tobe bodies everywhere.
On the Navy 44, which is themodern version of the Navy, all
typically 10 people.
So there will be two safetycoaches, one for each watch
(13:19):
section.
There'll be two upper classfirsties as sort of watch
captains, two other second classand then there will be three
plebe youngster second classthat round out that watch
section's crew, and so you havefive on, five off, except maybe
in bed.
Whether you need to do a sailchange, you need all hands.
(13:41):
But typically it's importantstarboard kind of a watch
arrangement.
When you're racing offshore,when we're racing on the
Chesapeake Bay, and it's a fullday, six hour race, all hands
are on deck full time.
And so you need people to grindwinches, trim the head sail,
(14:02):
work the fore deck for sailchanges, trim the main sail.
And I'm going in from and Idon't want to say least
importance, but from the lowskill to the higher skill jobs.
So you kind of start as a plebegrinding the winch, watching
how everything goes in the boat.
You transition to trimming thehead sail, which is you get a
(14:26):
lot of advice and help fromeverybody in doing that, but
you're on the low side of theboat, your feet are always wet,
so that's where your second stepis is in the trenches.
Skill positions are working thefore deck, which is sail changes
, jibing the spinnaker, pullingthe lines, the strings, so
raising and lowering sails,dipping the spinnaker pole for a
(14:49):
jib, making sure that all linesare running free so that you
can execute any evolutionwithout worrying about getting
your gear tangled.
And then main sail trim isprobably like the senior
technical position.
He works very closely with thehelmsman to balance the boat,
(15:10):
keep everything going in theright direction.
And then you have a helmsman,which is typically the skipper
and a tactician, somebody tokeep the big picture, like CIC
on a ship, of what's going onand advising the skipper where
to drive the boat so that we canbe most efficient to getting to
the line first.
Karl (15:31):
Right, right, okay, very cool.
So now let's get into a typicalpractice day.
I was wondering if you couldkind of describe some of the key
maneuvers that are justabsolutely critical to be able
to compete when you're out there, to be successful and then
regarded.
So if you could run that downfor me, that'd be great.
Warren (15:50):
So there's two really scenarios that we practice with
the offshore team and one ofthem is when we're all sailing
at 8044, so it's a one designand a practice race.
So you get to practice tacticsagainst people.
You race on a short race coursewhich forces you to tack more
(16:12):
efficiently.
When you're going downwind,your jibes have to be crisp and
fast, and so the windward, goingto the windward mark and then
back down to the lower mark, isa short and distance of practice
.
So it's very, very fast paced.
Typically you'll start outearly in the season and you'll
be doing drills, reefing andun-reefing, the mainsail,
(16:34):
practicing your man overboarddrill.
Everybody on the crew has to beable to assume just about any
position on the boat during aman overboard drill, especially
in bad weather when it'stypically, when it happens, very
challenging, very easy to losea crew.
So that's something that theypractice extensively, but work
really hard on standard languageso that everybody, when
(17:00):
something like this happens,everybody uses the same
terminology, the same commandsand every member of the crew is
fluent in a number of thecritical positions so that the
first one on the scene can takethat spot and make sure that
it's a successful recovery.
So, like we'll do upwind sailingand we'll go all the way out
(17:22):
into the bay and rather thantack and sit on that tack for a
long time, you will tack, getthe trim down, get the boat
speed up, get the boat speedwhere it wants to be and then
you'll tack over.
And you'll do this 100 timesduring practice and it gets you
to be crisp, trains the helmsmanhow to smoothly come about
(17:42):
without losing too much speed.
It teaches the sail trippers howto work with the boat as it
comes up into speed and adjustthe sail trim so that you get
back to your maximum speed asquickly as possible.
Now, when you get to the otherend, you turn around, you come
back, you put up your spitsticker and you jib from side to
side over and over and overagain.
As soon as the sails are setand drawn properly, you execute
(18:05):
the next one, and it's just arepetitive thing so that it
becomes muscle memory Everybodygets familiar with.
You know I have to ease thisline four feet and it becomes.
Rather than paying it outcarefully, you know exactly
where it is and boom, you canget the topping lift and the
(18:25):
pole through the fore triangleas quickly as possible without
any mix ups.
So there's a lot of drills likethat that happen tacking and
jiving and then, of course, thenyou get to practice against
your teammates, which is great.
Karl (18:43):
Okay, all right.
So I noted, just kind ofskimming, through the Navy
Sports webpage and everything,the offshore sailing team.
First of all, it doesn't appearthat they have much of an
off-season at all.
There looks like they're racingyear-round.
And secondly, they did competein the Race Around Long Island a
couple of months ago and didpretty well.
Aside from those open waterraces where you're going either
(19:06):
around a geographic landmark oryou're doing point to point,
like from Bermuda to I don'tknow, new York or something like
that, what might a typicalcourse setup look like?
I mean, is it an out-and-backsort of thing or does it vary?
Warren (19:21):
So setting up a race course and having a good race
committee is really as critical.
When we were in college, thetypical race course was a
triangle race course and therewas a windward going straight up
wind leg, a straight down windleg, and then there were a
couple of reaching legs and thereaching legs was really hard to
(19:43):
.
It's based on boat speed, sothe faster the boat, you stay on
one tack the whole time and youkind of race down, you flip
over, you do the same fast,reach back, and they felt that
that was less competitive.
So today's race courses arecalled windward lures, and so
(20:04):
the goal is to have the startingline perpendicular to the wind
and the windward mark isdirectly upwind.
So there should technically beno advantage to going to the
right or the left when you start.
In the perfect world and in thereal world, paying attention to
your environment, knowing wherethe winds are coming from, where
(20:24):
they're likely to shift, willlead you to choosing one side of
the course over the otherbecause it should be more
advantageous.
You get to the windward mark,you turn around, you put up your
spinnaker and as you come back,instead of having one mark they
have two.
That is called a gate, and soyou get to choose whether you,
when you go through the gate,whether you go to the right or
(20:44):
the left and sometimes one sideis more favored than the other
but it also is more crowded withother boats you may choose to
go to the least crowded sidebecause you'll have an easier
time getting around and back upto speed.
And so typically in that kindof a race environment, three to
five races a day, depending uponthe size of the boat and the
(21:07):
length of the course, and ifit's a two or three day event,
you can have anywhere up to 12races with one or two throwouts.
So if you have a bad race youget to toss out your worst score
.
Karl (21:23):
And one of the things that you had mentioned actually
before we started was the impacton weather on one of the trips
that you're taking when you'rein high school.
So my question is obviously youdon't race in even tropical
storm conditions or anythinglike that, but I was wondering
what the basic limitations arein terms of weather and what was
(21:44):
the worst weather you everraced in.
Warren (21:47):
It depends on the event and the type of boat.
In a typical J24, it's a 24foot sloop, it's a one design
class.
Or the Soling, which was theOlympic three man sloop, when
you got to 15 knots of breeze itwas getting towards the upper
end.
If it got consistently above 20, they would typically postpone
(22:10):
racing until the wind came down.
But when you're talking likelarger offshore boats, we won.
When I was back at the Academyas an instructor, we won the
Annapolis Newport race onAmerican Promise.
It was a solid gale force windsthe entire way from the moment
we left the Chesapeake till wepulled into Newport, rhode
(22:31):
Island.
But I was on American Promise,a very heavy, sturdy, 60 foot
boat that was designed to sailin extreme weather.
We were able to carry a lot ofsail and just plow our way
through the waves.
That was what the boat wasbuilt for.
The other large boats that werein the race were sporty.
(22:52):
They were built a lot lighter.
Their gear was not designed forall the extreme weather.
The boats that probably shouldhave won the race most of them
ended up retiring because of theweather, because it was an
offshore race.
That's part of the package.
(23:12):
We continued to compete.
I had a great team of mids withme.
It was really awesome goingacross the finish line in Castle
Rock and Narragansett Bay andhearing the gun go off and like
who's that for?
Oh, is that for us?
We had no idea we had done thatwell In the Chesapeake or in
(23:36):
any other weekend type regatta.
Once the winds start gettingabove 25 or 30 miles an hour,
certain fleets will postponetheir racing.
Larger boats will continueracing.
At just some point it becomesunsafe, either because of
lightning and swalls or justdanger to crew and equipment.
(23:57):
It's all up to the racecommittee.
Having an excellent racecommittee is important because
they understand the limitationsof the boats.
They will keep you racing rightup until that ragged edge of
are we safe or not, and theyknow when to call the race and
(24:18):
when to tell you to continue.
They bring a large safetyaspect.
I've also been in races whereskippers have said well, it's
just getting a little too roughout here.
I don't want to get anybodyhurt.
I think we're going to go inand we just retire from the race
.
It's an individual decision.
Karl (24:37):
Okay, All right.
So now, specific to the NavalAcademy program.
One thing I learned just inresearching this was that the
Kennedy Cup is recognized as thenational championship for
collegiate offshore sailing.
What I didn't know was that theNaval Academy has won that 15
times, including back-to-backyears when we were there in 81
(24:58):
and 82.
So I was wondering whatrecollection you have of those
two years.
That's obviously when we wereplebs and sophomores and
youngsters.
What do you recollect fromeither one of those two races?
I didn't know if you happenedto be part of the crew or
anything like that, but I'd becurious to get your take on
those.
Warren (25:15):
So when we were midshipmen, I'm going to guess
we had about 10 boats in theoffshore team.
It was basically everybody whowanted to sail was given the
opportunity and during the fallseason it was the McMillan Cup,
which was sort of like the EastCoast championships, sailed
(25:36):
under our Navy 44s and it wasagainst other colleges on the
East Coast and we would.
It was an opportunity to chooseteams and it was usually by
class and so there was a bunchof 84s you know Chris Kramer,
dan Crisp I'm going to forgetpeople like John Stamos, robin
(25:58):
Myers and we formed a team,probably not our fall of our
freshman year, but maybe for theKennedy Cup in the spring of
freshman year, cleave year andwe competed no, we didn't do so
well because we were fairly new,but that sort of nucleus stayed
together.
And in the fall of ouryoungster year we competed for
(26:19):
McMillan Cup and there's four,five, six boats that are
competing and it's a competitionin the boat that wins the
competition gets to representNavy in the in the Kennedy Cup
and McMillan Cup.
And what was really excitingabout that was it also gave us a
chance to compete against theintercollegiate team, and the
(26:43):
intercollegiate team was racinglaser single person boats, 420s,
two person boats and they didsome three person slope racing.
So they were not part of alarger crew that routinely
sailed big boats but becausethey were excellent at the
tactics still in its sail trimand the fast pace of Diggie
(27:04):
sailing, you know 50% of thetime they would have the winning
team and 50% of the time wewould have the winning team and
it was sort of a pride thing.
So I competed in Kennedy Cupspring of second class year and
I did McMillan Cup fall ofsecond class year and fall of
first class year and that wasone of the two ways you could
(27:26):
earn your varsity letter and onewas sailing.
You know those two were goddessand the other was a skipper
about.
Karl (27:34):
Okay, all right, cool.
Now, after graduation, youstill remained involved with the
program at some point.
I think I recall you talkingabout it was the summer sailing
program or something like that.
I was wondering if you couldrun that down for us.
What were some of the things,what were some of your
responsibilities, and how didthat program run?
Warren (27:54):
So when I finished my department tour on a submarine,
I had the opportunity to comeback and do my payback tour for
grad school.
So I was in the math departmentand I had the opportunity to
choose between doing sub-RYPcrews or the sailing crews.
Obviously, I chose the sailingcrews.
It was a great way to get backinto working with the midshipmen
(28:19):
.
Small unit leadershipopportunity for them to take
home responsibilities.
As I would tell them on the wayup to New England, your job is
to put me out of one so thatwhen we come back I can sit on
the fan tail and just watch.
They almost always rose to theoccasion.
(28:39):
It was really incredible towatch the maturation process and
how they went from not reallyknowing how to sail to being
fairly competent on a boat.
So I did that.
During the three years that Itaught in the math department
(28:59):
and I was active in the trainingaspect of it, the sailing
center asked me if I wouldconsider going to take a US
sailing instructor trainercourse for keelboats and I did
and I became the.
I think I was the first navalofficer to be an instructor
trainer for US sailing, so Iwould run certification clinics
(29:21):
for sailing instructors.
I did that because I thought itwas important to bring back a
national standard in sailtraining to try to help
incorporate into our curriculum.
When I was approaching the endof my time in the math
department I was starting tolook at where I was going to go
next and the director of ProDevreached out to me and asked me
(29:46):
what I consider going over tothe sailing center to run the
summer sail training program.
At the time the billet waslocated in loose hall and you
can't do a PCS move from withinyour same command.
So they moved the billet forthe sailing position over to the
naval station the same weekthat U-PERS moved to Millington
(30:09):
Tennessee.
So the computer that controlledwhere the billets were assigned
sat in a box for three yearsand when they finally got it set
up and changed my billet, theycut my orders from the date of
the billet change, not when Istarted the job.
So I ended up at the sailingcenter for a little over five
years running sail training.
(30:30):
So it was great I got toparticipate in the winter
training cycle to make sure thatour coaches and our first class
midshipmen were properlytrained.
They understood theresponsibilities of being watch
captain and safety coach Comespringtime, midshipmen who had
(30:51):
chosen to go on the summer sailcruise, we can get them out and
start the training process.
Then it was a three-week cycle.
They come in, they do chartpreps, they're given money so
they have to do meal planningand go buy their food.
They get it all stored.
They sail during the day to getup to speed.
(31:13):
Then on the second week theyleave Santee Basin, head down
the Chesapeake or up toChesapeake and go to New England
and get to Newport and spendthe weekend and they turn around
and sail back and turn the boatover for the next group to go.
It was really a fabulousprocess.
I was there long enough thatwhen I was in the math
(31:34):
department I had a young pleab.
He was a tall, gangly kid,grabbed, uncoordinated, very shy
, and you go.
Oh my God, this is the futureof our Navy.
Well, when I was at the sailingcenter we had a President's
Circle Day for the alumni and Igot asked to make half a dozen
(31:56):
boats available to take outthese President's Circle donors
and do a harbor tour.
This kid Ben he was the firstday at the time and he had
volunteered I got everybody ontheir boats and then I said I'll
just go out with this one, andI got on Ben's boat.
He had not only participated inyoungster sailing crews but he
(32:19):
was part of the sail trainingprogram and he had completed his
first class cruise as a watchcaptain and got his skipper qual
.
It was remarkable that thechange in what I had seen when I
first met him as a pleab tobeing a poised young man who was
in charge proper safety briefthere was not a moment during
(32:45):
the hour and a half underwaythat I felt I needed to step in.
He was just fabulous.
And that is typical of whathappens when a young midshipman
gets involved with the sailingprogram early on and the
maturation process through hisfour years at the academy, and
(33:05):
then you turn out these reallyfine young men.
My time at the academy continuedlong beyond my sailing program
experience.
I went back across the river toProDev and I got to watch this
young man come back as alieutenant.
I was even more amazed at howremarkable an individual this
(33:26):
was and that I had some part inthe process of getting him to
being the person that he was.
That's, I think, for thesailing program.
That's one of those lifetimeopportunities and the midshipman
that sees it really do.
(33:47):
Well.
There was a boat when we werethere as Patriot.
It was a Verus 46, a black-eyedboat and I believe in the time
I was a midshipman there werefour admirals that came off of
that one boat.
Wow, it's one of thoseexperiences that give you a
(34:08):
great sense of Siemens' Eyeappreciation for the weather,
the challenge of maneuveringboats, especially in crowded
harbors.
When you take a sailboat and yougo onto a starting line with 40
or 50 other large sailboats,you don't have a CIC team behind
you doing radar plotting andtelling you CPAs.
(34:30):
It's all Seamans' Eye and it'ssomething that you get to
develop over the course of yourmaturation process on the team.
I found that when I got to myfirst submarine, when we were
entering and exiting port, I waschosen over the department
heads to be the officer of thedeck because my experience of
(34:52):
driving large sailboats onto acrowded starting line.
I think it gave me the abilityto see the other traffic for
what it was and drive the shipproactively in a safe course
rather than waiting for the navplot and CIC to tell me where to
(35:13):
go.
The same reason we had so manysuccessful pilots come out of
the sailing team on a ship andyou're doing 20 or 30 knots,
your event horizon is fairlylong.
When you're flying around at Idon't know what they fly around
(35:34):
at 500 or 600 miles an hour,your event horizon is much, much
shorter.
I think that that ability ofseeing the situation, making an
instant analysis and choosing acorrect course leads to being a
better pilot as well.
Karl (35:51):
All right, good, good, I'll tell you what.
We're going to take a shortbreak, but first I wanted to let
you all know that you can staytotally up to speed on what's
going on with Navy Sports byjoining our group Facebook page
and by following this podcast.
I'll put a link in the shownotes to get you to our Navy
Sports Nation group page, andfollowing the show is even
easier.
All you've got to do is tap thefollow button.
Whether you're listening toApple Podcasts, spotify, google
(36:14):
Podcasts, it doesn't matter.
This will automatically dropthe most recent episode into
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it whenever you're ready.
It is definitely the easiestway to show your support for
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Sports Nation community.
So go ahead and hit that followbutton right now.
We'll be right back.
All right, thanks again forjoining us on Navy Sports
(36:50):
Central, Karl Darden, here withyou Today, we are talking about
the Navy Offshore SailingProgram with my guest, warren
Mazenek, who also happens to bemy classmate.
Warren, we'll get back to ourconversation in a minute, but
first I wanted to give you anopportunity to talk about
anything you'd like to sharewith our listeners.
That's important to you.
Maybe it's work related, but itdoesn't have to be so go ahead
(37:11):
and take it away.
The mic is yours.
Warren (37:13):
So what I'd like to do is just to give a shout out to
the offshore program at theNaval Academy.
It was very formative for me asa young person.
It gave me the opportunity totake on responsibility, be
competitive, learn what it meansto be a great team.
(37:35):
When I was able to come backand participate as one of the
leadership in the sailing center, I got to see a whole different
aspect of the dedication andthe love for the sport that an
entire host of volunteers andstaff brought to the table every
(37:56):
day.
The offshore team has been verylucky to have John Tahanski as
their leader.
I'm thinking it's going closeto 20 years.
I knew John long before he tookthis job and he ran J World in
Annapolis.
He was always a pillar of thesailing community.
He went out of his way to makesure that and this is long
(38:20):
before the Naval Academy healways did the right thing
because it was the right thingto do so.
When he came on board to be thehead coach of the offshore team
, he brought that philosophywith him.
That meshes perfectly with whatwe are trying to teach our
midshipmen, but there's amaintenance staff that takes
(38:46):
time to teach the midshipmen onengine maintenance and sail care
and how to repair winches.
To the coaches, who volunteerhundreds of hours of their time
to make sure that the midshipmenhave ample opportunity to get
on the water and do things in asafe fashion.
(39:07):
And you get to meet othermembers of the sailing community
and put their years of greatexperience to personal use.
And so, like I said, it's sucha wonderful family that I'll be
forever indebted to theopportunities that they provided
(39:29):
me and I hope that theycontinue for the future.
Midshipmen, the Navy in generalthe flavor has changed.
A lot of the fun out of what wedo has been regulated out of
existence, and this is one ofthose opportunities to sell a
young person on wind in yourhair, cup of coffee on the
(39:53):
bridge watching the sunrise inthe middle of the ocean.
And it's that kind of I lovethis that makes you a better
sailor, a better person, abetter naval officer.
And so, like I said, I'mincredibly indebted to all the
phenomenal people who, over theyears, have been giving their
(40:15):
time to make sure thatmidshipmen like me had an
opportunity to grow withunlimited potential.
Karl (40:23):
All right, all right, I don't know that I could have
said that any better, warren, soI really appreciate that
thought.
All right, so let's go aheadand get back to our conversation
Now.
Along with the rifle team, bothsailing programs were co-ed.
Was that the case back then?
Warren (40:37):
Yes, Okay, All right.
So the first one was Kay Hire.
She went on to be an astronautand even as a midshipman she had
that leadership it.
You know, the person walks inthe room and they don't really
have to do anything, but youjust get the sense that they're
competent and in charge.
And that was Kay, and I got theopportunity to sail for her and
(41:01):
, despite all the garbage thatshe cut for being a female, she
was just remarkable and I walkedaway thinking, well, here's a
woman who I'd follow anywherebecause she's a great leader and
that helped, you know, frame mystart of my naval career,
because you could have easilyended up in a company where a
(41:25):
very anti-woman and, you know,being a plebe and trying to stay
under the radar you would buyinto that vibe.
And we didn't have that in 16thcompany, so I just thought it
was amazing.
Karl (41:38):
Yeah, Wow, that's a great story, Warren.
Thanks for sharing it.
So now let's talk a little bitabout just professional racing,
I guess is the best way to putit.
I remember when the America'sCup was a really big deal and in
fact when we were at theAcademy, I think when they raced
in 83, at least I think it wasin 83, either in the fall of 83
(42:03):
or in the spring of 84, DennisConnors boat lost to the boat
from Australia which I guess waskind of renowned because it had
a really innovative design oftheir keel it was a winged keel
and then he won it back fouryears later when they raced out
there in Western Australia.
I don't hear as much about theAmerica's Cup now and I try to
(42:26):
kind of stay dialed in the mostsports, but usually you hear
that coming up on the radarevery three to four years.
I haven't heard that muchlately.
Is there a reason for that, ordo you get the same feel, or is
that just me?
Warren (42:40):
So when we were in the American Cup was going on, they
were racing a 12-meter designand taking to a bunch of factors
.
You do the math and the answeris 12 meters.
So you can define the box anyway you want, as long as the
answer equal 12 meters.
And it was a traditionalmonohull, and so that was
(43:03):
something that a lot of peoplecould relate to.
In the ensuing years they havechanged the design to make it a
lot more exciting.
Today they're sailing these70-foot catamarans that are on
hydrofoils and crew members arewearing body armor and crash
helmets because they're runningaround at 50 miles an hour and
(43:25):
if the boat starts to cartwheelyou have to be protected because
it could be.
In my personal opinion, that's akind of sailing, although it's
really exciting.
I have a hard time relating toand in Europe and other places
they have sailing venues thatare very conducive to being a
(43:49):
spectator sport, and so they'reharbors that when you see on TV
when they show the videos of theraces, there's thousands of
people that are there to watchthe racing happen right in front
of them, and I don't think thatthere are that many
opportunities or venues here inthe United States to do that
kind of sailing to get a crowdtogether and generate that sort
(44:13):
of excitement.
So I think it has evolved.
They've been trying to keep thesport relevant, try to
encourage technology and I thinkfor a certain segment of the
sailing population that theAmerica's Cup type racing has
(44:33):
left us kind of behind.
Karl (44:35):
Yeah, to your point about just the differences in the
design.
I remember within two yearsafter Dennis Conner won the
Americans Cup back and he didthat in 87, there was another.
I guess these countries canjust put challenges out there
anytime they want to.
And that was the first time Istarted to see differences in
(44:55):
boat design, because the nexttime I saw it was a challenge
race.
It looked like the Australianswere sailing in a standard 12
meter boat.
I'm sure there's some othermodifications paid to it to come
out to satisfy the rules, asyou stated.
But the American entry was,like you were saying, this
monstrous camera and I'mthinking, wait, how in the world
(45:16):
did they get that to go through, to get it approved?
And secondly, the Australiansdon't stand a chance with that
kind of it.
Looked just like a completemismatch.
So was that the first time thatyou started seeing that?
No-transcript.
Warren (45:30):
With the Australians and their winged keel, they sort of
opened the box out of the box,thinking so this was a new way
of looking at stability andspeed.
I think somebody took a stepback and said why are we
limiting ourselves to one hallwhere we can have two?
(45:52):
Can we work within the designrules?
Again, that's probably aboutthe point that many I don't say
traditionalists, but many of usthat sailed at race boats sort
of lost interest because it wasmore of a spectacle than a
competition.
Karl (46:12):
Right, OK, Makes sense, All right.
So now let's have what I hopeis a little bit of fun and let's
talk movies.
I know that typically, whateverprofession you happen to be in
and if there's a movie thatcomes out, they kind of either
reflects what you do for aliving or what a passionate
hobby of yours is, that sort ofthing you always watch it with a
(46:34):
really critical eye.
I do the same thing anytime Isee movies that involve
helicopters for sure.
So in 1992, they came out witha movie called Wind and it
starred Matthew Maudine andJennifer Gray and it was about
the America's Cup races.
I happened to watch it.
I was knowing what I know aboutsailing.
(46:55):
It was fairly entertaining to me, but from your perspective,
first of all, did you see it?
And secondly, what was yourtake on it?
Warren (47:02):
So, yes, I saw it.
I really liked it.
So, whether it's a movie abouthelicopters or submarines or
racing sailboats, you canapproach it in one of two ways.
You could go at it and pickapart all the things that aren't
accurate and it detracts fromthe overall movie.
(47:26):
Or you can go into it and say Iunderstand that there's going
to be departure from reality,but I'm going to enjoy this for
the story that it's supposed tobe.
And the storyline was prettycool.
It is pretty typical of a lotof us.
I believe that she came from awell-heeled family, grew up in
(47:50):
the yacht club environment.
Matthew Maudine I guess kind oflike my experience moved
somewhere where you could dosailing, sailed with friends,
was a pickup crew but never partof the Blue Blazer Club, and
got really good and I think thecompetition scenes and the
(48:13):
decision making that went intoit closely parallels the way it
happens.
But what I think theyunderplayed was the investment.
These are people who spendinsane amounts of money to gain
that technological advantage, towin a race and have the
(48:34):
America's Cup and the R&Ddollars that go into it and the
exotic materials that go intothe boat building all that stuff
.
It seems improbable that a guylike Matthew Maudine's character
would be able to generate thecapital necessary to mount a
(48:54):
successful campaign.
But it was supposed to be ahappy ending story.
It was they won.
So I think it casts theAmerica's Cup and sailing in a
good light.
If there was somebody that wasinterested in civil racing and
(49:16):
hadn't quite made the leap, thiswas probably a good movie to
encourage them to explore it alittle bit more.
So for being a good movie forentertainment, I thought it was
fabulous.
Karl (49:29):
Yeah, that was my take as well, and I was especially
impressed with the way theyfilmed the sailing scenes, the
racing scenes.
I thought that really kind ofpulled me into what was going on
.
Ok, it's funny here You've gota pretty good knack for
answering questions before I askthem, but I'm going to kind of
combine these two together here.
(49:50):
You've already talked a lotabout some of the technical
innovations and changes thathave basically made the sport
completely different than whatwe're accustomed to seeing years
ago.
Now the question I'll put toyou is based on that, and I'm
going to put you in charge ofyacht racing's governing body
here.
For, just theoretically, whatare a couple of changes that you
(50:13):
would make that would kind ofsatisfy both sides of the
equation in terms of justkeeping things innovative but
not making it quite thespectacle as it is right now?
Warren (50:24):
You know, there's almost very little.
I look back I lived inAnnapolis for 25 years while I
was stationed at the Academy andthen, when I worked in the
defense industry and while I waswith the Academy, I became part
of a race crew from out in townpeople that had known
(50:46):
beforehand, and we ended upsailing for over 20 years
together before I moved out toNew Mexico and changed my water
sports to snow sports.
I think that the sailing sceneit is in a fairly healthy place
right now.
There are a lot ofopportunities to participate in
(51:07):
more entry level one designsailboats which help contain the
cost.
There is a community oflearning and education
associated with that class ofboat.
In most cases, they are verygenerous with their time and
(51:28):
their advice and their expertise.
I was very fortunate that Iraced Solings.
It's a three man Olympic classsloop.
My son was very active inracing those as well.
He crewed for Stuart Walker,multiple Olympic competitor,
(51:48):
world champion, and he was onthe race course giving it his
all into his 90s.
Man was just a legend and myson got to sail with him.
And in the 90s no sorry, 2014,my son and I raced together in
the world championships up inToronto and these are Olympic
(52:10):
class competitors and theparking lot was as collegial as
anything I had ever seen.
Oh crap, I left my jib at home.
Oh, here I have a spare, youcan use that.
And the thought was I don'twant to go out there and win
because somebody is at adisadvantage, I want to go out,
win because I'm better.
(52:32):
There were crews whose combinedage was 200.
And there were crews who wereyoung people and that was sort
of the spirit that you find inthe one design classes.
That are the classics.
You find that in Wednesdaynight racing in an apples
(52:53):
harbour or Newport or pick aplace that does Wednesday night
racing Business takes me out toSan Diego.
I really try hard to make sureI'm there for Wednesdays.
I do Wednesday night sailingwith Gerald David and his wife
Ann and it is a very welcomingcasual.
Let's get out on the water andsail a course and, ok, we'll
(53:17):
call it a race, but it's just anopportunity to take a break
midweek and get out on the waterand I think that vibe is really
alive and well.
I think in terms of world classcompetition there are avenues
for people to compete in the onedesign realm and Olympic class
(53:37):
sailboats.
Those are typically simpler.
If you're that good and that'syour passion, there are
opportunities to go.
You know, grand Prix and inanother direction, and so I
think, depending on yourpersonality and your desires,
there are multiple opportunitiesfor you to pursue in whatever
direction you need to go.
(53:58):
I have sailed from club level topro-Gran Prix and I ended up
sailing with this particularcrew, the Zeiberger crew, for 20
years because on a Wednesdayevening those are the people
that I just wanted to hang outwith.
I mean, we were good, we won,but it was a very collegial
(54:22):
environment.
Nobody yelled at anybody.
You know we all did our best,it was a team effort and I just
like being around those people.
I've been on other boats thatwere filled with very aggressive
type A personalities and therewas yelling and you know the
tension was high and, althoughwe won, it was not a pleasant
(54:45):
experience, and so, you know, Igot to the point where I didn't
feel like I needed to, you know,prove myself any longer and I
got to do what I really enjoyed,right, and that conveyed to my
children, who Also raisedsailboats, and when they had the
opportunity They'd say, hey,dad, you want to go out sailing.
Which was really my goal, wasto create Something that we
(55:09):
could do together as a family,and so that's, you know, the.
My end game was to make this afamily sport, and I think you
know we can do this for the next.
You know, god willing, 30 yearsand and I'll still have
children who will say, hey,that's pretty cool, dad, can we
go sailing again this summer?
Karl (55:29):
Right, right, okay.
Well, that sounds like a prettygood spot to stop, warren.
I really appreciate the insight.
So thank you very much forjoining me to talk about the
Navy offshore sailing program.
It has definitely been a goodlearning experience for me.
Oh no, worries.
No worries at all.
Warren (55:42):
If you have any other questions, send me an email.
I'll answer the best I can okay, sounds good, take care.
Karl (55:48):
All right, we are approaching the home stretch.
We'll be back shortly with ourquestion of the day and
mid-watch segments.
Okay, it is time to jump intoour question of the day, but
(56:13):
before I get to that, I did wantto basically confirm something
Warren said about what yachtracing is like these days, at
least when it comes to theAmerica's Cup.
I happen to jump on one of thethe yachting websites recently,
and I think it's probably onespecific to the America's Cup.
But I will tell you I could notbelieve what I was seeing.
(56:33):
I mean, warren was right, youhave these huge catamarans,
these double-hole, thesedouble-hole boats that we're
just flying all over the place,I mean just going, these
incredible rates of speed, justcrazy, death-defying angles.
And I tell you what?
There's no wonder that wearingcrash helmets and body armor,
because you get thrown from oneof those things and, believe me,
you may not walk away from it.
(56:54):
So, anyway, I can see why.
You know, some of the moretraditional professional racers
have kind of gotten away fromthat, but definitely Something
crazy to look at.
All right, let's go ahead andget to our questions today and,
as usual, let's start with theone from our last episode,
remember it had to do with aNavy goalkeeper, maddie
Gallagher.
And here it is.
(57:15):
Maddie Gallagher played apivotal role in starting nine of
ten games as a freshman for theNavy women's soccer team.
Her goals against averageduring the season was a
microscopic 0.80 per game.
What was her save percent isduring that same period?
Was it a 77 percent, b, 79percent, c, 82 percent or D 84
percent?
The most popular answer was D84 percent, and there were 61
(57:40):
percent of you who selected thatone, and then 38 percent of you
chose C, which was 82 percent.
Neither 77 percent nor 79percent received any votes, and
it turns out that the correctanswer was D 84 percent.
So shout out to all my 84classmates who jumped all over
that answer way to go.
It was really tough to get ashot past Gallagher that year.
One of the things I've seen herdo really well to this day is
(58:02):
redirect the ball over the crossball On a shot that's going
kind of high.
That takes some real athleticability and some pretty good
hops too.
And you know Gallagher is is 57, so certainly not short, but
not overly tall either, whichtells you she's probably got a
pretty good vertical.
Now, these last three setbacksthat the women's soccer team has
suffered have derailed theirregular season title aspirations
(58:23):
.
But if they can reverse courseand win at least two of these
last three league games, theycan generate a little bit of
momentum going into the PatriotLeague tournament, where
basically anything can happen.
Okay, now let's get to ourquestion for this week's episode
.
I mentioned earlier that theNaval Academy has won the
Kennedy Cup 15 times.
That is basically offshoresailings version of the NCAA
championship.
Now, on how many occasions didthe Mids win it in consecutive
(58:47):
years?
Was it a just once, b twice, cthree times or D four times?
Go ahead and give that somethought and let me know what you
come up with.
I will have the question up onthe Navy Sports Nation Group
Facebook page by the end of theday and you can respond there.
Now we're going to close thingsout by checking in to see how
our two athletes on the midwatchare doing.
First we've got Averi Miller,who is a senior from Phoenix
(59:10):
Arizona and she is a setter forthe volleyball team who, at six
feet, can be used as a blockerand a hitter if necessary.
I'm recording this segment onFriday evening, october 13th,
and it occurred to me that theNavy just finished playing
American University and I justhappened to check the score.
Navy came from two sets to one,down to win three sets to two,
and Averi Miller had 47 of theMids 53 assists, and she also
(59:34):
added four kills and ten digs togo along with that.
At her current rate she's adeadlock to finish her career in
the top five in both totalassists and assists per set.
This win ends a three matchlosing streak and the Mids are
still in decent shape to getthemselves in a position for a
good seat at the Patriot Leaguetournament.
But they will have to win outthe rest of their games and they
(59:56):
do have another shot againstArmy in the star match which
takes place on November the 11th.
Okay, let's move on to the men,and here we're looking at
freshman Kiefer Black from thewater polo team.
He is from San Diego,california, and currently leads
the Mids in both goals with 43and assists with 37, and that
gives him a total of 80 points.
I did watch this guy play whenthe Mids took on Air Force last
(01:00:21):
month and Black didn't score,but he had three really nice
assists, and what's amazing tome is how high he is able to
elevate himself when he takes ashot, makes it pass or gets a
steal.
Remember, these guys aren'tpushing off from the bottom of
the pool, okay.
It takes some serious legstrength and athleticism to
propel your body halfway out ofthe water to make a play in
water polo and at 6'7" 220,kiefer Black is just simply a
(01:00:45):
beast.
He's actually got a decent shotat a 100 point season.
The team has five games left,plus the Mid-Atlantic Water Polo
Association tournament, so allhe needs is four or five points
a game to get to 100.
The Mids are currently ranked19th in the country and I think
it's fair to say that Black willdefinitely be one of the keys
to their success as they finishup the regular season and try to
qualify for the NCAA tournament.
(01:01:06):
That's going to do it for thisedition of Navy Sports Central.
Thank you all so much forjoining us Now.
If you like what you've heard,please be sure to hit that
follow button wherever you getyour podcast and remember to get
the word to all the other Navyfans out there.
Once again, I'd like to thankmy fellow classmate, Warren
Mazanek, for joining me today totalk about the Navy Offshore
Sailing Program.
I don't know about you guys,but I know way more about it now
(01:01:29):
compared to before.
Our question of the daycontinues to be a show favorite.
You can get in on that byjoining the Navy Sports Nation
group Facebook page and givingyour answer to this week's
question.
I will pin it to the top so youdon't miss it.
And just a quick reminder theviews expressed on Navy Sports
Central are my own and do notreflect those of the US Naval
Academy or Navy Athletics.
By the way, the music used inNavy Sports Central comes to
(01:01:50):
your courtesy of Audio Jungle.
This is a great site forpurchasing the rights to use the
music from thousands of artistsaround the world, and those
featured in the podcast will becredited in our show notes.
Talk to you soon, everybody.
Until next time.
This is Karl Darden Go Navy!Beat Army!
Hi everybody, my name is Karl Darden and I'd like to
welcome and thank all of you forjoining us today on Navy Sports
Central.
I'm your host and this is theofficial podcast of the Navy
Sports Nation where we take adeeper dive into Navy Sports.
Last week was a little rough onthe mids as the Army-Navy Star
Series got underway.
They suffered a couple ofreally tough setbacks in both
men's golf and sprint football,so I'll give you a quick update
(00:35):
on how those two contests went.
Meanwhile, the football teamlooks to make it to and a row
after a hard-fought win overNorth Texas.
They are on the road to take onCharlotte University this
weekend, a team that is muchbetter than their current 1-4
record.
And today, in our deep divesegment, we'll be talking about
a sport where Navy owns 15 NCAAChampionships and will be joined
by an awesome guest who willhelp us learn more about it.
We will also have our questionof the day and mid-watch
(00:56):
segments, so please stay with us.
Alright, so glad to have youwith us here today on Navy
Sports Central, whether this isyour first visit or your regular
listener.
Thanks for taking the time.
I'm going to keep the sportsupdate kind of short today
because I want to get into thedeep dive segment.
(01:18):
The sport we'll be discussinghas been on my list for a while.
I just needed to track down aguest with the expertise to talk
about the program, so you'lldefinitely want to stick around
for that Now.
You all heard me say in theopening that the Mids got off to
kind of a rocky start in theArmy-Navy Star competition.
The men's golf team looked tobe in a pretty good spot after
their four ball matches lastweek.
They won all of them to take a4-0 lead going into the singles
(01:40):
matches on Saturday.
That meant they needed to pulldown two more points in the
remaining seven singles matchesto earn the star.
Unfortunately, they were onlyable to come up with one and a
half.
The matches tied 5 and a halfto 5 and a half after those
seven singles matches werecompleted and Army ended up
taking the star in the playoff.
So no doubt that stung quite abit.
But this is a very young team.
(02:01):
In fact I was surprised tolearn that there are no seniors
on a 10-man squad.
It consists of three juniors,four sophomores and three
freshmen.
So from here on the men's golfteam will be competing in a
series of invitations as theywork their way towards the
Patriot League championships inApril.
By then they'll be much morebattle tested and hopefully
they'll be able to get somemeasure of revenge against Army
(02:23):
when the time comes.
The sprint football team alsocame up short on the road
against the Black Knights.
This was your typical defensivebattle.
I mean, when these two teamsget together, it is a very, very
low-scoring game, and this yearwas no different.
I mean, I think in terms oftotal yardage there was only a
difference of about four yardsbetween the two.
I think Army had 225 and Navyhad 229, something like that,
(02:48):
but it all came down tobasically turnovers.
Navy was driving down for whatlooked like it was going to be
the go-ahead score, butunfortunately Army came up with
an interception and they wereable to score a touchdown with
about 47 seconds left in thegame.
That pretty much did it.
If the Mids win the rest oftheir games, they could wind up
facing the Black Knights in theCSFL championship game, just
(03:08):
like they have the last twoyears, and no doubt they'll be
looking to fix what went wronglast week.
I do want to end on a positivenote, though, so I'll finish up
by saying it was great to seethe football team earn a
hard-fought win over North Texaslast week.
The defense recorded a schoolrecord eight sacks.
One of those came courtesy ofsophomore Raider Luke Parris.
He forced a fumble that theMids recovered and converted
(03:28):
into a touchdown, and that gavethem the cushion they needed to
get the win.
Finally, the men's rugby teamtook on Life University in a
very close game.
Life is a private school inMarietta, georgia, and they have
an excellent program.
In fact, the Mids had neverbeaten them in the years that
they competed as a club team,but this time around Sean
McLeaney came through with a try, with Navy trailing 14-13 in
(03:48):
the second half.
The kick put them up 20-14, andthe defense made that stand up
for the rest of the game.
So the Mids are now 6-0 in thefall with five games left.
And that includes Air Force andArmy.
What I don't get is that Armyis not designated as a star
match, and I'm pretty sure theyplay again in the spring, but so
far that's not a star matcheither.
If it was, that would make it atotal of 26 for the year, and
(04:09):
right now that number is stillstanding at 25.
So I guess I'm not sure what'sgoing on there.
Alright, that's going to do itfor our sports update.
Stick around, because our deepdive segment is next.
Okay, we are back.
(04:37):
When I started the Navy SportsNation blog three years ago and
followed that up with thispodcast in 2021, one of my
stated goals was to shine thespotlight on the sports at the
Naval Academy that tend to flyunder the radar.
Those would be the ones besidesfootball, basketball, baseball
and I would put lacrosse inthere as well.
So that's what we're going todo today.
In the opening, I shared thatthe Naval Academy has won 15
(05:00):
national championships in thisparticular sport.
Now, I'm not sure if any of youwere trying to guess which
sport it was when I said that,but if you came up with offshore
sailing, you would be correctTo tell you the truth.
You could fit what I know aboutthis sport into a small shot
glass and still have plenty ofroom for a generous amount of
alcohol.
So that's what.
I've got an awesome guest tohelp me out.
He is my classmate from theclass of 84 and he was a member
(05:22):
of the offshore sailing team allfour years Following graduation
.
He joined the submarine forceand later came back to Annapolis
to teach mathematics and tolead the summer sailing program,
and during that time he playeda pivotal role in developing the
mid-seamanship and leadershipskills.
So I'm very happy to welcomeWarren Mazanek to the podcast.
So, warren, I really appreciateyou joining me today.
One of the reasons I wanted tofeature offshore sailing is
(05:44):
because I don't know that muchabout it, so thanks for taking
the time.
Warren (05:49):
Oh, thank you, Carl.
This is a great opportunity andyou're right, there aren't many
people who know a lot about theoffshore sailing team and the
things that they've been able toaccomplish, so I appreciate
this opportunity.
Karl (06:01):
Yeah, no problem.
So now, sailing is not a sportthat most mids are exposed to
prior to arriving at the NavalAcademy.
Was that true in your case, ordid you have sailing experience
before getting there?
Warren (06:12):
So there's formal sailing experience and then
there's, you know, sort of youthknocking about in boats.
And when I was a freshman inhigh school my father moved us
to Cape Cod we're here as aprincipal of a high school and
so I started sailing on thelocal ponds with sunfish and
lasers and met some sailingfriends who belong to the yacht
(06:35):
club and I go along as crew andrace with them and you know
weekend races or some of the onedesigns.
But at the Naval Academy theoffshore team is sort of
although it's a varsity sportkind of a club level entry point
in that on the intercollegiateteam, just like with football
and baseball, there are bluechip recruits.
(06:58):
They do recruiting, theyidentify people.
Most of the people who come tothe Naval Academy and end up, as
you know, all American skippersand crews come out of formal
sailing programs at yacht clubsfrom you know very early on.
Just like in swimming, whereyou start at you know age four
(07:19):
or five and you progress throughthe ranks, sailing is very,
very similar.
In offshore sailing it'susually people who raced with
family or friends, haveexperience on the water.
Maybe they were a sailingjunior but didn't quite reach
the level to make theintercollegiate team but want to
continue their sailing.
(07:39):
And so the offshore team isthere and in our day it was made
up of a fleet of the Navy 44foot yalls, which are all the
same design and donated boats.
So I started out, like I said,doing the club thing with
families and friends on the Cape, the person that I was working
(08:03):
for in high school.
I went to 90 foot schooner andmy sophomore year of high school
he asked if I would sail withhim down to the islands to start
the winter charter season andthey flew me home.
I went down the springtime andI came back.
So that was my first offshoreexperience.
What happens that his brotherwas Dodge Morgan, the man who
(08:24):
built American promise and setthe record for the first solo
nonstop around the world sail.
And my junior year of highschool.
On our way down to the islandswe ran into Hurricane Lucille,
ended up getting dismasked itand spending several months in
(08:44):
Marsh Harbor in the Bahamasdoing refit and getting the boat
ready.
And then I came home, finishedup my junior year and came to
the Academy and I was able toleverage that offshore
experience into getting on tothe offshore team.
So that's how I got there.
Karl (09:02):
Hey, nice having some time off in the Bahamas before you
finished up schooling, I guess,huh.
Warren (09:07):
Well, there was.
It was called the CalvertSchool back then and there was
no internet or anything.
But you know, they sent you offwith a couple of boxes of
materials and you would do selfstudy.
Somebody would proctor theexams for you, put them in an
envelope and mail them in.
That's how you got your grades.
You know, looking back on itfor increasing the odds to get
(09:32):
into a surface Academy, that wasprobably not a smart move, but
it was a lifetime experience.
So you know, my parents were onboard and I took advantage of
it.
Karl (09:44):
Wow, that's awesome.
So it sounds like I mean,obviously you had a little bit
of offshore experience beforegoing in and that's really what
kind of appealed to you about it.
Let's talk a little bit aboutthe types of boats that are used
.
You mentioned the 44 foot y'alland, by the way, the last time
I was on a Naval Academy y'allwas the end of Pleabes summer
(10:04):
but I'm curious to know thedifferent types of categories
that you guys competed in whenyou were offshore sailing.
Warren (10:15):
There's two basic kinds of fleets.
One is a one design fleet.
There are several thousand J24sand J105s and Pearson Flyers.
They have a fleet organization.
They maintain rigorspecifications.
(10:36):
So technically when everybodygoes on the water they're
sailing an identicallyperforming boat.
Then it becomes really easy.
The first one across the finishline wins.
The other kind is when there isa rule, a design rule like the
12 meter rule.
You do all the calculations fora sail area draft and all the
(10:57):
thousands of things that go intothe design.
The answer has to equal 12meters.
The box can look like anythingyou want it to look like.
The goal is to make the fastestboat for specific conditions
and it equals the rule.
There are rating rules.
You can race with a variety ofboats and the attempt is to give
(11:20):
them a rating so that, like agolf handicap, at the end of the
day, if you have a 25 handicap,then you get 25 bonus points.
If you're golfing againstsomebody who's a five
handicapper, you get 20 morepoints towards leveling the
field than he does.
That's kind of like how therating systems work.
(11:43):
There are two objectives too.
You can spend both sets.
You can spend a lot of money,but to make the sport
competitive and affordable toaverage people who want to race
sailboats.
One design sailing is veryappealing because typically your
local fleet will one year sail.
Everybody will buy a main sailand they'll do a group buy and
(12:05):
the price will be good.
Everybody sails with the sameset of sails and they rotate
through.
Better sailors typically end upon top, but it allows average
sailors to go out and have funand be marginally competitive In
intercollegiate.
They're much smaller boats,typically two or three person
crews.
(12:26):
They're singles and all theboats are identical.
All the sails are identical.
Again, it's whoever is fastestaround the course wins and
there's no calculating differentboats against each other, right
?
Karl (12:41):
Okay, I was wondering if you can kind of understand it.
Offshore sailing crew.
I was wondering if you couldjust kind of run down first of
all how many people are in itand then secondly, just a real
quick thumbnail sketch on theirpositions and responsibilities.
Warren (12:56):
Certainly so.
As you would imagine, itdepends upon the size of the
boat.
Some of the very large 80footers go offshore with 20, 22
people and there just seems tobe bodies everywhere.
On the Navy 44, which is themodern version of the Navy, all
typically 10 people.
So there will be two safetycoaches, one for each watch
(13:19):
section.
There'll be two upper classfirsties as sort of watch
captains, two other second classand then there will be three
plebe youngster second classthat round out that watch
section's crew, and so you havefive on, five off, except maybe
in bed.
Whether you need to do a sailchange, you need all hands.
(13:41):
But typically it's importantstarboard kind of a watch
arrangement.
When you're racing offshore,when we're racing on the
Chesapeake Bay, and it's a fullday, six hour race, all hands
are on deck full time.
And so you need people to grindwinches, trim the head sail,
(14:02):
work the fore deck for sailchanges, trim the main sail.
And I'm going in from and Idon't want to say least
importance, but from the lowskill to the higher skill jobs.
So you kind of start as a plebegrinding the winch, watching
how everything goes in the boat.
You transition to trimming thehead sail, which is you get a
(14:26):
lot of advice and help fromeverybody in doing that, but
you're on the low side of theboat, your feet are always wet,
so that's where your second stepis is in the trenches.
Skill positions are working thefore deck, which is sail changes
, jibing the spinnaker, pullingthe lines, the strings, so
raising and lowering sails,dipping the spinnaker pole for a
(14:49):
jib, making sure that all linesare running free so that you
can execute any evolutionwithout worrying about getting
your gear tangled.
And then main sail trim isprobably like the senior
technical position.
He works very closely with thehelmsman to balance the boat,
(15:10):
keep everything going in theright direction.
And then you have a helmsman,which is typically the skipper
and a tactician, somebody tokeep the big picture, like CIC
on a ship, of what's going onand advising the skipper where
to drive the boat so that we canbe most efficient to getting to
the line first.
Karl (15:31):
Right, right, okay, very cool.
So now let's get into a typicalpractice day.
I was wondering if you couldkind of describe some of the key
maneuvers that are justabsolutely critical to be able
to compete when you're out there, to be successful and then
regarded.
So if you could run that downfor me, that'd be great.
Warren (15:50):
So there's two really scenarios that we practice with
the offshore team and one ofthem is when we're all sailing
at 8044, so it's a one designand a practice race.
So you get to practice tacticsagainst people.
You race on a short race coursewhich forces you to tack more
(16:12):
efficiently.
When you're going downwind,your jibes have to be crisp and
fast, and so the windward, goingto the windward mark and then
back down to the lower mark, isa short and distance of practice
.
So it's very, very fast paced.
Typically you'll start outearly in the season and you'll
be doing drills, reefing andun-reefing, the mainsail,
(16:34):
practicing your man overboarddrill.
Everybody on the crew has to beable to assume just about any
position on the boat during aman overboard drill, especially
in bad weather when it'stypically, when it happens, very
challenging, very easy to losea crew.
So that's something that theypractice extensively, but work
really hard on standard languageso that everybody, when
(17:00):
something like this happens,everybody uses the same
terminology, the same commandsand every member of the crew is
fluent in a number of thecritical positions so that the
first one on the scene can takethat spot and make sure that
it's a successful recovery.
So, like we'll do upwind sailingand we'll go all the way out
(17:22):
into the bay and rather thantack and sit on that tack for a
long time, you will tack, getthe trim down, get the boat
speed up, get the boat speedwhere it wants to be and then
you'll tack over.
And you'll do this 100 timesduring practice and it gets you
to be crisp, trains the helmsmanhow to smoothly come about
(17:42):
without losing too much speed.
It teaches the sail trippers howto work with the boat as it
comes up into speed and adjustthe sail trim so that you get
back to your maximum speed asquickly as possible.
Now, when you get to the otherend, you turn around, you come
back, you put up your spitsticker and you jib from side to
side over and over and overagain.
As soon as the sails are setand drawn properly, you execute
(18:05):
the next one, and it's just arepetitive thing so that it
becomes muscle memory Everybodygets familiar with.
You know I have to ease thisline four feet and it becomes.
Rather than paying it outcarefully, you know exactly
where it is and boom, you canget the topping lift and the
(18:25):
pole through the fore triangleas quickly as possible without
any mix ups.
So there's a lot of drills likethat that happen tacking and
jiving and then, of course, thenyou get to practice against
your teammates, which is great.
Karl (18:43):
Okay, all right.
So I noted, just kind ofskimming, through the Navy
Sports webpage and everything,the offshore sailing team.
First of all, it doesn't appearthat they have much of an
off-season at all.
There looks like they're racingyear-round.
And secondly, they did competein the Race Around Long Island a
couple of months ago and didpretty well.
Aside from those open waterraces where you're going either
(19:06):
around a geographic landmark oryou're doing point to point,
like from Bermuda to I don'tknow, new York or something like
that, what might a typicalcourse setup look like?
I mean, is it an out-and-backsort of thing or does it vary?
Warren (19:21):
So setting up a race course and having a good race
committee is really as critical.
When we were in college, thetypical race course was a
triangle race course and therewas a windward going straight up
wind leg, a straight down windleg, and then there were a
couple of reaching legs and thereaching legs was really hard to
(19:43):
.
It's based on boat speed, sothe faster the boat, you stay on
one tack the whole time and youkind of race down, you flip
over, you do the same fast,reach back, and they felt that
that was less competitive.
So today's race courses arecalled windward lures, and so
(20:04):
the goal is to have the startingline perpendicular to the wind
and the windward mark isdirectly upwind.
So there should technically beno advantage to going to the
right or the left when you start.
In the perfect world and in thereal world, paying attention to
your environment, knowing wherethe winds are coming from, where
(20:24):
they're likely to shift, willlead you to choosing one side of
the course over the otherbecause it should be more
advantageous.
You get to the windward mark,you turn around, you put up your
spinnaker and as you come back,instead of having one mark they
have two.
That is called a gate, and soyou get to choose whether you,
when you go through the gate,whether you go to the right or
(20:44):
the left and sometimes one sideis more favored than the other
but it also is more crowded withother boats you may choose to
go to the least crowded sidebecause you'll have an easier
time getting around and back upto speed.
And so typically in that kindof a race environment, three to
five races a day, depending uponthe size of the boat and the
(21:07):
length of the course, and ifit's a two or three day event,
you can have anywhere up to 12races with one or two throwouts.
So if you have a bad race youget to toss out your worst score
.
Karl (21:23):
And one of the things that you had mentioned actually
before we started was the impacton weather on one of the trips
that you're taking when you'rein high school.
So my question is obviously youdon't race in even tropical
storm conditions or anythinglike that, but I was wondering
what the basic limitations arein terms of weather and what was
(21:44):
the worst weather you everraced in.
Warren (21:47):
It depends on the event and the type of boat.
In a typical J24, it's a 24foot sloop, it's a one design
class.
Or the Soling, which was theOlympic three man sloop, when
you got to 15 knots of breeze itwas getting towards the upper
end.
If it got consistently above 20, they would typically postpone
(22:10):
racing until the wind came down.
But when you're talking likelarger offshore boats, we won.
When I was back at the Academyas an instructor, we won the
Annapolis Newport race onAmerican Promise.
It was a solid gale force windsthe entire way from the moment
we left the Chesapeake till wepulled into Newport, rhode
(22:31):
Island.
But I was on American Promise,a very heavy, sturdy, 60 foot
boat that was designed to sailin extreme weather.
We were able to carry a lot ofsail and just plow our way
through the waves.
That was what the boat wasbuilt for.
The other large boats that werein the race were sporty.
(22:52):
They were built a lot lighter.
Their gear was not designed forall the extreme weather.
The boats that probably shouldhave won the race most of them
ended up retiring because of theweather, because it was an
offshore race.
That's part of the package.
(23:12):
We continued to compete.
I had a great team of mids withme.
It was really awesome goingacross the finish line in Castle
Rock and Narragansett Bay andhearing the gun go off and like
who's that for?
Oh, is that for us?
We had no idea we had done thatwell In the Chesapeake or in
(23:36):
any other weekend type regatta.
Once the winds start gettingabove 25 or 30 miles an hour,
certain fleets will postponetheir racing.
Larger boats will continueracing.
At just some point it becomesunsafe, either because of
lightning and swalls or justdanger to crew and equipment.
(23:57):
It's all up to the racecommittee.
Having an excellent racecommittee is important because
they understand the limitationsof the boats.
They will keep you racing rightup until that ragged edge of
are we safe or not, and theyknow when to call the race and
(24:18):
when to tell you to continue.
They bring a large safetyaspect.
I've also been in races whereskippers have said well, it's
just getting a little too roughout here.
I don't want to get anybodyhurt.
I think we're going to go inand we just retire from the race
.
It's an individual decision.
Karl (24:37):
Okay, All right.
So now, specific to the NavalAcademy program.
One thing I learned just inresearching this was that the
Kennedy Cup is recognized as thenational championship for
collegiate offshore sailing.
What I didn't know was that theNaval Academy has won that 15
times, including back-to-backyears when we were there in 81
(24:58):
and 82.
So I was wondering whatrecollection you have of those
two years.
That's obviously when we wereplebs and sophomores and
youngsters.
What do you recollect fromeither one of those two races?
I didn't know if you happenedto be part of the crew or
anything like that, but I'd becurious to get your take on
those.
Warren (25:15):
So when we were midshipmen, I'm going to guess
we had about 10 boats in theoffshore team.
It was basically everybody whowanted to sail was given the
opportunity and during the fallseason it was the McMillan Cup,
which was sort of like the EastCoast championships, sailed
(25:36):
under our Navy 44s and it wasagainst other colleges on the
East Coast and we would.
It was an opportunity to chooseteams and it was usually by
class and so there was a bunchof 84s you know Chris Kramer,
dan Crisp I'm going to forgetpeople like John Stamos, robin
(25:58):
Myers and we formed a team,probably not our fall of our
freshman year, but maybe for theKennedy Cup in the spring of
freshman year, cleave year andwe competed no, we didn't do so
well because we were fairly new,but that sort of nucleus stayed
together.
And in the fall of ouryoungster year we competed for
(26:19):
McMillan Cup and there's four,five, six boats that are
competing and it's a competitionin the boat that wins the
competition gets to representNavy in the in the Kennedy Cup
and McMillan Cup.
And what was really excitingabout that was it also gave us a
chance to compete against theintercollegiate team, and the
(26:43):
intercollegiate team was racinglaser single person boats, 420s,
two person boats and they didsome three person slope racing.
So they were not part of alarger crew that routinely
sailed big boats but becausethey were excellent at the
tactics still in its sail trimand the fast pace of Diggie
(27:04):
sailing, you know 50% of thetime they would have the winning
team and 50% of the time wewould have the winning team and
it was sort of a pride thing.
So I competed in Kennedy Cupspring of second class year and
I did McMillan Cup fall ofsecond class year and fall of
first class year and that wasone of the two ways you could
(27:26):
earn your varsity letter and onewas sailing.
You know those two were goddessand the other was a skipper
about.
Karl (27:34):
Okay, all right, cool.
Now, after graduation, youstill remained involved with the
program at some point.
I think I recall you talkingabout it was the summer sailing
program or something like that.
I was wondering if you couldrun that down for us.
What were some of the things,what were some of your
responsibilities, and how didthat program run?
Warren (27:54):
So when I finished my department tour on a submarine,
I had the opportunity to comeback and do my payback tour for
grad school.
So I was in the math departmentand I had the opportunity to
choose between doing sub-RYPcrews or the sailing crews.
Obviously, I chose the sailingcrews.
It was a great way to get backinto working with the midshipmen
(28:19):
.
Small unit leadershipopportunity for them to take
home responsibilities.
As I would tell them on the wayup to New England, your job is
to put me out of one so thatwhen we come back I can sit on
the fan tail and just watch.
They almost always rose to theoccasion.
(28:39):
It was really incredible towatch the maturation process and
how they went from not reallyknowing how to sail to being
fairly competent on a boat.
So I did that.
During the three years that Itaught in the math department
(28:59):
and I was active in the trainingaspect of it, the sailing
center asked me if I wouldconsider going to take a US
sailing instructor trainercourse for keelboats and I did
and I became the.
I think I was the first navalofficer to be an instructor
trainer for US sailing, so Iwould run certification clinics
(29:21):
for sailing instructors.
I did that because I thought itwas important to bring back a
national standard in sailtraining to try to help
incorporate into our curriculum.
When I was approaching the endof my time in the math
department I was starting tolook at where I was going to go
next and the director of ProDevreached out to me and asked me
(29:46):
what I consider going over tothe sailing center to run the
summer sail training program.
At the time the billet waslocated in loose hall and you
can't do a PCS move from withinyour same command.
So they moved the billet forthe sailing position over to the
naval station the same weekthat U-PERS moved to Millington
(30:09):
Tennessee.
So the computer that controlledwhere the billets were assigned
sat in a box for three yearsand when they finally got it set
up and changed my billet, theycut my orders from the date of
the billet change, not when Istarted the job.
So I ended up at the sailingcenter for a little over five
years running sail training.
(30:30):
So it was great I got toparticipate in the winter
training cycle to make sure thatour coaches and our first class
midshipmen were properlytrained.
They understood theresponsibilities of being watch
captain and safety coach Comespringtime, midshipmen who had
(30:51):
chosen to go on the summer sailcruise, we can get them out and
start the training process.
Then it was a three-week cycle.
They come in, they do chartpreps, they're given money so
they have to do meal planningand go buy their food.
They get it all stored.
They sail during the day to getup to speed.
(31:13):
Then on the second week theyleave Santee Basin, head down
the Chesapeake or up toChesapeake and go to New England
and get to Newport and spendthe weekend and they turn around
and sail back and turn the boatover for the next group to go.
It was really a fabulousprocess.
I was there long enough thatwhen I was in the math
(31:34):
department I had a young pleab.
He was a tall, gangly kid,grabbed, uncoordinated, very shy
, and you go.
Oh my God, this is the futureof our Navy.
Well, when I was at the sailingcenter we had a President's
Circle Day for the alumni and Igot asked to make half a dozen
(31:56):
boats available to take outthese President's Circle donors
and do a harbor tour.
This kid Ben he was the firstday at the time and he had
volunteered I got everybody ontheir boats and then I said I'll
just go out with this one, andI got on Ben's boat.
He had not only participated inyoungster sailing crews but he
(32:19):
was part of the sail trainingprogram and he had completed his
first class cruise as a watchcaptain and got his skipper qual
.
It was remarkable that thechange in what I had seen when I
first met him as a pleab tobeing a poised young man who was
in charge proper safety briefthere was not a moment during
(32:45):
the hour and a half underwaythat I felt I needed to step in.
He was just fabulous.
And that is typical of whathappens when a young midshipman
gets involved with the sailingprogram early on and the
maturation process through hisfour years at the academy, and
(33:05):
then you turn out these reallyfine young men.
My time at the academy continuedlong beyond my sailing program
experience.
I went back across the river toProDev and I got to watch this
young man come back as alieutenant.
I was even more amazed at howremarkable an individual this
(33:26):
was and that I had some part inthe process of getting him to
being the person that he was.
That's, I think, for thesailing program.
That's one of those lifetimeopportunities and the midshipman
that sees it really do.
(33:47):
Well.
There was a boat when we werethere as Patriot.
It was a Verus 46, a black-eyedboat and I believe in the time
I was a midshipman there werefour admirals that came off of
that one boat.
Wow, it's one of thoseexperiences that give you a
(34:08):
great sense of Siemens' Eyeappreciation for the weather,
the challenge of maneuveringboats, especially in crowded
harbors.
When you take a sailboat and yougo onto a starting line with 40
or 50 other large sailboats,you don't have a CIC team behind
you doing radar plotting andtelling you CPAs.
(34:30):
It's all Seamans' Eye and it'ssomething that you get to
develop over the course of yourmaturation process on the team.
I found that when I got to myfirst submarine, when we were
entering and exiting port, I waschosen over the department
heads to be the officer of thedeck because my experience of
(34:52):
driving large sailboats onto acrowded starting line.
I think it gave me the abilityto see the other traffic for
what it was and drive the shipproactively in a safe course
rather than waiting for the navplot and CIC to tell me where to
(35:13):
go.
The same reason we had so manysuccessful pilots come out of
the sailing team on a ship andyou're doing 20 or 30 knots,
your event horizon is fairlylong.
When you're flying around at Idon't know what they fly around
(35:34):
at 500 or 600 miles an hour,your event horizon is much, much
shorter.
I think that that ability ofseeing the situation, making an
instant analysis and choosing acorrect course leads to being a
better pilot as well.
Karl (35:51):
All right, good, good, I'll tell you what.
We're going to take a shortbreak, but first I wanted to let
you all know that you can staytotally up to speed on what's
going on with Navy Sports byjoining our group Facebook page
and by following this podcast.
I'll put a link in the shownotes to get you to our Navy
Sports Nation group page, andfollowing the show is even
easier.
All you've got to do is tap thefollow button.
Whether you're listening toApple Podcasts, spotify, google
(36:14):
Podcasts, it doesn't matter.
This will automatically dropthe most recent episode into
your library as soon as it'sreleased, and you can listen to
it whenever you're ready.
It is definitely the easiestway to show your support for
Navy Sports Central and thefastest way to grow the Navy
Sports Nation community.
So go ahead and hit that followbutton right now.
We'll be right back.
All right, thanks again forjoining us on Navy Sports
(36:50):
Central, Karl Darden, here withyou Today, we are talking about
the Navy Offshore SailingProgram with my guest, warren
Mazenek, who also happens to bemy classmate.
Warren, we'll get back to ourconversation in a minute, but
first I wanted to give you anopportunity to talk about
anything you'd like to sharewith our listeners.
That's important to you.
Maybe it's work related, but itdoesn't have to be so go ahead
(37:11):
and take it away.
The mic is yours.
Warren (37:13):
So what I'd like to do is just to give a shout out to
the offshore program at theNaval Academy.
It was very formative for me asa young person.
It gave me the opportunity totake on responsibility, be
competitive, learn what it meansto be a great team.
(37:35):
When I was able to come backand participate as one of the
leadership in the sailing center, I got to see a whole different
aspect of the dedication andthe love for the sport that an
entire host of volunteers andstaff brought to the table every
(37:56):
day.
The offshore team has been verylucky to have John Tahanski as
their leader.
I'm thinking it's going closeto 20 years.
I knew John long before he tookthis job and he ran J World in
Annapolis.
He was always a pillar of thesailing community.
He went out of his way to makesure that and this is long
(38:20):
before the Naval Academy healways did the right thing
because it was the right thingto do so.
When he came on board to be thehead coach of the offshore team
, he brought that philosophywith him.
That meshes perfectly with whatwe are trying to teach our
midshipmen, but there's amaintenance staff that takes
(38:46):
time to teach the midshipmen onengine maintenance and sail care
and how to repair winches.
To the coaches, who volunteerhundreds of hours of their time
to make sure that the midshipmenhave ample opportunity to get
on the water and do things in asafe fashion.
(39:07):
And you get to meet othermembers of the sailing community
and put their years of greatexperience to personal use.
And so, like I said, it's sucha wonderful family that I'll be
forever indebted to theopportunities that they provided
(39:29):
me and I hope that theycontinue for the future.
Midshipmen, the Navy in generalthe flavor has changed.
A lot of the fun out of what wedo has been regulated out of
existence, and this is one ofthose opportunities to sell a
young person on wind in yourhair, cup of coffee on the
(39:53):
bridge watching the sunrise inthe middle of the ocean.
And it's that kind of I lovethis that makes you a better
sailor, a better person, abetter naval officer.
And so, like I said, I'mincredibly indebted to all the
phenomenal people who, over theyears, have been giving their
(40:15):
time to make sure thatmidshipmen like me had an
opportunity to grow withunlimited potential.
Karl (40:23):
All right, all right, I don't know that I could have
said that any better, warren, soI really appreciate that
thought.
All right, so let's go aheadand get back to our conversation
Now.
Along with the rifle team, bothsailing programs were co-ed.
Was that the case back then?
Warren (40:37):
Yes, Okay, All right.
So the first one was Kay Hire.
She went on to be an astronautand even as a midshipman she had
that leadership it.
You know, the person walks inthe room and they don't really
have to do anything, but youjust get the sense that they're
competent and in charge.
And that was Kay, and I got theopportunity to sail for her and
(41:01):
, despite all the garbage thatshe cut for being a female, she
was just remarkable and I walkedaway thinking, well, here's a
woman who I'd follow anywherebecause she's a great leader and
that helped, you know, frame mystart of my naval career,
because you could have easilyended up in a company where a
(41:25):
very anti-woman and, you know,being a plebe and trying to stay
under the radar you would buyinto that vibe.
And we didn't have that in 16thcompany, so I just thought it
was amazing.
Karl (41:38):
Yeah, Wow, that's a great story, Warren.
Thanks for sharing it.
So now let's talk a little bitabout just professional racing,
I guess is the best way to putit.
I remember when the America'sCup was a really big deal and in
fact when we were at theAcademy, I think when they raced
in 83, at least I think it wasin 83, either in the fall of 83
(42:03):
or in the spring of 84, DennisConnors boat lost to the boat
from Australia which I guess waskind of renowned because it had
a really innovative design oftheir keel it was a winged keel
and then he won it back fouryears later when they raced out
there in Western Australia.
I don't hear as much about theAmerica's Cup now and I try to
(42:26):
kind of stay dialed in the mostsports, but usually you hear
that coming up on the radarevery three to four years.
I haven't heard that muchlately.
Is there a reason for that, ordo you get the same feel, or is
that just me?
Warren (42:40):
So when we were in the American Cup was going on, they
were racing a 12-meter designand taking to a bunch of factors
.
You do the math and the answeris 12 meters.
So you can define the box anyway you want, as long as the
answer equal 12 meters.
And it was a traditionalmonohull, and so that was
(43:03):
something that a lot of peoplecould relate to.
In the ensuing years they havechanged the design to make it a
lot more exciting.
Today they're sailing these70-foot catamarans that are on
hydrofoils and crew members arewearing body armor and crash
helmets because they're runningaround at 50 miles an hour and
(43:25):
if the boat starts to cartwheelyou have to be protected because
it could be.
In my personal opinion, that's akind of sailing, although it's
really exciting.
I have a hard time relating toand in Europe and other places
they have sailing venues thatare very conducive to being a
(43:49):
spectator sport, and so they'reharbors that when you see on TV
when they show the videos of theraces, there's thousands of
people that are there to watchthe racing happen right in front
of them, and I don't think thatthere are that many
opportunities or venues here inthe United States to do that
kind of sailing to get a crowdtogether and generate that sort
(44:13):
of excitement.
So I think it has evolved.
They've been trying to keep thesport relevant, try to
encourage technology and I thinkfor a certain segment of the
sailing population that theAmerica's Cup type racing has
(44:33):
left us kind of behind.
Karl (44:35):
Yeah, to your point about just the differences in the
design.
I remember within two yearsafter Dennis Conner won the
Americans Cup back and he didthat in 87, there was another.
I guess these countries canjust put challenges out there
anytime they want to.
And that was the first time Istarted to see differences in
(44:55):
boat design, because the nexttime I saw it was a challenge
race.
It looked like the Australianswere sailing in a standard 12
meter boat.
I'm sure there's some othermodifications paid to it to come
out to satisfy the rules, asyou stated.
But the American entry was,like you were saying, this
monstrous camera and I'mthinking, wait, how in the world
(45:16):
did they get that to go through, to get it approved?
And secondly, the Australiansdon't stand a chance with that
kind of it.
Looked just like a completemismatch.
So was that the first time thatyou started seeing that?
No-transcript.
Warren (45:30):
With the Australians and their winged keel, they sort of
opened the box out of the box,thinking so this was a new way
of looking at stability andspeed.
I think somebody took a stepback and said why are we
limiting ourselves to one hallwhere we can have two?
(45:52):
Can we work within the designrules?
Again, that's probably aboutthe point that many I don't say
traditionalists, but many of usthat sailed at race boats sort
of lost interest because it wasmore of a spectacle than a
competition.
Karl (46:12):
Right, OK, Makes sense, All right.
So now let's have what I hopeis a little bit of fun and let's
talk movies.
I know that typically, whateverprofession you happen to be in
and if there's a movie thatcomes out, they kind of either
reflects what you do for aliving or what a passionate
hobby of yours is, that sort ofthing you always watch it with a
(46:34):
really critical eye.
I do the same thing anytime Isee movies that involve
helicopters for sure.
So in 1992, they came out witha movie called Wind and it
starred Matthew Maudine andJennifer Gray and it was about
the America's Cup races.
I happened to watch it.
I was knowing what I know aboutsailing.
(46:55):
It was fairly entertaining to me, but from your perspective,
first of all, did you see it?
And secondly, what was yourtake on it?
Warren (47:02):
So, yes, I saw it.
I really liked it.
So, whether it's a movie abouthelicopters or submarines or
racing sailboats, you canapproach it in one of two ways.
You could go at it and pickapart all the things that aren't
accurate and it detracts fromthe overall movie.
(47:26):
Or you can go into it and say Iunderstand that there's going
to be departure from reality,but I'm going to enjoy this for
the story that it's supposed tobe.
And the storyline was prettycool.
It is pretty typical of a lotof us.
I believe that she came from awell-heeled family, grew up in
(47:50):
the yacht club environment.
Matthew Maudine I guess kind oflike my experience moved
somewhere where you could dosailing, sailed with friends,
was a pickup crew but never partof the Blue Blazer Club, and
got really good and I think thecompetition scenes and the
(48:13):
decision making that went intoit closely parallels the way it
happens.
But what I think theyunderplayed was the investment.
These are people who spendinsane amounts of money to gain
that technological advantage, towin a race and have the
(48:34):
America's Cup and the R&Ddollars that go into it and the
exotic materials that go intothe boat building all that stuff
.
It seems improbable that a guylike Matthew Maudine's character
would be able to generate thecapital necessary to mount a
(48:54):
successful campaign.
But it was supposed to be ahappy ending story.
It was they won.
So I think it casts theAmerica's Cup and sailing in a
good light.
If there was somebody that wasinterested in civil racing and
(49:16):
hadn't quite made the leap, thiswas probably a good movie to
encourage them to explore it alittle bit more.
So for being a good movie forentertainment, I thought it was
fabulous.
Karl (49:29):
Yeah, that was my take as well, and I was especially
impressed with the way theyfilmed the sailing scenes, the
racing scenes.
I thought that really kind ofpulled me into what was going on
.
Ok, it's funny here You've gota pretty good knack for
answering questions before I askthem, but I'm going to kind of
combine these two together here.
(49:50):
You've already talked a lotabout some of the technical
innovations and changes thathave basically made the sport
completely different than whatwe're accustomed to seeing years
ago.
Now the question I'll put toyou is based on that, and I'm
going to put you in charge ofyacht racing's governing body
here.
For, just theoretically, whatare a couple of changes that you
(50:13):
would make that would kind ofsatisfy both sides of the
equation in terms of justkeeping things innovative but
not making it quite thespectacle as it is right now?
Warren (50:24):
You know, there's almost very little.
I look back I lived inAnnapolis for 25 years while I
was stationed at the Academy andthen, when I worked in the
defense industry and while I waswith the Academy, I became part
of a race crew from out in townpeople that had known
(50:46):
beforehand, and we ended upsailing for over 20 years
together before I moved out toNew Mexico and changed my water
sports to snow sports.
I think that the sailing sceneit is in a fairly healthy place
right now.
There are a lot ofopportunities to participate in
(51:07):
more entry level one designsailboats which help contain the
cost.
There is a community oflearning and education
associated with that class ofboat.
In most cases, they are verygenerous with their time and
(51:28):
their advice and their expertise.
I was very fortunate that Iraced Solings.
It's a three man Olympic classsloop.
My son was very active inracing those as well.
He crewed for Stuart Walker,multiple Olympic competitor,
(51:48):
world champion, and he was onthe race course giving it his
all into his 90s.
Man was just a legend and myson got to sail with him.
And in the 90s no sorry, 2014,my son and I raced together in
the world championships up inToronto and these are Olympic
(52:10):
class competitors and theparking lot was as collegial as
anything I had ever seen.
Oh crap, I left my jib at home.
Oh, here I have a spare, youcan use that.
And the thought was I don'twant to go out there and win
because somebody is at adisadvantage, I want to go out,
win because I'm better.
(52:32):
There were crews whose combinedage was 200.
And there were crews who wereyoung people and that was sort
of the spirit that you find inthe one design classes.
That are the classics.
You find that in Wednesdaynight racing in an apples
(52:53):
harbour or Newport or pick aplace that does Wednesday night
racing Business takes me out toSan Diego.
I really try hard to make sureI'm there for Wednesdays.
I do Wednesday night sailingwith Gerald David and his wife
Ann and it is a very welcomingcasual.
Let's get out on the water andsail a course and, ok, we'll
(53:17):
call it a race, but it's just anopportunity to take a break
midweek and get out on the waterand I think that vibe is really
alive and well.
I think in terms of world classcompetition there are avenues
for people to compete in the onedesign realm and Olympic class
(53:37):
sailboats.
Those are typically simpler.
If you're that good and that'syour passion, there are
opportunities to go.
You know, grand Prix and inanother direction, and so I
think, depending on yourpersonality and your desires,
there are multiple opportunitiesfor you to pursue in whatever
direction you need to go.
(53:58):
I have sailed from club level topro-Gran Prix and I ended up
sailing with this particularcrew, the Zeiberger crew, for 20
years because on a Wednesdayevening those are the people
that I just wanted to hang outwith.
I mean, we were good, we won,but it was a very collegial
(54:22):
environment.
Nobody yelled at anybody.
You know we all did our best,it was a team effort and I just
like being around those people.
I've been on other boats thatwere filled with very aggressive
type A personalities and therewas yelling and you know the
tension was high and, althoughwe won, it was not a pleasant
(54:45):
experience, and so, you know, Igot to the point where I didn't
feel like I needed to, you know,prove myself any longer and I
got to do what I really enjoyed,right, and that conveyed to my
children, who Also raisedsailboats, and when they had the
opportunity They'd say, hey,dad, you want to go out sailing.
Which was really my goal, wasto create Something that we
(55:09):
could do together as a family,and so that's, you know, the.
My end game was to make this afamily sport, and I think you
know we can do this for the next.
You know, god willing, 30 yearsand and I'll still have
children who will say, hey,that's pretty cool, dad, can we
go sailing again this summer?
Karl (55:29):
Right, right, okay.
Well, that sounds like a prettygood spot to stop, warren.
I really appreciate the insight.
So thank you very much forjoining me to talk about the
Navy offshore sailing program.
It has definitely been a goodlearning experience for me.
Oh no, worries.
No worries at all.
Warren (55:42):
If you have any other questions, send me an email.
I'll answer the best I can okay, sounds good, take care.
Karl (55:48):
All right, we are approaching the home stretch.
We'll be back shortly with ourquestion of the day and
mid-watch segments.
Okay, it is time to jump intoour question of the day, but
(56:13):
before I get to that, I did wantto basically confirm something
Warren said about what yachtracing is like these days, at
least when it comes to theAmerica's Cup.
I happen to jump on one of thethe yachting websites recently,
and I think it's probably onespecific to the America's Cup.
But I will tell you I could notbelieve what I was seeing.
(56:33):
I mean, warren was right, youhave these huge catamarans,
these double-hole, thesedouble-hole boats that we're
just flying all over the place,I mean just going, these
incredible rates of speed, justcrazy, death-defying angles.
And I tell you what?
There's no wonder that wearingcrash helmets and body armor,
because you get thrown from oneof those things and, believe me,
you may not walk away from it.
(56:54):
So, anyway, I can see why.
You know, some of the moretraditional professional racers
have kind of gotten away fromthat, but definitely Something
crazy to look at.
All right, let's go ahead andget to our questions today and,
as usual, let's start with theone from our last episode,
remember it had to do with aNavy goalkeeper, maddie
Gallagher.
And here it is.
(57:15):
Maddie Gallagher played apivotal role in starting nine of
ten games as a freshman for theNavy women's soccer team.
Her goals against averageduring the season was a
microscopic 0.80 per game.
What was her save percent isduring that same period?
Was it a 77 percent, b, 79percent, c, 82 percent or D 84
percent?
The most popular answer was D84 percent, and there were 61
(57:40):
percent of you who selected thatone, and then 38 percent of you
chose C, which was 82 percent.
Neither 77 percent nor 79percent received any votes, and
it turns out that the correctanswer was D 84 percent.
So shout out to all my 84classmates who jumped all over
that answer way to go.
It was really tough to get ashot past Gallagher that year.
One of the things I've seen herdo really well to this day is
(58:02):
redirect the ball over the crossball On a shot that's going
kind of high.
That takes some real athleticability and some pretty good
hops too.
And you know Gallagher is is 57, so certainly not short, but
not overly tall either, whichtells you she's probably got a
pretty good vertical.
Now, these last three setbacksthat the women's soccer team has
suffered have derailed theirregular season title aspirations
(58:23):
.
But if they can reverse courseand win at least two of these
last three league games, theycan generate a little bit of
momentum going into the PatriotLeague tournament, where
basically anything can happen.
Okay, now let's get to ourquestion for this week's episode
.
I mentioned earlier that theNaval Academy has won the
Kennedy Cup 15 times.
That is basically offshoresailings version of the NCAA
championship.
Now, on how many occasions didthe Mids win it in consecutive
(58:47):
years?
Was it a just once, b twice, cthree times or D four times?
Go ahead and give that somethought and let me know what you
come up with.
I will have the question up onthe Navy Sports Nation Group
Facebook page by the end of theday and you can respond there.
Now we're going to close thingsout by checking in to see how
our two athletes on the midwatchare doing.
First we've got Averi Miller,who is a senior from Phoenix
(59:10):
Arizona and she is a setter forthe volleyball team who, at six
feet, can be used as a blockerand a hitter if necessary.
I'm recording this segment onFriday evening, october 13th,
and it occurred to me that theNavy just finished playing
American University and I justhappened to check the score.
Navy came from two sets to one,down to win three sets to two,
and Averi Miller had 47 of theMids 53 assists, and she also
(59:34):
added four kills and ten digs togo along with that.
At her current rate she's adeadlock to finish her career in
the top five in both totalassists and assists per set.
This win ends a three matchlosing streak and the Mids are
still in decent shape to getthemselves in a position for a
good seat at the Patriot Leaguetournament.
But they will have to win outthe rest of their games and they
(59:56):
do have another shot againstArmy in the star match which
takes place on November the 11th.
Okay, let's move on to the men,and here we're looking at
freshman Kiefer Black from thewater polo team.
He is from San Diego,california, and currently leads
the Mids in both goals with 43and assists with 37, and that
gives him a total of 80 points.
I did watch this guy play whenthe Mids took on Air Force last
(01:00:21):
month and Black didn't score,but he had three really nice
assists, and what's amazing tome is how high he is able to
elevate himself when he takes ashot, makes it pass or gets a
steal.
Remember, these guys aren'tpushing off from the bottom of
the pool, okay.
It takes some serious legstrength and athleticism to
propel your body halfway out ofthe water to make a play in
water polo and at 6'7" 220,kiefer Black is just simply a
(01:00:45):
beast.
He's actually got a decent shotat a 100 point season.
The team has five games left,plus the Mid-Atlantic Water Polo
Association tournament, so allhe needs is four or five points
a game to get to 100.
The Mids are currently ranked19th in the country and I think
it's fair to say that Black willdefinitely be one of the keys
to their success as they finishup the regular season and try to
qualify for the NCAA tournament.
(01:01:06):
That's going to do it for thisedition of Navy Sports Central.
Thank you all so much forjoining us Now.
If you like what you've heard,please be sure to hit that
follow button wherever you getyour podcast and remember to get
the word to all the other Navyfans out there.
Once again, I'd like to thankmy fellow classmate, Warren
Mazanek, for joining me today totalk about the Navy Offshore
Sailing Program.
I don't know about you guys,but I know way more about it now
(01:01:29):
compared to before.
Our question of the daycontinues to be a show favorite.
You can get in on that byjoining the Navy Sports Nation
group Facebook page and givingyour answer to this week's
question.
I will pin it to the top so youdon't miss it.
And just a quick reminder theviews expressed on Navy Sports
Central are my own and do notreflect those of the US Naval
Academy or Navy Athletics.
By the way, the music used inNavy Sports Central comes to
(01:01:50):
your courtesy of Audio Jungle.
This is a great site forpurchasing the rights to use the
music from thousands of artistsaround the world, and those
featured in the podcast will becredited in our show notes.
Talk to you soon, everybody.
Until next time.
This is Karl Darden Go Navy!Beat Army!
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