Sailboat Show

This year's U.S. Sailboat Show will feature the fast-paced action of two new team-racing events.The SUSA Cup regatta is Oct. 9, and the sailing industry exhibition regatta, which kicks off this year's Columbus Cup Regatta, is Oct. 11.In team racing, the object of individual skippers and their crews is not necessarily to cross the finish line first. Rather the sailors on each three-boat team strive to obtain the best overall total score.From the starting signal, each crew strategically tries to pass or block the opposing team so that a teammate can pass both TC boats.

For Jimmy Cornell, it was all about freedom. Early in his adult life, it came from fleeing communist Romania and finding his way to England, where he worked as a radio correspondent for the BBC. After he got married and began to help his wife, Gwenda, raise their two small children, it came in finding his way to the sea. It took until his early 30s to get there. "I was, to be honest, a hippy and I did not want a career in the BBC. I did not want to become a rich man when I was 50, I didn't care about this," Cornell recalled.

The Annapolis sailing community will be celebrating today with the opening of the 25th annual U.S. Sailboat Show and the anticipated announcement that the city will be a stopover during the next Whitbread Round the World Race.More than 200 boats will be on display at the show, which organizers bill as the largest in-water boat show in the world. The show opens with a VIP and press day today and continues through Monday.Tickets today are $20 a person and on the other days $9 for adults and $4 for children 12 and younger.

ANNAPOLIS - -To borrow a phrase from the world of politics, "It's the weather, stupid." Merchants at the 38th annual United States Powerboat Show had fewer customers during its rainy weekend stand in this city's harbor. But those who turned out were serious about buying and did little complaining about the economy, the merchants said. "I've been at this show every year since it started in 1972, and we've never had four straight days of rain," said Woody Jackson of Jackson Marine Sales in Baltimore and North East.

I've not had my first glass of cider yet, nor a cup of hot chocolate that's almost too hot to hold, but I don't need the bronzing of the dogwoods to tell me fall is here. Sunday morning at the Sailboat Show sufficed. The warm clothes that I stowed somewhere logical when we moved in August have yet to surface, and layered dressing can be taken only just so far. Was it really only a few weeks ago that we could barely find the energy to move, much less work, in the heat?*One sure sign of fall is the increase in political tempo.

By 10 a.m. yesterday, there were lengthy lines of people at each of the entrances to the U.S. Sailboat Show in Annapolis -- and the opening of the show for the general public isn't until 10 o'clock today.For years Thursdays have been preview sessions for the boat trade, media and anyone willing to pay $25 for a VIP ticket to get an early look at the best and newest the sailing industries have to offer."The weather looks like it will be great through the weekend, advance ticket sales are up 26 percent, and the show has great variety in boats, gear and accessories," said Jeffrey Holland, who has been a manager at the sailboat and power boat shows for many years.

Early each October, the best manufacturers of boats and boating gear make their way to Annapolis for the United States Sailboat Show, which again this year features the latest models of cruisers, racers, motorsailers and multihulls -- as well as tents and booths displaying and selling up-to-date gear, accessories and financing.The show opens Thursday for trade, VIPs and the media and on Friday for the general public. The show closes Monday, with 10 a.m. openings each day.According to show organizers, dozens of designs will be making their debuts at the Annapolis show, including a number built by the largest contingent of foreign manufacturers in a decade.

WHEN THE U.S. Sailboat Show comes to Annapolis, parking becomes impossible, every restaurant table and hotel room seems to be booked and throngs of people flood the historic downtown's narrow streets.Blessed with unseasonably warm weather and a booming national economy, this weekend's boat show may attract more visitors than ever. This is good news for exhibitors, but also good news for Maryland's state capital.In its 28 years, the boat show has become one of the most important national exhibits for the yachting community.

After five years of floating dead in the water, boating industry representatives at the 24th annual U.S. Sailboat Show in Annapolis again have wind in their sails.Attendance at the show on the first two days seemed to be up over previous years, but more important, many of those who came were serious about buying.Geoff McCord, a manufacturer's representative for Beneteau, a South Carolina boat builder, said the company sold five boats the first day."Usually, you don't see this kind of response so early," he said.

Annapolis' claim to be the "sailing capital of the world" is undisputed for five days every October as the city holds what organizers bill as the nation's largest and oldest in-water sailboat show. The 31st annual United States Sailboat Show - featuring 350 boats and an equal number of accessory, service and equipment vendors at City Dock - begins Thursday with a VIP day and is open for general admission Friday through Oct. 9. Followed closely by the United States Powerboat Show, which runs Oct. 12 through 15, the event transforms the city into "the center of the boating universe," said Thomas Roskelly, the city's public information officer.

Music blasted and waiters rushed by with trays of sloshing drinks. It was a fine, warm evening for an outdoor party, and the crowd - with their sunglasses, boat shoes and suntans - proved easy to please. Pressed up to the edge of the water, they drank, hooted, cheered and bid a proper adieu - Annapolis-style - to the boats that had been packed into the harbor all week for the U.S. Sailboat Show. For as long as the show has existed, locals and boat-show regulars have gathered on the last night to marvel as gleaming sailboats suddenly peel away with choreographed precision and glide into the bay. Most agree that the best spot to watch from these days is Pusser's Caribbean Grille, the waterside restaurant and bar, and on Monday, the happy throngs began arriving in the early afternoon for the annual breakdown party, a beloved ritual some compare to a block party or a family reunion.

It's been more than a week since the last of four hurricanes ravaged the Caribbean and Florida, but their effects were still being felt in Annapolis yesterday with the start of the 35th annual United States Sailboat Show at City Dock. Although the fall show attracted about 600 exhibitors, roughly the same number as last year, organizers likened many of the 250 sailboats that arrived this week to unexpected guests. Because of treacherous weather or damage to boats from the storms, many exhibitors found their vessels stranded far out of town and were forced to show different models than planned, said organizer Rick Franke.

It's been more than a week since the last of four hurricanes ravaged the Caribbean and Florida, but their effects were still being felt in Annapolis yesterday with the start of the 35th annual United States Sailboat Show at City Dock. Although the fall show attracted about 600 exhibitors, roughly the same number as last year, organizers likened many of the 250 sailboats that arrived this week to unexpected guests. Because of treacherous weather or damage to boats from the storms, many exhibitors found their vessels stranded far out of town and were forced to show different models than planned, said organizer Rick Franke.

Hatteras Yachts is bringing out a brand new 54-footer, and Hunter Marine has a 42-footer to debut at the boat shows in Annapolis this year. J-Boats is rolling out a new cruiser and Endeavor has a new power catamaran. In fact, some 48 manufacturers are debuting more than 50 new boats at the U.S. sailboat and powerboat shows this weekend and next, and nearly 100 shore-side dealers are exhibiting scads of new water purifiers, boat toilets, dry bags and motion sickness cures. There's even a sister-act apparel company that timed the launch of a new line of slickers for the boat shows.

Amid the sailors decked out in foul-weather gear, the hundreds of gleaming sloops and catamarans and row after row of maritime accessories at this weekend's U.S. Sailboat Show, Bob Maersch is peddling a simple service. For $100, he can take a faded, scraped-up winch and turn it into a gleaming piece of nautical hardware. He'll do the same for your turnbuckles, your chocks, your cleats and any other sailboat equipment or metallic keepsake. A former electrical engineer, Maersch and his wife, Rita, both 61, bought Annapolis Plating and Polishing on Hudson Street in Annapolis four years ago, becoming part of the diverse and thriving maritime industry in the state capital.

In the world of boat shows, the back-to- back U.S. Sailboat and Powerboat shows in Annapolis have become the bellwethers for an industry that relies on discretionary spending for its success. Do well in Annapolis, whether it's sales, orders or contacts, and probably you'll have a good year. If the attendance is down, the customers lukewarm about the latest products, then you have a problem. "We pretty much look at Annapolis as the barometer for what's going to happen for the coming season," says Sharon Day, vice president of marketing for Catalina yachts.

Annapolis will undergo its annual October transition this week as hundreds of sailboats and thousands of sailors arrive at the harbor for the United States Sailboat Show. Showing off its strength as the self-proclaimed "Sailing Capital of the World," Annapolis is expecting about 50,000 sailing enthusiasts to land here for the four-day event billed as the nation's largest in-water sailboat show. The event, which will run Thursday through Monday - and will be followed by a similarly significant powerboat show from Oct. 11 through 14 - will feature about 270 boats at more than 200 floating docks stretching out from the City Dock.

With sailboats giving way to powerboats this week, Annapolis can again begin to count the benefits of its back-to-back boat shows. The traffic jams and congestion that the two shows visit on the city are offset by the equally dramatic impact they have on the local economy. The city and its boat shows are partners in perhaps the perfect marriage of public interest and private enterprise, with one providing the setting, the other the business. It's a win-win formula that benefits both. "The relationship has been forged over many years," said James F. Barthold, general manager of the United States Sailboat Show and the United States Powerboat Show.

Technically, says Rick Franke, an official of the 32nd United States Sailboat Show, most people get it wrong. A yacht is any vessel used for pleasure. So it depends on your point of view - one man's dinghy is another man's pleasure craft. But as Franke leads a guest along the docks that moor scads of the world's state-of-the-art cruisers and racers - bright boats bobbing in the hot October sun - at this weekend's extravaganza in Annapolis, there's little doubt about the nomenclature. That's especially true when he's asked flat-out to show what a million dollars can buy. In that price range, he says, you'll be getting certain amenities.