My Response to Dean Brenner's latest post which I quote here is made just below his post.

"I had some great conversations and dialogue on this with lots of people over the last couple of weeks. Not everyone is going to agree on issues like this.

But the part that I think people forget is that there are only ten events in the Games, for men and women combined. That means that based on simple math, something is going to left out. singlehanded, doublehanded dinghies, skiffs, multihulls, boards, kites, and oh yes... keel boats! The math doesn't add up. No one segment of our sport has the absolute right to be an Olympic class, yet when something gets removed from the Games, the tone from many is that heir fundamental right has been trampled.

I've also heard from lots of people that Boards has a great pipeline program that is now going to be useless. There has been some great strides made in the board community to begin a pipeline program, but let's remember that boards have been in the Olympics since 1984. There were a lot of years with no development efforts, and only now has some momentum been established.

This whole discussion may be moot. We'll see how the efforts go to get a revote in the fall. This may be much ado about nothing.

Sail fast,

Dean Brenner"


 Dear Dean,

It's not that the rights of windsurfers are being trampled. It is that the WRONG decisions are being made for the WRONG reasons. That offends everyone's sense of right and wrong. Ben Barger's analysis of this issue which you can find on Facebook (see below) shows how badly the process went from the beginning. Yes there are only ten classes but you don't

A) Swap out the second most popular class to admit kiteboarding.
B) Pretend that kiteboarding has an established path to the Olympics (required by evaluation prescriptions) and enough safety to be even considered for youth sailing.

As to saying it took 38 years to establish a strong youth program for windsurfing

C) As a point in fact Robby Naish won his first World Championship at 13 years of age in 1976! Pretty youthful and just 7 years after the sport was invented.

D) And as a counterpoint if it takes 38 years to develop a strong youth program (the largest youth event ever will probably happen this summer in with 400+ Techno 293 windsurfers at Medemblik Holland) then why change to another event before it has had a chance to properly mature and solve the issue mentioned in B above.

I would like to see US Sailing join Venezuela, Spain and Israel in officially criticizing the ISAF decision and asking for a simple majority vote on either windsurfing or kitesurfing.

Will US Sailing do that?

Sincerely,
Platt Johnson
(Kitesurfer and Windsurfer and Sailor)

Robby's Resume
https://www.facebook.com/RobbyNaishUS1111/info

General info - 19,000 plus members
 Appeal against kite surfing in the Olympics put windsurfing back in
https://www.facebook.com/groups/ISAFolympicswindsurfing/

Ben Barger's analysis
ISAF Athletes Commission - The Sailors Voice!
https://www.facebook.com/groups/7041592283/

Another country joins Israel and Spain in officially criticizing ISAF decision
http://www.surfertoday.com/windsurfing/7409-venezuela-and-neil-pryde-defend-windsurfing-in-the-2016-olympic-games


Techno 293 Worlds
http://www.windsurfworlds.com/Pages/Home.aspx