I am completely gutted!
Unfortunately I am unable to travel to Dublin for the ILUG2007 event I was so looking forward to.
Some time ago my passport expired and I sent of for it to be renewed. It got sent back with what I am hearing is a common complaint, that the photos I’d included with my application weren’t suitable. This despite having read carefully the photo guidelines available supposedly to help. We couldn’t find anything wrong with them! To be fair there was also a section of the form I hadn’t completed, due to misunderstanding the arrows leading you through it, based on your answers to various complicated questions which read differently depending on where you pause for breath!
So I had to return the application with new photos, all a little too close to my travel date to Ireland for comfort. And, you guessed it, it hasn’t turned up in time 
Sods law says it’ll be here Thursday!
So, all of you lucky ones off to Dublin for what I’m sure will be a fantastic event, have a Guiness for me! Having to follow events on the blogs is going to be tough, I’m in for a miserable few days until I get over it.
I just hope Paul, Eileen and co, all forget they’ve already said “never again” (again!) and put on the show next year!
I’m a little late in posting this, but reading the news I was pretty upset. The Cutty Sark suffered a serious fire early on Monday morning, causing extensive damage.
Anyone who has an interest in sailing vessels will likely have heard of the Cutty Sark - or should have! For the land-lubbers out there, she is one of the last remaining Tea Clippers that made the trip from England to China, via the Cape of Good Hope, over a hundred years ago. Visitors to London may well have seen or even visited her too, as she has long been kept in a dry-dock as a tourist attraction and tribute to those in the merchant navy.
Perhaps luckily her current restoration has avoided much more significant damage, lets just hope the funds can be found to bring her back to her former glory.
This rather (in my opinion) poor piece of journalism from the BBC quoting Gates on Vista sales figures caught my interest, particularly following the news this week regarding Microsoft’s threat to persue patent royalties from open source initiatives such as Linux and OpenOffice.org. (Link via Bub Sutor).
Mr Gates said sales had been quicker than Microsoft expected, and made Vista the firm’s quickest selling software.
What!? Does anyone believe this stuff? What upset me about the article from the beeb was the lack of comment or verification of Gates’ statement. There is plenty on this out there, so you can do your own searches on google, but with Vista sales being reported as slow, Dell offering linux and bringing back Windows XP, how can it be Microsoft’s quickest selling software?
Oh, and to say sales were quicker than they had expected, that just makes me wonder just how low their expectations really were! 
Just where are MS going? They are appearing increasingly deperate and looking to create confusion. Smells like fear to me.
My take on all this, forget Vista and move to Ubuntu. 
Into the semi-finals we go, and the pressure dial gets turned up a few notches. Having got this far, the four teams going head-to-head in their pairings know that they cannot afford any errors. The first to five wins in a best of nine matches.
Having topped the table, Emirates Team New Zealand earned the right to choose their opponent for the next stage of the competition. They went unsurprisingly for the fourth placed team, Desafío Español.
The choice was likely quite easy; the Spanish have never beaten the Kiwis in seven tries over the past three years.
Source
The local boys have nothing to lose, the pressure is not on them. They simply have to go out and sail at the top of their game, try to pressure the Kiwis and take advantage of any mistakes whilst avoiding making any themselves. Sounds easy!
In the other pairing, BMW ORACLE Racing takes on Luna Rosa Challenge in what will be a hard battle, though the stats also favour the Americans.
I hope I am wrong, as I would love to see the Spanish get to the final, however I’m going with the stats and expect to see the Kiwis taking on the Americans for the big prize, the showdown against Alinghi.
Today the semi-finals kick off with the first matches between the top four teams from the round robins. The final standings saw Emirates Team New Zealand step into the top spot having trailed BMW ORACLE Racing and Luna Rossa Challenge in third for most of the competition. However wins against both and Victory Challenge in the last three flights ensured them top spot.
The final standings then:
- Emirates Team New Zealand
- BMW Oracle Racing
- Luna Rossa Challenge
- Desafío Español 2007
So that worked out to plan…!
With one thing and anothe, I didn’t get to post my predictions for the last three rounds. Its all a little academic now, but for the record here they are. There was no cheating here honest! I had done the predictions prior to seeing the results. Anyway, who’s reading this rubbish!?
Flight 9
- +39 Challenge - Team Shosholoza
- China Team - Areva Challenge
- Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team - BMW ORACLE Racing
- Victory Challenge - Desafío Español 2007
- Luna Rossa Challenge - Emirates Team New Zealand
Flight 10
- China Team - +39 Challenge
- United Internet Team Germany - Areva Challenge
- Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team - Luna Rossa Challenge
- Victory Challenge - Emirates Team New Zealand
- Desafío Español 2007 - BMW ORACLE Racing
Flight 11
- Victory Challenge - Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team
- Desafío Español 2007 - Luna Rossa Challenge
- BMW ORACLE Racing - Emirates Team New Zealand
- United Internet Team Germany - +39 Challenge
- Areva Challenge - Team Shosholoza
Predictions Round-up
Here are my stats for both rounds and overall:
- Round Robin 1: 76.36% (42/55 matches)
- Round Robin 2: 85.45% (47/55 matches)
- Overall: 83.64% (89/110 matches)
I’d have taken that at the start, particularly with having picked not only the top four, but the correct order!
One more interesting stat is the teams I managed to pick their results (win or lose) 100%:
- Round Robin 1: China Team
- Round Robin 2: Luna Rossa Challenge and United Internet Team Germany
To be honest, China Team wasn’t a surprise, and their moment of glory came with their big win against BMW ORACLE Racing, spoiling my record a little, as that would have seen two more names on the list for the second round!
A few things have been turned on their head already during this second round of matches, with racing being cancelled due to too much wind, and the Chinese scoring a famous and moral-boosting win over none other than the mighty BMW ORACLE!
However the table is starting to stabilise, with the teams in contention for the last semi-final berth needing a good run of results during the final seven matches.
Here are my predictions for todays flight 5:
Flight 5
- United Internet Team Germany - Victory Challenge
- BMW ORACLE Racing - Luna Rossa Challenge
- Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team - +39 Challenge
- Team Shosholoza - China Team
- Desafío Español 2007 - Emirates Team New Zealand
Here the local boys will be going all out to get an important victory against the Kiwis, with the other big match between the top of the table teams, BMW ORACLE and Luna Rossa.
I’m not sure I’ll be able to manage daily updates over the next few days, so here also are my picks for flights 6, 7 & 8:
Flight 6
- Luna Rossa Challenge - Areva Challenge
- Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team - United Internet Team Germany
- Victory Challenge - +39 Challenge
- Desafío Español 2007 - China Team
- Emirates Team New Zealand - Team Shosholoza
This flight will see Mascalzone Latino look to get on a roll towards a push for the 4th spot, whilst Team New Zealand will be hoping to avoid slipping up against the South Africans who won’t be fearing their opponents following the scalps they have already claimed.
Flight 7
- Emirates Team New Zealand - United Internet Team Germany
- China Team - Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team
- Team Shosholoza - Desafío Español 2007
- Areva Challenge - BMW ORACLE Racing
- +39 Challenge - Luna Rossa Challenge
The top four teams will consider this a fairly comfortable day, if such a thing exists, however they won’t be taking their opponents lightly and will want to ensure they register another win.
Flight 8
- United Internet Team Germany - Desafío Español 2007
- Team Shosholoza - Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team
- Emirates Team New Zealand - China Team
- Areva Challenge - Victory Challenge
- +39 Challenge - BMW ORACLE Racing
This will be a day for the middle table teams to look to gain ground over their direct competition, with much needed wins. It’ll be interesting to see who comes out on top.
WiFi is bad for you
Sorry Chris, I couldn’t resist the title!
After so many cancellations due to lack of wind, it was only a question of time before we saw too much. Yesterday saw racing abandonded with 30 knot gusts on both courses. Lets hope today provides s with slightly calmer conditions!
Flight three from yesterday will be raced along with flight 4. Predictions as follows:
Flight 4
- Emirates Team New Zealand - Areva Challenge
- Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team - Desafío Español 2007
- China Team - United Internet Team Germany
- Luna Rossa Challenge - Team Shosholoza
- BMW ORACLE Racing - Victory Challenge
Luna Rossa Challenge will be looking to avoid a repeat of their loss to Team Shosholoza in round one, while BMW ORACLE must be hoping further gear failure does not cause them to drop more vital points at the top of the table. A good days racing in prospect in what are likely to be heavier conditions than we have seen up until now.
Following the shock defeat of ORACLE BMW yesterday to the Chinese (although the Americans did have a headsail problem for pretty much the whole match) lets see what surprises today gives us!
My picks in bold:
Flight 3
- Desafío Español 2007 - Areva Challenge
- +39 Challenge - Emirates Team New Zealand
- United Internet Team Germany - Luna Rossa Challenge
- China Team - Victory Challenge
- Team Shosholoza - BMW Oracle Racing
No, nothing terribly interesting, just that I have finally gotten round to changing the default Wordpress theme to something (in my opinion) a little sexier!
I might make a few tweaks to this one, which is called fSpring, and designed by Fredrik Fahlstad. I like!
Oh, and happy May Day to those of you in Europe who celebrate the real thing. For the Brits, you’ll just have to wait a week!
Lets Connect!