spanier

BarrySpanier

Rigging it Right

An interview by Robert Masters

Barry Spanier grew up in San Francisco and started sailing dinghies when he was ten years old. Spending summers on a working dairy ranch in Oregon gave him lots of opportunity to build and repair things, so he was never afraid to try anything that had to do with making things.

Once he started sailing, it was pretty much all he wanted to do. As he grew older and got better at sailing, it was easy for him to be doing it all the time.

He went to work for a sail maker named Hank Jotz when he dropped out of U.C. Berkeley in 1967. Hank made lots of performance dinghy sails - and was very open and giving of his knowledge. His support and help made it possible for Barry to learn how to design sails, as well as build them.

During the past forty years, Barry has designed products for the world’s most popular sail makers. His designs have set world speed records - and powered more sailors to World Championships than any other sailmaker alive.

In 2005, Barry and other members of The Team (Kevin Pritchard and Phil McGain) resurrected the MauiSails name - and created a company who’s team riders are already winning major events... and another World Championship.

Read on to learn more about this charismatic designer and sail maker...

What attracted you to the sport of windsurfing?

BS - Initially I wasn't attracted. It looked so silly to be falling into the Bay all the time, and when I actually did try it, the equipment was so crude and hard to use that I just laughed at it.

Compared to sailing a Flying Dutchman or 5O5, a stock windsurfer was a poor excuse for sailing. But after getting reintroduced again in Hawaii, and being able to sail in a place where the water was warm and it wasn't so painful to learn, then it began to be fun, followed shortly by exhilarating and exciting.

Then we were hooked.

What would you say is the single most important development in the sport since 1980?

BS - The adaptation and use of carbon fiber in rigs and boards, and polyester films in sails.

Perfecting the performance and durability in the use of these materials has made the sport more enjoyable, accessible, and interesting.

Why did the sport shrink in the early 90's?

BS - I think the biggest factor was the lack of foresight and overall organization of the sport. It became a financial game with too many players all interested only in their own success, not thinking of the sport as a whole.

They neglected to include women and kids in the marketing and image, and as a result, there was no growth, and that translated into shrinkage as time passed without a real change in attitude.

Do you see a general desire for the sport to re-shape itself and grow, or is the industry content with how it is perceived and defined by the general public?

BS - I think it can grow, especially now with good instructional gear and better teaching methodology. The real need is to be able to get the experience of windsurfing to be more easily available to anyone wishing to learn.

Summer camps, yacht clubs, even the school systems in some areas, could be the right vehicles for developing a new core of users. Without this, there will be further attrition.

To windsurf, do you have to be somewhat independent and stubborn? Also - is the sport primarily run by windsurfers? If these things are true, if the industry is filled with independent and stubborn people, is this the reason why the sport does not have the strongest of governing bodies and trade organizations?

BS - This is an activity without real rules - and that leads to a wide variety of 'opinions' about what works and why. People have no chance to experience most of what they buy, and thus they buy based on marketing, which is 90% bullshit 90% of the time.

Then they have no instruction or service locally available and get frustrated and disappointed, thinking they can't like this thing that is so hard to do. This is why a central system of teaching and access would help to build the awareness of how fun it is and how easy it is to learn to do now.

Most of the businesses seem so intent on defending their own paltry shares that they are not interested in cooperating to build everyone's pie.

In F1 motor sports, it's very clear who respects and fears who. Who are the people and teams to be feared or respected in the world of windsurfing? And why?

BS - The billionaire's teams dominate through sheer numbers of supported sailors. I think you can take any one of the top ten sailors and change their brand and they will be still competitive.

So when you buy all the top ten sailors, having a champion is pretty easy. If you are asking whose sails I would be getting to test against for developing competitive high performance designs, there is only one, the one with the richest billionaire backer.

Let's talk speed. What is keeping us under 50 knots? The board, the sail, the fin...?

BS - Some of all, but mostly conditions. In speed trials, getting the right wind, from the right direction and strength, in the daytime, with a timing crew available, is the biggest challenge.

If you took ten top speed sailors and put them in truly perfect conditions, every day until fifty knots was broken, I'll bet it wouldn't take that long to do it.

Speaking of people who enjoyed speed, give me a portrait of Arnaud de Rosnay. What sort of man was he?

BS - Arnaud was the ultimate self-promoting free spirit. He had panache, he had commitment to his ideas, and he was willing to risk everything to see his dream through. Some of this came from a kind of naiveté, some from a huge ego. But it was all good for windsurfing. We really need another visionary like him again.

Who is the most driven sailor you've ever worked with? How did that drive manifest itself?

BS - Of course this is Bjorn Dunkerbeck. He was always sheeting in harder, pushing more, and in his own words, "I just want to crush them until they have no hope." Sadly, I think it was this dominance that killed racing, killed most of the competition, and then made everyone get all ho hum about the sport in general. All that became boring. As unique as it was in the world of sport to have a dominant champion for twelve years, it was also boring and uninviting to newcomers.

How important is it to have extra-wide luff sleeves in race sails? Is the performance not compromised as long as you are dealing with a semi-circular leading edge that the mast provides? And if so, what's the fix?

BS - You need wide sleeves to be able to rig and de-rig without wrinkling the sail. Fix what? It works pretty good as is... and the fix I have in mind I wouldn't explain here anyway.

Still images provided courtesy of MauiSails, Neil Pryde and Alex Williams / PWA

I see some people having a hard time downhauling their sails enough. Does the solution lie with a sail that needs less downhaul, or improved downhaul systems to handle the load with no strain on the part of the user?

BS - Get a downhaul tool and quit complaining. Or buy MauiSails that don't require this deadening load.

And what about mast loading? Some manufacturers seem to be having problems with mast reliability, especially on larger flat water sails. What's with that?

BS - Technology hadn't caught up with the job yet. Sails grew larger without growing the strength of the masts. It's better now for some brands that have chosen to make their masts a bit heavier. And as time goes on they will get better and better.

I hear people moaning about how complicated tuning is. Where does the problem lie? Is the technology so complicated to work with, or do some sailors' attitudes need a tweak?

BS - It's all attitude. How can something that only requires a few seconds of attention be such a mystery? C'mon. There's two little strings to pull.

Just do it and pay attention to what happens. Read a little about it, ask someone who has well tuned equipment about the basics. And buy a downhaul tool. And use it!

What is happening with development of new materials and technologies for sails? How do you keep improving on the designs?

BS - Mostly what is being developed is for flash and marketing, not performance enhancement. There are plenty of materials we can use, but in most cases they are way too expensive for our customers, and of questionable return of value.

When a sail with $100 worth of material will perform perceptibly as well as one made with $400 worth of material, what is the point other than ego gratification or one-upmanship? Why bother if it isn't really necessary?

Is catamaran sail design and windsurf sail design on a converging or diverging path?

BS - I think that yacht sail design in general is now taking lessons from windsurfing. When you have those people finally recognizing the aerodynamic things we have been using for decades and taking them on as their own, it seems that the influence is obvious.

They tried to look old fashioned and inefficient for as long as they could hold out, but finally when one guy broke the ice, they all had to give it up. But they are only giving the slightest credit to our thinking, because after all, they are the center of the sailing universe.

Why did you turn MauiSails from what was primarily a design firm, into a full-fledged manufacturer of windsurf products?

BS - Simple. It was our obvious solution to having been cast aside two times after having done great things for a manufacturing company. Finally, we control our own future.

What makes MauiSails different?

BS - We are a group that is more interested in our customer being part of our product - and that we build what we know to be good without a huge dependence on marketing by normal means.

We feel our products will sell themselves through satisfaction more than anything else.

What is the future for MauiSails - and the sport in general?

AB - MauiSails will be one of the top three brands in sales volume, and will be a top competition brand. Our products are good enough for world champions, and feel so comfortable that the average guy knows why the world champ loves them.

As far as the sport, I have optimism and enthusiasm for it continuing to be one of the most fun things that has ever been invented by mankind. How can it go wrong?