2010 Classic Snipe Rally Know Your Trophies Strategies for the ...

The Code of Competition by Stuart H. Walker,
Illustrated by Thomas Price.
By Richard Evans
In the latest of his many books,
The Code of Competition, Dr.
Walker steps back from the
tactics and strategies of racing
performance one-design
sailboats to the psychological
roots of what pushes us to
raise sails every weekend. Is it
to win races and defeat other
sailors? No! Is it to bask in the
glory of holding silver at the
award ceremony? Not really.
According to Dr. Walker, most of us race to satisfy the need
to be accepted by a pack, like a pack of dogs, or in sailboat
racing, the fleet.
Maintaining pack or fleet cohesion and fellowship are the
underlying principles to the unwritten rules we follow in
competition on the water. Except now the unwritten rules
are listed in Dr. Walker’s book. He gives 35 code-of-competition
precepts such as “Admire courage. Fear revealing
fearfulness,” and “maintain the pecking order; do not
attempt to usurp the higher place of someone more deserving.”
In essence, he’s listing the behavioral reasons why
most of us don’t win regattas, instead acting as the fleet’s
nice guys. We’ve all had this kind of conversation around
Book Review
the club: “Do I know Bill? Yeah, I know Bill, he frostbites
Lasers with me every Wednesday evening. Great guy,
middle of the fleet, but he always brings good beer.” The
code of competition keeps the status quo, keeps us all in our
correct rank in the fleet so we are all happy pack members.
It’s the pack or herd mentality that Dr. Walker uses to rationalize
his code, along with some genetic arguments and
shout-outs to the Iliad, Galileo, Shakespeare, various Olympians
and hubris. His justifications aren’t fact; of course,
he’s simply compiling anecdotal evidence and behavioral
theory to support and justify his code. The anecdotes are
compelling because mid-fleet sailors can see themselves
in the stories – like the time we let the lead slip out of our
hands on the reach, or the time we won the first race and
tanked the second. It’s those kinds of performances that
Dr. Walker uses to define two types of competitors the true
competitor and the code competitor.
The code competitor follows the code of competition by
keeping his rank in the fleet, suppressing hubris, restraining
aggressiveness and so on. The true competitor “senses
the fear, but derides the code and its requirement to atone.
He exacts his own retribution for all the times he has been
defeated. He seeks the forbidden Grail. He attains hubris
and glories in it. He has but one goal – victory!”
If the true competitor doesn’t sound like a nice person, well,
that’s the point – he doesn’t want or need hugs and kisses
from the fleet, he gets those at home. As for the rest of us,
we launch our boats every weekend pretty much knowing
the race outcome before the first horn. That’s not a good
feeling, and now that Dr. Walker has diagnosed our problem,
he’ll have to deliver the cure in his next book.
Serious Fun at the 2010 District 2 Championships, Bow Mar Yacht Club, Denver.
1 www.snipeus.org