Scary Times – Ricoh the one world leader succumbs to bad economy and is vulnerable like everyone else…

Now this is just hearsay, but I was just told that Ricoh is making employees take a week furlough without pay and has started lying off employees. This is a very similar situation that I am seeing across the boat I mean board with companies in our industry. From Konica Minolta's huge layoffs right after Xerox and Kodak cut roughly 20% of their global workforce. I'm sure it is not a shock to see HP step back and act cautious in new hires and expansion. Now with Canon in complete desperation to see them partner up with HP is almost funny. These types of partnerships are not uncommon in our industry, good bedfellows they make as they both struggle to assert their once top tier status. With Oce bleeding profusely to now even Ricoh showing their humanity we see salary's decreasing, employee benefits being cut or disappearing all together to sheer headcount reductions in almost every company.

IKON has even make changes and cutbacks in our company 401K matching program. The one thing I will say is that we are still expanding headcount and retooling our demo facilities and go to market strategy. We have not given up that we can be successful in such trying economic times. "Be Bullish In Production" our RVP says religiously. IKON is very bullish in times when even the greats are cowering. In fact we seem to have put on the war paint and run into the streets to meet our enemy head on. We continue the fight regardless of the naysayers.

I am getting nervous to see our "big brother" have such 'noise' coming from their employees. I knew many that went from Konica Minolta and others to over to RBS when they were the best looking for longevity; now what were long term stable employees they too are making the great pilgrimage to look for "gainful employment."

With everyone having such a knee jerk reaction it makes me wonder what is coming next. From everything I am seeing it appears that IKON is coming out on top and in a strong position to negotiate with the Ricoh first born. It would not surprise me to find that IKON becomes the "chosen one" and the pony picked to win this next horse race. I look forward to hearing the stories from my readers as I'm sure that many will find even uttering such a thing blasphemous.

If you have a Ricoh layoff story or more "inside information" I would love to hear. As for Pirate Mike I think we will see the true colors of Ricoh's intentions by April 1^st 2010! Maybe I'm wrong but hide and watch as Ricoh retools their organization to come out fighting strong in the next fiscal.

Also be looking for the new Ricoh Pro C901 ( or whatever they will call it ) This new machine of destruction will be a great advancement of the C900 of today with no fuser oil, basing its strengths on a newly formulated polymerized toner? that will bring digital quality to new heights. If I had to guess with the speed at which they are developing products I would guess mid spring or early summer. With all of the great advancements of the Aegis product you can be sure that Ricoh is looking to show the world that "Ricoh knows production." Or at least the new horse they ride IKON>

What Ricoh knows is how to buy the best technology and engineers and then follow that up with a great distribution model which they did too buy. The IKON acquisition will show that their multibillion dollar purchase was not in vain but truly put them on the map in a way that they never could have done before the acquisition.

Ricoh is slowly learning the power of the weapon that she bought. But being able to wield this new weapon of destruction is yet another story. IKON is not an easy horse to ride, and this ride is surely to get very edgy in the short term as things build and the economy continues to falter. This is an "E" Ticket for sure!

As we get into 2010 I'm sure there are more cuts, layoffs, and changes to come. All we can ask is in the end that we are paid to the champions of the day. I for one cannot complain too bad as I have had record months and a record year! I am sitting somewhere around 120% of my budget with almost 400% of my yearly units. The Ricoh Pro 550EX, 700EX and the infamous C900 have taken me to the Promised Land!

Even in bad times the pirate of Lewisville Lake is showing that it can be done with no food or water and just on new business acquisition alone!

Happy Hunting,

2009 Texoma Lakefest Regatta

(2009 Second Star Racing team consisted of: JD Hill, Susan Hill, Ben Gray, John Kleineberg, Michael (Pirate Mike) Brooks, Angela Haar, Harald TenWolde, Scott Spurlin)

Well I haven't been home for 24 hours and I am writing the chronicles of another great adventure. Texoma Lakefest (website) a long standing tradition in North Texas has been recognized as the largest inland charity sailing regatta in the nation. 2009 was no different and a tremendous amount of effort was put in by the races sponsoring yachtclub the Texoma Sailing Club (website)! 47 boats and close to 300+ competitors came to battle it out on one of Texas' biggest lakes. Lake Texoma is one of the largest reservoirs in the United States, the 12th largest Corps of Engineers (USACE) Lake, and the largest in USACE Tulsa District. ¹

4 days of fund raising for a great charity; the Make A Wish Foundation (website). Thursday is the Chaos Cup where the corporate sponsors get to try their hand at sailboat racing! Teams are sent out to have a great time and get a chance to meet the sailors that will for the next 3 days battle it out with the famous North Texas weather and the top rated competitors that come from around the nation to try their hand at getting their name engraved on the ever sought after silver cup. Thursday had overcast but fair weather as we saw great sailing from the cast of competitors. Almost event free Thursday did bring about one casualty when 2008 3^rd place competitor Nelda Ray snapped their mast to end their campaign for the silver cup.

From first time newbie's to Amercia's Cup sailors Texoma Lakefest brings them all together in the spirit of competition and love of the sport. Friday is the first day of competition and typically is full of emotion and excitement as the boats get launched and the competitors look over the scratch sheets to see whom they will be battling it out with. This year Friday brought lightning storms and while we all went out to the battle ground not one race was started. After the high winds and lightning got within masts reach the races were postponed and we were sent in to wait out the weather. By the time the weather was past us night had fallen. Over the Eastern sky one could see thermal lightning giving everyone a great fireworks display. Dinner was a great Texan tradition barbeque catered in from a great Fort Worth practitioner. (Riscky's Barbeque)
The night wouldn't have been complete without some great dancing to a live band and Captain J.D.'s Lavaritas! Saturday started off well as the dangerous weather had passed us and we were hoping to get out on the proving grounds and play hard! Rain started to fall as the winds had given way to glassy seas. With light to nonexistent winds we got off one race that became extremely tactical as we raced for what seemed like an eternity. The multi-hulls and the spinnaker boats got off the course in reasonable time but the working sail classes extended the race for about 3 hours till there was no more wind or light to race. Coming back to the marina everyone was joyous and in one piece all wanting more wind and a chance to compete. Saturday night Riscky's came up with a great meal of fajitas while the headliner band broke out with some winner tunes. Lavaritas (margaritas that come from a ten foot volcano) were flowing again as the mountain starting erupting as soon as the competitors landed. In sailor style competitors bid silently for all kinds of trinkets of all kinds and values from a nice massage to a Donzi boat. Dancing went on till everyone was satisfied. Everyone went to sleep early as they knew that the race starting times had been pushed up an hour early so we could get in enough races to satisfy the regatta.

Sunday was the day, sunny cold and windy. Wind started off easy 8-10 knots as everyone got suited up for the insanity. When we got out to the proving ground out in the exposed main body of the lake the winds quickly bumped up to 20 knots. Everyone suited up in full armor as we awaited the starting sequence. 3 races convened that opened everyone eyes to the dangers of sailboat racing. From the many near misses and close calls to gear breaks and collisions Sunday was full of "Lakefest" spirit. Lakefest is always a serious competitors concern as the weather is always a big factor; proved again Lake Texoma brought forth serious conditions for the competitors to overcome.

From Terra Nova getting hung up on the judge's boat to God Speed having a serious collision and boom breakage to fishing sailors out of the lake to the sad personal injury on Predator. It was a busy day indeed, and the weather came back to revel her serious side to us. To the family & crew of the injured sailor we send our best wishes. We await the verdict on the injured sailor but from some reports someone fell and possibly broke ribs and collapsed a lung. We pray that he heals fast and comes back to win more races. As the sailor lay on the deck in serious condition some of the last reported words from his mouth were, "Finish the race!" Predator did manage even with a DNC to finish in 2nd place for class #2. Congratulations to all the sailors that made that win possible! (Consequently Predator was in OUR fleet!)

All in all it was a typical Lakefest averaging about 15 knots from days at zero to days with gusts over 30. The official results will be posted on the Lakefest website
and on the Texoma Sailing Club's website.

I learned a lot and am grateful that we only had a few mishaps and no serious injuries. I am blessed to have met Scott and Harald two passing experienced sailors that graced us with their skill for this special journey. I look forward to our new J122 and learning how to use it as the weapon that it is. To everyone out there, fast sailing…

Pirate Mike.

"Sailing doesn't make a man but it reveals him to himself. His strengths, his weaknesses, his fears and his accomplishments. Sailing is a culmination of everything he knows, thinks, and feels. It brings all the senses together and like the rest of nature shows us how small we really are. Sailing puts things into perspective but yet allows us to be supernatural if even just for a moment." – Pirate Mike…

1 Reference pulled from Wikipedia at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Texoma

Something wicked this way comes!

Everyone is waiting for their ship to come in and this week it looks like my ship is arriving! I live aboard a Beneteau 331 which is a 34 foot coastal cruiser like the type of boat you would charter in the Virgin Islands or along the coast of Europe. There are many classes of sailboats that fit certain applications. For example there are truly lake boats that are very light weight and fun to sail but should never be on open water. There are coastal cruisers that are about as light but are equipped to stand up to tides/currents and are safe for open water navigation. There are blue water boats that are heavy and full of tankage for long ocean voyages and then there are race boats.

Now race boats also break down into classes from one design where everyone has the exact boat to PHRF (pronounced perf) racers. PHRF is a handicapping system used in yacht racing, so that boats that are not alike can race with each other and still have a chance to win. Yacht racing in many cases really isn't about the boat is it about the crew. The idea is to see who has the best crew so the boats are handicapped to give everyone a fair shot. Now there are several different systems and they all work in a common way of trying to take into account how a boat should perform but none of them work all the time and under all conditions.

The PHRF system is the system that most lakes and costal organzations use. Boats are given a number of seconds that they are given as an advantage based off of the baseline boat "a boat with a 0 rating" so a boat with a 150 rating gets a hundred and fifty second "head start" on the boat that rates a zero. So for example if the first boat crosses the line in 10 minutes (600 seconds) and the next boat finishes in 20 minutes (1200 seconds) but the first boat rates a zero and the second boat rates 120 and it was a 5 mile race then the second boat gets to subtract 120X5=600 seconds from their finish time so that both boats actually finish in a tie! Talk about shocking to find out you finished first eat lunch and still lost to the next boat or a boat that finished twentieth!

Well our teams race boat Second Star was a Beneteau First Series 33.7 and rated 123/126 depending on the event which is ok for cruising boats but very slow for serious race boats. Other elements come into play as well. As the boats get longer the theoretical hull speed also increases along with the sail area that they can carry. The math is pretty simple when you have a full displacement hull the boat can only go a limited speed as the boat will never get on top of the bow wake and plane. The formula is pretty simple even thought there are things it doesn't take into account it is relatively accurate; the square root of the waterline length multiplied by 1.35 is the basic equation. These aspects are all taken into account into your PHRF.

So what racers do is they lighten their boats and make them out of very strong but light weight materials like epoxy and carbon fiber! They also take great pains in engineering everything for a well oiled crew (that becomes movable ballast) to ensure that they boat can keep herself upright under the increased pressures. Everything in the boat is designed to go fast; hulls are not always built for the greatest stability race boats have semi displacement or even planing hulls. So one thing that happens is as boat get bigger (longer water lines) their PHRF typically goes down and as they rip everything including the seats and the microwave out the rating goes down even more. In the end we would not be complete without overloading these "shell" of a boat with incredibly large sails to bring the boats to life.

Now that I face my 4^th race season I will get to graduate to a new level of racing! Originally starting in the cruiser fleet or the "working class sails" group then to graduate to the "spinnaker" class group but be one of the slower "boats" in that class to now racing a brand new one design sport boat in the spinnaker class. We have been diligent and it has paid off for our team. We have seen a good amount of sailors come and go but the core team is still intact. When I started there was the skipper and his wife and whomever else he could con with food and drink to show up! Typically that meant 2 other people. Between the drinks, food and strong winds we would surely finish the race in the same day that we started, but that was not good enough. That first year we pushed very hard (at a pirates request) to raise the standards for crewmanship. Before having a way to get to the lake and a pulse was all that was required. By the end of the year we actually asked people if they had sailed before! By the end of 2006 we were ready to compete. Averaging a crew of 4-6 we started making our mark in the working sails division. By Spring of 2008 we were full time Spinnaker Class racers and as of Lakefest we will begin a new chapter in our racing careers! Now Second Star has new meaning as we will not have anyone in front of us to show us the way we will have to look for the "second star" As you may remember from your childhood:

"The second star to the right
Shines in the night for you
To tell you that the dreams you plan
Really can come true"

Except from "Second star to the right" song from Peter Pan

2005
Who is Second Star?
2006
Icebreaker Series Regatta 8th Place
Lakefest Regatta (I am not 100% sure on this one)
Leukemia Cup Regatta 1st Place (crewing for Sealake Yacht Sales)
Solstice Series Regatta 5th Place
Texoma Classic Regatta 5th Place Wunderlick Regatta 7th Place
Sundowner Regatta Did not compete
2007
Icebreaker Series Regatta 2nd Place
Lakefest Regatta 2nd Place
Leukemia Cup Regatta 1st Place (crewing for Sealake Yacht Sales)
Solstice Series Regatta 1st Place
Asbury Smith Memorial Cup 1st Place
Texoma Classic Regatta 9th Place
Wunderlick Regatta 1st Place
Sundowner Regatta 1st Place
2008
Icebreaker Series Regatta 1st Place
Cedar Mills Yacht Club 1st Place (Spinnaker) Beer Can Race Series
Lakefest Regatta 1st Place (Spinnaker)
Leukemia Cup Regatta 1st Place (crewing for Sealake Yacht Sales)
Solstice Series Regatta 4th Place (Spinnaker)
Asbury Smith Memorial Cup 4th Place (Spinnaker)
Texoma Classic Regatta 2nd Place (Spinnaker)
Wunderlick Regatta 2nd Place (Bob Sittle & J124) Spinnaker
Cedar Mills Regatta 2nd Place (Spinnaker)
Sundowner Regatta 6th Place (Spinnaker)
2009
Icebreaker Series Did not compete
Lakefest Regatta 5th Place (Spinnaker 1st Fleet)

Something wicked this way comes… Second Star Racing the saga continues…

From a PHRF of 123/126 to a renewed opportunity and a rebirth at 33 Second Star Racing is taking it to the next level. Almost a half a million dollars later and what do you get?

Perfection… See you on the water…

Pirate Mike