Τετάρτη 8 Οκτωβρίου 2014

Tiny Horse: Cute Steed Suffers From Dwarfism

This Tiny Horse's Owner Refused To Put Him Down. But Wait Till You See How This Horse Lives Today.

Born at only 22 inches, Acer the Aquinas was far too small to even be referred to as a miniature horse. In fact, miniature horses are usually around 34 to 38 inches, depending on the breed registry that is involved in designating this type of horse.

So, then, what is Acer? Well, the little guy actually has a very rare type of horse dwarfism. Surprisingly, both his mother and his father had the gene for dwarfism, even though they were both full-sized horses.

Horses that suffer from dwarfism might be awfully cute, but, unfortunately, they often have to deal with significant health issues. Therefore, breeding stock registries often will avoid accepting horses affected by dwarfism to their registration of miniature horses.

VOLVO OCEAN RACE__ THE TEAMS PART 2

AROUND THE WORLD FROM SEVEN GROUPS

All you need to know about this round-the-world crewed sailing race – what is the event about, when it takes place, where it goes, who is taking part and what is that fancy boat you’ve seen in photos.

What is the Volvo Ocean Race?It’s the leading round-the-world sailing race for teams, with a series of stops that give fans the chance to experience the In-Port Race series. It began life in 1973 and was then known as the Whitbread. Today it is sailing's biggest offshore race and one of the most coveted prizes in the sport. It lasts for nearly nine months - it’s the longest sport event in the world.

For more information on the history of the race, check out our Memories section.

When is the next edition?The 12th edition of the Volvo Ocean Race will start from Alicante, Spain on October 4, 2014. The race will finish in Gothenburg, Sweden with a final in-port race on June 27, 2015. Check out our easy-to-read table with exact dates.

What is the route?11 ports, 38,739 nautical miles - for a quick overview of the route, go the the Route section. The route map is available here.

Where can I learn about the sailors?Seven teams will cross the start line in October in Alicante:

Team SCA, the first all-female team to compete in the race since 2001-02.
Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing, back for a second race with British skipper Ian Walker.
Dongfeng Race Team from China, skippered by Frenchman Charles Caudrelier.
Team Brunel from the Netherlands, skippered by race veteran Bouwe Bekking.
Team Alvimedica with a double flag Turkey/USA, skippered by American youngster Charlie Enright.
A Spanish team, whose main title sponsor has yet to be revealed, skippered by Iker Martínez.
Team Vestas Wind from Denmark, skippered by Australian sailor Chris Nicholson.

Tell me about the boat:The new one-design Volvo Ocean 65 is the boat that will be used for the next two editions of the Volvo Ocean Race. There is a whole section about this radical, high-performance, world-class, tough, affordable boat here.

This is great, but where can I find the rules?You can find the official Notice of Race and Class Rule for the Volvo Ocean 65 on the Race Noticeboard.

How do I contact the Volvo Ocean Race?Whatever your needs, try contacting one of the people in this list.

4) TEAM BRUNEL

Dutch expert Bouwe Bekking is a six-race veteran, but has yet to win. He is back with a crew of young guys - and this time, he means business.

5)TEAM ALVIMEDICA

They are young, they are American, and they've joined forces with a Turkish sponsor to finally make their seven-year dream of doing the race a reality.

Although Mark is the youngest crew member of Team Alvimedica, that hasn't held him back with success in the team. Mark is one of the co-founders of the team with Skipper, Charlie Enright. Since attending college together they have been working together to get the experience needed to create their own Volvo Ocean Racing team. Over the years he has logged over 20,000 miles in ocean sailing, including participation in events such as the Fastnet, Newport-Bermuda, and Transatlantic Races.

In addition to being Watch Captain, Mark is also leading the team on-shore as Team Manager. He doesn't take himself to seriously though, he is Hawaiian after all and lives by the motto, “No shirt, no shoes, no worries.” Its just a guess, but I am willing to bet he will want a shirt while racing in the Southern Ocean!

Sailing Team

Volvo Ocean Race sailors will tell you that they love the race for the long downwind rides at breakneck speeds across the world’s greatest oceans. Although each sailor is selected for a specific crew position, in reality they all get do a bit of everything and that’s another reason they love doing the race. It’s not uncommon for just three sailors – a driver, trimmer and grinder – to be on deck hurtling the boat across the waves in the middle of a pitch black night some thousands of miles offshore. Those are the moments that stoke the inner explorer, pitting man against nature.

There are eight active sailors aboard each yacht. During the offshore legs the Team Alvimedica crew is split into two watches of three each, with two sailors – the skipper and navigator – floating, not adhering to the watch rotation. The three sailors on watch will be responsible for driving, trimming and grinding. If maneuvers are required they’ll wake as many sailors as needed from the off watch to assist.

During the in port races, when there’s a higher priority on timely crew maneuvers, the sailors will fill the specific role they were recruited to so that the sails are hoisted and lowered, trimmed and eased at the exact time.

6) TEAM MAPFRE

Spain is back in the race thanks to Iker Martínez and Xabi Fernández. And this time, they have one clear objective: to claim the nation's first victory.

7) TEAM VESTAS

Chris Nicholson is back. The four-time race veteran will lead Team Vestas Wind, a campaign sponsored by Vestas, the world’s leading wind energy company.

From time immemorial, humanity has looked to the wind for hope, for harbingers of change, for the promise of victory.

That’s why Vestas is competing in the Volvo Ocean Race. Over nine months, eleven ports of call, and 39,000 nautical miles, it embodies the convergence of technology, human ingenuity, and the monumental strength of the wind. To win, you need heart and mind, ambition and optimism, skill and nature.

The awe-inspiring challenge of the Volvo Ocean Race perfectly captures the mission of Vestas, the only global company wholly devoted to wind energy. Just as the wind will fill the sails of Team Vestas Wind and propel it to the finish line, it also powers us in a race with even greater significance for everyone on this fragile planet. With the wind’s help, we are creating a smarter way of living, a better model for business, and a more sustainable future. Truly, this is a race we must win.

Wind brings hope. More than 1 billion people still live without reliable electricity. But wind can power affordable progress in the fight against energy poverty. It fuels medical equipment and lights schools. It energises water pumps in areas of scarcity while using little of that precious resource. It invigorates businesses, opens new paths to prosperity, and takes us places we never imagined we could go.

Wind brings harbingers of change. We know the importance of adjusting to the winds. Which is why Vestas believes in being not only the world’s undisputed wind power leader but also a pioneer of a transformative model of business. We work nonstop to live out our passion for customer service and improve our leading-edge technology. We strive to lower the cost of energy, making it both environmentally beneficial and financially optimal to choose wind over less earth-friendly alternatives.

Wind brings the promise of victory in the fight for a cleaner, greener, more energy-efficient world. As we wrestle with climate change and worries about energy security, it hints at the possibility of a more sustainable future. Though much of the world may be late to this endeavour—just as Vestas joins the Volvo Ocean Race at the eleventh hour—we believe success is not only within reach but also imperative.

With teamwork and pioneering spirit, world-class technology, and the wind at our backs, we will achieve our goals—both in the Volvo Ocean Race and in the push to create a brighter, better tomorrow. Indeed we have no choice. Truly, this is a race we must win.

VOLVO OCEAN RACE__ THE TEAMS PART 1

Team SCA, the first all-female team to compete in the race since 2001-02.
Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing, back for a second race with British skipper Ian Walker.
Dongfeng Race Team from China, skippered by Frenchman Charles Caudrelier.
Team Brunel from the Netherlands, skippered by race veteran Bouwe Bekking.
Team Alvimedica with a double flag Turkey/USA, skippered by American youngster Charlie Enright.
A Spanish team, whose main title sponsor has yet to be revealed, skippered by Iker Martínez.
Team Vestas Wind from Denmark, skippered by Australian sailor Chris Nicholson.

NOW YOU SEE IS WHAT THESE GROUPS WITH THE FIRST AMAZONES

1) TEAM SCA

All-female sailing team could be a game changer in round-the-world race

Team SCA is focused on succeeding in the competition, but the members also hope to encourage more mixed-race crews

An all-female sailing crew will set out on a grueling round-the-world race on Saturday, and although the team is focused simply on the competition, its success could open the door for more women to join Volvo Ocean Race crews, which have generally been all male.

The team, named SCA for its Swedish sponsor, is the fifth all-female boat in the quadrennial contest’s 41-year history. This year all crews will be sailing identical boats: 65-foot monohulls. Modifications are not allowed, so architecture and materials won’t determine victory; athletes will.

The women of Team SCA see this as the best chance an all-female team has had at succeeding, and they hope that if they do, it will encourage more mixed-gender teams in future races.

“In my eyes, this is the first time an all-female team has been given all it takes to go out and try to win,” said Liz Wardley, 34, of Papua New Guinea.

The seven teams competing in the Volvo Ocean Race will leave from the eastern coast of Spain to navigate fierce Mediterranean storms, piracy threats, fishing nets, icebergs, the brutal Southern Ocean and the complicated waters where Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 is believed to have disappeared in March. The race covers 38,739 nautical miles — nearly twice the earth’s circumference.

“It’s a very, very, very physical operation. It’s not just pure strength but endurance,” said Neal McDonald, a veteran of five Volvo races whose wife, Lisa, skippered the last all-female team, in 2001–02. Its boat broke a mast between Baltimore and La Rochelle, France; it rejoined the race and finished last.

Tacking the boat, or changing direction, which could happen 10 times a day, requires moving two to three tons of gear by hand while the boat’s platform is bouncing around the ocean. That means lifting 40,000 to 60,000 pounds per day on six hours of sleep or less.

Sailing team — Team SCA in the Round Britain Island Race in August 2014.

To compensate for inherent strength differences, the women’s crew is allowed 11 sailors on board at once. All-male crews are limited to eight.

McDonald, who now works for rival crew Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing, said, “There are some very good sailors on SCA, and they’ve got more of them. They should be a force to be reckoned with, but we won’t know till the end.”

Living quarters would be tight for eight and even tighter for 11 people. It’s cramped, damp and stuffy and jokingly referred to as the carbon coffin. Every meal is freeze-dried and prepared in a sink and stove in a galley that is smaller than an office cubicle. Sleep shifts never exceed four hours, and sailors belt themselves into their bunks to avoid being violently ejected while the vessel tilts, creaks and whines to a roar. One change of clothes is allowed — never mind bathing.

The boats will stop in 11 countries on five continents, including one U.S. stop in Newport, Rhode Island, in May. After nine offshore legs — long races from country to country — and 10 in-port races — one-day races held in each port — whoever reaches Gothenburg, Sweden, by June 27 with the fewest points is the winner.

More than 400 women applied when SCA’s recruitment began in the fall of 2012.

“There were no obvious choices,” said Joca Signorini, SCA’s Brazilian coach. “It’s not like you were putting together a male team and would perhaps try to find some of the guys who had done the last race.”

SCA’s sailors hail from five nations. Three are Olympians; three competed in the last all-female Volvo team, in 2001–02; one is a sailmaker by trade; one has an engineering degree from Cambridge University; and another was a rower who helped Cambridge beat Oxford in the women’s version of the annual Boat Race on the River Thames. Two are sisters. Three have children. A few, like Dee Caffari, have circumnavigated the globe several times nonstop single-handedly.

In fact, Caffari, 41, is the only woman in history to have sailed solo around the globe in both directions. The “wrong” way took 178 days, she said of her 2006 westward voyage. The eastward route took half the time. But the Volvo Ocean Race lasts nine months.

“This is easier,” Caffari said of the Volvo race, because sailors get a break on shore between stages. But the intensity is higher.

“Volvo is three-week sprints,” she said. “The nonstop is a marathon. [In Volvo] you can’t miss anything. It’s all or nothing for three weeks, get to the finish line, sort out all the problems, have a rest, then do it again.”

U.S. Olympian Sally Barkow, 34, has had to make the opposite adjustment. The Wisconsin native has focused on in-shore racing for the past 10 years. “What I’d been doing was 20-minute match races or even one-to-two-hour races,” she said. “This is a totally different concept.”

And Annie Lush, 34, the Cambridge rower and an Olympic sailor, was used to 12-minute races. “It was like stadium racing, basically. Now I’m in the middle of the ocean with a whale to shout at you.” The biggest adjustment she found on the trans-Atlantic crossing was that “while you’re sleeping, someone else is working. I’d feel kind of guilty to rest in my off time if someone else was doing something.”

Abby Ehler during the 2014 Round Britain Island Race.

As with Tour de France teams, each crew is backed by a sponsor, which provides a $9 million to $14 million investment over two years, according to the race’s CEO, Knut Frostad. SCA was the first to sign on, specifically looking to create an all-female team because 80 percent of its retail customers are women.

The early investment meant that this spring, while most teams were still choosing crew members and some didn’t even have a boat, Team SCA already had its three coaches, 12 sailors and the chance to test equipment and team dynamics on an ocean crossing.

“We’ve got no excuses this time,” Wardley said. “We’ve got the best resources, the best coaches.”

Despite some gender parity in high-stakes sailing events, including Olympic sailing and the America’s Cup, the Volvo Ocean Race is still male-dominated. The last time a woman participated in the Volvo race was in 2005, when Adrienne Cahalan navigated on Brasil 1 for the first leg of the race.

Crew member Abby Ehler, 41, said, “It comes down to opportunity. You would almost never get a chance to do this with a mixed team because [some think] there are just not the girls with the experience or physical strength to be worth a spot on a men’s boat. Since the opportunity hasn’t been there for so many years, it kind of has to be an all-female team. And it has to be run properly to ensure that we can prove ourselves and be competitive.”

Ehler’s hope is that the team will prove a strong competitor — even if it’s not at the top of the results board — and will be taken seriously. “It’s just a relief, from a sailor’s point of view, that we’re not just there as media tokens,” she said.

Caffari said, “I think this is the first step toward mixed teams being the norm.”

“You almost need to make this huge impact so in the next edition everyone maybe considers a mixed team because we proved we can do it. I think the shock tactic is going to help.”

2) ABU DHABI

Ian Walker is back at the helm of Azzam - Arabic for ‘determination'. The Emirati syndicate has the experience, talent and drive to succeed this time around. A strong contender.

Ian Walker’s Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing crew for the Volvo Ocean Race 2014-15 is a potent blend of experience and exciting new talent which includes several familiar faces from the last campaign as well as some newcomers.

New race rules have reduced the number of sailors from 11 down to just eight this time around. However, just like last time the teams will have an on board reporter to keep our fans up to date with everything that goes on while Azzam is at sea.

Donning Abu Dhabi crew uniforms for the second consecutive time are under-30 helmsman and trimmer Adil Khalid (United Arab Emirates), navigator and helmsman Simon Fisher (Great Britain) and bowman Justin Slattery (Ireland).

Making their first appearances in ADOR colours are helmsman and trimmer Phil Harmer (Australia), pitman & boat captain Daryl Wislang (New Zealand) and under-30 bowman and helmsman Luke Parkinson (Australia).

Completing Walker’s lineup is Spanish sailing legend and five-time Volvo Ocean Race veteran Roberto Bermudez de Castro. Better known as ‘Chuny’, the Spaniard has and amazing pedigree in the race, having finished outside the top three on only one occasion in his five campaigns.

The team’s second under-30 sailor is Australia’s Luke Parkinson whose track record includes a an Olympic 49er campaign and representing his country at the 2014 Red Bull Youth America’s Cup in San Francisco. In contrast to his crewmates, this will be Parkinson’s first ever Volvo Ocean Race.

Backing up the sailing team in a non-sailing coaching capacity is ADOR Performance Manager Neal McDonald, one of the most highly respected round the world sailors who has five Volvo Ocean Races to his name.

3) DONGFENG

Dongfeng means “the eastern wind” and this ambitious Chinese team, skippered by Frenchman Charles Caudrelier, is represented by a crew that is half Chinese, half international.

RACE TEAM

It takes strong men to be able to compete in the Volvo Ocean Race and there is no doubt that, thanks to these men, the heart of Dongfeng Race Team beats strongly. "We know we're not in the same league as our competitors yet. We don't expect to be. But I believe our team has a fire within, a quiet determination that will show itself gradually as the race progresses. The gap will close and I hope our team will be the team that constantly surprises throughout." - Charles Caudrelier.

Most of the time our sailors are miles from anyone and anywhere and they would love to hear from you. Sometimes those small messages of support mean the world of difference during a tough day at sea! See below the individual email addresses or send a general message of support to the team by emailing: messageofsupport@dongfengraceteam.com