mine is 323-251-5367 - brian

my cellphone # is 202-425-0486 Ira

I got a studio apartment on Craigs List at 8200 Byron Avenue so I'm about 20 blocks north of the boathouse. The guy said he would lend me a bike which is sweet so I can ride to the boathouse everyday.

I'm now staying at The Mimosa. It's closer to the boathouse and got better reviews than the Deauville.

I just snagged an ocean front room at the Deauville Beach Resort. Ira

Ira likes to stay at nice hotels, if his preferences are anything like his previous visits to Austin. Mike stayed at gay DL hotel in South Beach. Will you be back for round 2? :)

With one Miami Rowing Festival under my belt, and having flown in to Fort Lauderdale Airport last February, I can recommend that everyone choose MIA as your airport of choice. There is a super cheap, super fast 'airport flyer' bus directly from the airport to Miami Beach. See this link. I tried to save money last year by using a free ticket on Jet Blue, arriving at Fort Lauderdale airport. I then had to catch one bus to get to the train, then catch that train to first one wrong stop, reboard the train southbound to the correct stop, cross over the tracks and have the likes of Rufus Scrimgeour (Harry Potter reference) muttering (I'm being totally serious) that I should make haste for this is a dangerous area. I walked to the bus stop, waited 45 minutes for the bus and eventually got to my hotel. What a total hassle and not exactly safe. Yes, you can always rent a car at Fort Lauderdale airport but it is quite a drive to Miami Beach and there, you can use buses that run between South and North Miami Beach all the time. As to West Palm Beach airport, that is even further north and just more of a challenge to get your tired self to Miami Beach.

For 2011, the Miami Rowing Festival format will be modified. Based on observation and feedback, we decided to cut one of the on the water sessions from the schedule. This will bring the total sessions to 6 instead of 7. The reasoning was that by Sunday afternoon, most participants were wiped and could use a break. Also, this Sunday afternoon break will give everyone a chance to 'take in' a little of Miami. (This also allowed us to lower the cost of the camp by $55). We'll still have the Monday morning session. In summary: Friday - 2 sessions Saturday - 2 sessions Sunday - 1 session Monday - 1 session Other changes that we are making is the break between morning and afternoon sessions on Saturday. We've added an extra hour so that folks have time to nap, romp on the beach, or just laze at the cafe with that frothed double decaf nonfat cappucino. There is also talk about making the Saturday afternoon session even later, closer to dusk, for a nighttime lights on the bay feel. MBRC still has to discuss this with the coaches because safety is paramount. (The Miami Boat Show is in full swing this weekend so there is more power boat traffic). In terms of rowing, we plan to offer both sweep and scull. Last year, we had one eight, and then one four and one quad. Depending on the number of participants, we may see a mix of 8+, 4+, and 4x. Small boats are available, but in a limited supply: : there are (4) singles and (2) doubles. However, given the requirement for one coach just for small boats, we may restrict the festival to just quads and larger sweep boats. Finally, we plan to hold to our coaching standard of 2 coaches for up to 24 participants, adding a third after that. Basically the standard is one coach for every two boats. Got any thoughts? Please post!

The refunds for the 2010 Miami Rowing Festival insurance pool have been sorted. There were a total of 8 participants @ $150 per person so the insurance pool was $1200. The cost of the insurance premiums was $362. There were no damage claims. Therefore the refundable pool was $1200 - $362 = $838 Divided among 8 participants, the individual refunds were $104.75 We anticipate the insurance premium costs to be close to the same for 2011 and if we get more people attending the 2011 Rowing Festival, the insurance pool will be larger and therefore the refunds will be larger as well. Post if you have any questions.

Many of you may be asking what's with the supplemental fee that we are adding to the Miami Rowing Festival registration fee? - The simple answer is GLRF is on the line for property damage and liability from accidents. - In the US, lawsuits and insurance claims are as common as a pair of socks. To ensure GLRF was protected, we needed to charge a supplemental fee that would cover whatever costs might emerge from the Miami Rowing Festival weekend. Since we don't know how many participants will attend, we needed to establish a pool of funds that would cover what we believe could be the costs involved for damages to the boats, as well as pay for a fixed fee liability policy, for a minimum number of participants We don't anticipate there will be any property damage claims but if we don't have that reserve fund, and we have to pay a large deductibe, GLRF could be essentially wiped out. We anticipate returning most of the supplemental fee to the festival participants, and the cost per person that GLRF will have to hold back after the event will go down as each additional person registers (basically a shared liability approach). Why are we making this a shared liability if one person drops a boat or slams into a bridge pier? Because negligence is always difficult to assign and if a claim comes in, and there is debate about who is at fault, GLRF still has to pay the damages. We think this is the easiest, fairest approach. We will post the costs of the claims and the fee for the liability policy here after the event, and provide a transparent accounting of how we calculated the refunds.