I race my Catalina 30 and use a spinaker. My foredeck guy was telling me the ring on the spinaker pole slide was bent and hard to him to get the pole on. At first, I though he was just belly aching and needed an excuse for how long it's beet taking to get the pole set. Well, I looked at it close today and whoa, it's a pretzel. Worse, the thing is bent down and the part that slides on the track is also deformed. I can't even slide it up and down without it digging up the track. Attempting to bend it up and relieve the pressure on the track didn't help, but i didn't have anything with leverage. Tomorrow, I am going to the dock with a 4 ft piece of 1" pipe. Hopefully, that will get it to the point where I can slide it off. Now, for a question: Anyone else use a spinaker on a c-30 and race? Given that the damn thing almost turtled me a few weeks ago in a wind sheer, it must be puttings some tremendous force on that spinaker ring. Any thoughts on a replacement? I was thinking of having a welder reinforce it beyond the original welds. Looking at west, I see several options (most pricey). There is one that is less costly and says it is "investment cast" . does that mean aluminum? it's on page 1027 of west. any help appreciated jimbo