The Vancouver Sun du lieu suivant : Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada • 27

CLASSIFIED5 TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 1985 I I nrmmn-' 1 0 Uf i Mark van Monrt phjtot Captain Stan Smyl ond rest of the Vancouver Canucks get ready to do some relaxing aboard team's 727 Speed and convenience make Air Canuck untouchable 1, 1 tt r' i 1 1 1 By MIKE BEAMISH Sun Sports Reporter NEW CARROLLTON, Md. There are few untouchables in the Vancouver Canuck organization. But one 20-year-old veteran of the low-flying National Hockey league team can bank on employment for next season. Air Canuck, the seasoned Boeing 727 aircraft which makes the Canucks the envy of the league in the air, if not on the ice, won't be sold off, according to Arthur Griffiths, the team's assistant to the chairman. "Certainly two years is not enough time to say whether the plane has been a success or failure," said Griffiths before the Canucks left Vancouver yesterday afternoon for a flight to Baltimore and tonight's game against Washington Capitals in Landover, Md.

"We bought the plane for convenience, as a way of alleviating travel time and distance," Griffths continued. "Ideally, it would give us a few more points on the road. It hasn't worked out that way, because of a number of unforseen difficulties along the way Whether the plane has been worth the expense is a difficult thing to judge." From a player's standpoint, Air Canuck makes a lot of sense. The Canucks arrive relaxed and refreshed, without having to spend hours standing in queues to check in, pick up baggage or stand around and wait. In the pre-Air Canuck era, for instance, the Canucks would have taken a 6:30 a.m.

flight AIR CANUCK very nice, very expensive fessional sports team in North America with an airplane comes at a sky-high cost. The cost of topping up Air Canuck with litres of fuel for yesterday's flight was about $6,800. And no lunch of moist sandwiches and cold coffee for these guys. Thirty steak dinners for the players, coaches, trainers and media in the Canucks' entourage cost the club $700. "The caterers really sock it to you when they know it's the Canucks' plane," says cabin attendant Gary Kainz.

John Chesman, team vice-president in charge of finance, says the Canucks' travel budget has doubled since the club switched, from commercial airliners to Air Canuck. "We've gone from somewhere between $300,000 and $500,000 a season to something between $750,000 and $1 million," Chesman admitted. But Chesman quickly adds that the plane has been a good investment. "If we ever did decide to sell Air Canuck, we could probably get back considerably more than we paid for it," he says. Co-pilot George Vilven, one of four employees added to the Canuck payroll when CG- WALLY KACHUR to Seattle yesterday morning before making a connection to the Washington area, arriving here in the late afternoon.

Flying Air Canuck allowed the team the luxury of practising in the morning at the Agrodome, then making a leisurely drive to the airport for a scheduled 2 p.m. takeoff. Image-wise Air Canuck may make sense. But being able to claim you're the only pro VCH (Vancouver Canucks Hockey) was purchased, says the plane is in superb shape despite its years. Technically, Air Canuck is a Boeing 727-100, a shorter version of the standard 727-200 series which is used by many of the world's airlines.

Vilven said Air Canuck was "No. 189" off the assembly line in 1965 at Boeing's Seattle plant. More than 1,800 were built before production shutdown. With only 46,000 hours of flying time, Air Canuck is just reaching "middle says pilot Wally Kachur. Kachur, Vilven and flight engineer Mike Gauthier have some of the most unusual jobs in Canadian aviation.

Their plane is a celebrity in its own right. With its gleaming, cream-colored fuselage, markings in team colors and an illuminated Canuck logo on the tail section, Air Canuck is as popular with North American airport personnel as the players. Maybe more so. Air Canuck is a pampered craft. It is used only to fly the Canucks to and from away games, so it's off most of the spring and all of the summer.

Because it is licensed as a "private the Canucks can't put out the plane to charter during the off-season. On board, the atmosphere is laid back and distinctly masculine. Before takeoff the players strip to their underwear, doffing sport coats and ties before settling in to sweat shirts, rugby pants or, in the case of captain Stan Smyl, a pair of well-worn pyjamas. Some, such as defenceman Rick Lanz, quickly make claim to the observation seat in the flight deck and sit in for the pre-flight checks and takeoff. "We have to get up here ahead of him (Lanz), otherwise we won't have a seat," chuckles Vilven.

There are no pre-flight instructions or baggage check in. With 40 first class seats, the players simply bring their luggage on board and still have plenty of leg space left over. Kainz, who cooks aboard the Griffiths family's 87-foot yacht during the summer, and Kevin McAuley, who doubles as Air Canuck's mechanic, are the cabin crew. Besides lunch or dinner, players can help themselves to snacks of cheese, chocolate bars, fruit juice, soft drinks or fruit on a cart near the galley. Beer is also freely available but rationed according to circumstance and the whims of the coach.

Compared with their NHL brethren, the Canucks usually don't have to line up with the rest of the travelling public at customs. They're either whisked through or, better yet, an official comes on board to speed the procedure. As a result, the Canucks are in great spirits when they touch down. The only hard part is having to play when they get there. Neale may be best choice for Canucks after all By ARV OLSON Harry Neale's worst fears may be unfounded after all.

He's the logical choice to be general manager and coach of the Vancouver Canucks next season, according to the assistant chairman of the National Hockey League club. "Someone more suited to coach than Harry is will have to be found," Arthur Griffiths said Monday. "He's a good candidate himself. Look at the team's record under him since before Christmas. They're doing pretty well.

"Depending on what happens in the last 19 games of the season, Harry could be the best person available to coach the team next year." The 27-year-old son and chief aide of majority owner Frank Griffiths added that Glen Sather and Scotty Bowman "do fairly well handling both jobs with Edmonton and Buffalo, so I can't see any reason why Harry couldn't continue to do the same here." If Neale isn't kept as the coach, Griffiths indicated he favors "someone upbeat like (Calgary coach) Bob Johnson or (Islanders' assistant) Brian Kilrea." Neale, who has two years remaining on his contract to manage the team, has said he believes he will be fired at the end of the season. He also took over the coaching responsibilities for the second straight season, in November, when rookie NHL coach Bill LaForge was canned after 20 games. LaForge was hired last summer after Griffiths and Neale had interviewed two other top candidates and considered "at least another 12 people" to replace Roger Neilson, who had been dismissed as coach in January, 1984. Griffiths said he and Neale haven't discussed the coaching vacancy yet, reiterating that candidates for the position won't be considered until after the season. "There are more pressing things to be done from now until then," he said, "such as assessing the players in our organization and preparing for the draft.

Ideally, we'd like to have a coach before the (June 8) draft but we're not going to jump to get anyone." Only Ludek Bukac, coach of Czechoslovakia's national team, has applied in writing for the Canucks' coaching job, said Griffiths. "Bukac wants to coach in the NHL, though he may have to start by taking a job as an assistant or minor league coach," said Griffiths, adding that Vancouver associate coach Ron Smith has requested that he be considered for the vacancy. The contract of Smith, who came here with Neilson via Buffalo and Toronto in 1981, expires two weeks after the season ends. "No one else has applied for either (coach or general manager) job with us," says Griffiths. "Or for mine.

I suspect that we'll start getting some coaching resumes the day after the season's over. "The best candidates might be employed with other NHL teams. We don't know their contractual status, so we really don't know who will be available. If we're interested in someone under contract, we'll have to approach his team for permission to talk to him. We haven't done that with anyone as yet.

You almost have to wait until after the playoffs, especially if his team is involved." Griffiths said that LaForge, Mike Keenan and Pat Quinn were interviewed last spring for the job. Keenan and Quinn subsequently were hired to coach Philadelphia Flyers and Los Angeles Kings respectively. "Smith and (Don) Cherry also were considered and we had applications or enquiries from about another 10 people. Arguments persuasive for expensive VRC restoration Vancouver Rowing Club needs $1.4 James trit Lawton bership roll it has to be a tenable position. Older glories were evoked Monday when an inspection was made from the deck of a ketch which sailed grandly from the shadow of skyscrapers to a building of some rickety splendor.

The club's official historian, 72-year-old Jack Carver, was aboard and ready to link the glories of the past with the requirements of the future. In his book, The Vancouver Rowing Club, 1886 to 1980, Carver wrote, "Coal Harbour and Brockton Point are inseparable from our history. For 94 years young men have rowed the waters of Coal Harbor, the shouts of coxswains ringing out as they exhort their straining charges to ever greater effort until is heard 'Easy and suddenly all is quiet except for the gasps and groans of oarsmen spent." Four such oarsmen travelled to the Olympics of Paris in 1924 and stole a silver medal from the powerful Swiss. George MacKay, Archie Black, Bill Wood and stroke Colin Finlayson were then ushered into the presence of the Prince of Wales. Finlayson found himself pushed into the ballroom and the arms of the Duchess of Sutherland, an experience that was apparently almost as arduous as beating the Swiss.

Chairman Sacre points out that the club is far from an elitist organization. "We're aware that there is a lot of economic pressure and on the face of it this might not be the best time to launch this project. "But then the building is suffering all the time and it's our contention that there will always be a need for people to get involved in athletics and to relax. It would be tragic if a few years down the road, when the economic climate was better, we had lost our chance of saving a building that is a genuine part of the city's tradition." The club could have gone for some safe money by seeking an official 'heritage' classification for the clubhouse but as an official points out, "that means you have to go to about three committees before you make one simple decision." There are currently six sections, rowing, rugby, yachting, field hockey, tennis and cricket, with an infant jogging offshoot possibly expanding to track and field. None of this should obscure the fact that the dub has a legendary reputation for dances of huge athleticism and, in a moment of fleeting candor, the official project film does include some shots of championship-quality arm-bending.

Perhaps all that really needs to be said to prospective donors, especially those from corporate and local government sources, is that a piece of both the city's history and still vibrant life is about to fall into the sea Given the current state of civic morale, this would seem to be something to be avoided at considerable cost. The first clubhouse was taken over by the city as a plare to quarantine a case of smallpox. A inure contemporary contagion is the extraction of tradition and community life. The city might feel that the old VRC is an appropriate place to stop the rot. million to put new, safe legs on the old mock tudor building that has launched many noble sporting deeds and the kind of hangovers that give you a headache in the left eye, Campaign chairman Philip Sacre agrees that in the current pecking order of fund raising there may be more immediately compelling causes but then a city, especially one as young as Vancouver, is unwise to let wither the roots of the past.

The VRC's alternative was to build a new clubhouse and let the old one slide gently into Coal Harbor, carrying with it the ghosts of nearly a century of Christian sweat and pagan celebration. The argument, which I find quite persuasive, is that we impoverish the future when we forget the past. Anyway, the fact is that with considerable nerve members, who have already produced more than $100,000, have embarked on Operation Landmark. It is based on the proposition that the club has made a vital contribution to the recreational life of the city and that the old building represents a tradition worth maintaining. With sixteen 1984 Olympians including six medalists on the mem 4 2 COLOR.