Pursuit and Handicap Racing - Portsmouth Yardstick

Pursuit racing and handicap racing are a bit of a mystery to me. So this post will probably have more questions than answers. I hope, dear reader, you have some answers for me...

I haven't done much pursuit racing and handicap racing in my decades of small boat racing, but this year was different in that I did participate in some pursuit racing at my sailing club, and at the Archipelago Rally a couple of weeks ago, both in my RS Aero.

A pursuit race

Handicap and pursuit races are ways to enable a variety of classes of boats of different speeds to race together fairly. 

In a handicap race the boats all start together, and the elapsed times for them to finish the course are corrected to take into account that some classes of boats are faster than others. The correction is done using a published handicap number for each class known as the Portsmouth Yardstick.

A yardstick - probably not from Portsmouth

In a pursuit race the starts of each class of boat are staggered to allow for those differences in speed. Slower boats start first and faster boats last. The times of the starts are calculated using the same Portsmouth Yardstick system.

You can find out more about the Portsmouth Yardstick System from US Sailing or the Royal Yachting Association.

US Sailing and the RYA publish national PY numbers based on information provided by sailing clubs on the times taken by all the boats competing in their handicap races. 

So far so good.

But what should happen if a club finds that the published PY numbers are just not working for them? One class always wins? Or one class always loses?

Should they adjust the national handicap numbers?

There are all sorts of reasons why this might make sense. Maybe the winds are always light at their venue and so one class which does well in light air always wins. Or maybe they sail on a very small lake or river so trapeze and spinnaker classes never really get a chance to "stretch their legs."

Sailing on a very small river in England

I'm not sure what the US Sailing guideline on this is, but the RYA  positively encourages clubs to develop their own club list of handicap numbers. See  60 years of fair racing.

In order for a club to use the scheme to its full potential and meet the main objective of giving fair racing between different classes of boats, a club will need to develop its own list of Portsmouth Numbers (PN’s).  

As a club starts using the scheme it may decide to rely on the national list as this has historically been seen as a list of long established numbers. However, the national list is based on a summation of recommendations from clubs nationwide. The list of national numbers may not be appropriate for every club individually. This is due to a number of factors including the type of boats sailed at each club, the predominant wind trends, tidal factors, size of water etc.  

Because the national list will not suit every club, each individual club should develop its own list of handicap numbers from their race results. A club should do this by periodically carrying out an analysis of their race data. By doing this a club will be able to see if any of the classes/ configurations of boat are over or under performing to the PN they are currently racing on and can adjust the number accordingly.

Hmm!

How would a club produce its own local handicap numbers?

One of the RYA's suggestions is "educated guesswork." Always one of my favorite ways to attack any problem!

Or if you want to get more scientific, the RYA offers a system complete with a spreadsheet, for analyzing all your race results and calculating adjustments to the national PY numbers.

Wow! That sounds like fun!



But wait. Is it really that simple?

What if you have one really good sailor in one class? Should her results distort the handicap numbers for everyone else in her fleet?

A very good sailor

Or what about the opposite situation? What if one class in a club has a lot of novices who always perform below the national average for the class? Should their performance so distort the club handicap for that class that the one good sailor in the fleet can easily win every club race on handicap?

Probably not going to win the handicap race

And how important is it that all the fleets in the club have a chance to win at least one race in a series?

Let's consider a hypothetical situation. A club has 5 active one design fleets. In an 11 race pursuit race series, what if  the number of races won by each of the five classes was...

A - 8

B - 2

C - 1

D - 0

E - 0

Should this data be used to consider some adjustments to start times in the pursuit series next year?

Or is this focus only on the winners not relevant to all the sailors in each class?

And how can we be sure that any adjustments based on such a skewed set of results would be ignoring the "crew skill factor" as RYA calls it?

What if there were more boats in fleet A and some of the best sailors in the club are in this fleet?

Are the sailors in fleets D and E really all raw novices?

And does it matter if they are?

Would the club racing be more fun for everybody, if sailors in fleets D and E had a chance of winning some of the races occasionally?

Once we start going down this path of adjusting handicaps (or pursuit race start times) based on actual performance of sailors in the club, aren't we really handicapping on sailor ability rather than inherent performance of each design of boat? Why not go the whole hog and just give each sailor a personal handicap?



As I said at the start of this post, there are more questions than answers.

Or as some folk say in their Facebook relationship status - "It's complicated."

It's Complicated

What do you think?

Collision Avoidance and Offset Marks

Many of you have probably already seen this video of a port-starboard collision at the recent E-Scow Nationals, but I haven't sen much discussion about it online. So here's my take on the situation and what we can learn from it and how such situations might be avoided in future.

As always, all opinions are my own and may be ill-informed, confused, or even downright wrong. So feel to disagree and abuse me in the comments if you are so inclined.



So what do we have here?

A large fleet.

A crowded windward mark rounding.

Boats on starboard bearing away on to a run and raising their spinnakers, while port tackers further down the fleet are still racing upwind towards the windward mark and are crossing the path of the starboard tack boats.

And one of the port tackers collides with a starboard tacker.

It's one of the most dangerous parts of the race course. Everyone knows that port should give way to starboard in this situation, but it's complicated by the facts that the starboard tackers are changing course and the the crew of the starboard tackers are probably busier than they are at any other time on the race course. It's bad enough on the Laser... sheeting out, pulling up the board, releasing the outhaul, maybe resetting the vang if you released it too much at the windward mark, catching the first wave… and I suspect it's even worse on a boat with a spinnaker. So sometimes the starboard tacker doesn't have their eyes out of the boat enough, and the port tacker may see the starboard tacker but isn't sure exactly when she is going to turn and how sharply. I've seen a similar incident in a Laser fleet which put the starboard tack sailor in the hospital.



So what can be done to avoid these collisions?



Options for the sailors

Under Rule 10, the obligation is clearly on the port tackers to keep clear. What options do they have? Slow down, head up, bear away, or tack I suppose.

Bearing way is certainly an option but you had better do it soon enough to be able to pass cleanly ahead of the starboard tacker. The port tack boat in the video tried to bear away but was too late. Tacking wouldn't usually be necessary or even advisable so close to the lay line. Slowing down or heading up are the best possibilities I suppose for avoiding one starboard tacker. But what if there is a whole parade of starboard tackers, as there is in this incident? Do you luff up and wait for them all to pass? You might wait for the whole fleet. Or do you choose a likely looking gap and go for it? It can be a tough choice.

The real lesson is that port tackers should really anticipate this situation and not put themselves in the situation of having to cross a crowd of starboard tackers bearing away to the downwind leg so close to the mark. It's a bit like the old joke about a tourist in Ireland who asks one of the locals for directions to Dublin. The Irishman replies, "Well sir, if I were you, I wouldn’t start from here."



And the starboard tack boats are not entirely immune from the responsibility to avoid a collision. Rule 16.1 says, "When a right-of-way boat changes course, she shall give the other boat room to keep clear." So if a starboard tack boat wishing to bear away sees a port tacker approaching, sailing in a straight line course that would cross to leeward of the starboard tacker if she maintained her course, the latter can't just bear away in front of the port tacker and immediately claim right of way under Rule 10. She has to give the port tacker room to keep clear.

Not that I'm saying that the starboard tacker in this incident changed course in such a way that she infringed Rule 16. But if the port tacker were so minded she could certainly argue a case under Rule 16 in the protest room.

It is interesting that the two starboard tack boats rounding the mark after the one involved in the collision chose to sail high to avoid another port tacker rather than bearing away in front of it. That may have been for strategic reasons (wanting to sail on that side of the downwind leg) but it was probably also smart tactics to avoid any risk of getting tangled up with the port tacker.



Options for the race committee

OK. So I hope we can all agree that having a bunch of port tack close-hauled boats sailing into a bunch of starboard tack boats trying to bear away and raise spinnakers is a situation fraught with risks of collision. The classic race management solution to avoid this problem is to lay an offset mark to define a short reaching leg for the boats after the rounding the windward mark. Then when they do round the offset mark and start to bear away they will be several boat lengths to windward of the port tack lay line and so when the the boats going downwind meet the port tackers they will be settled on their downwind course and not trying to make dramatic changes of course.

It's a good idea and it has its merits. But there is an offset mark in this incident. And still the port tackers are tangling with the starboard tackers as they are bearing away to start the downwind leg.

So what went wrong? Why are the port tackers so close to the offset mark?

Let's be generous and assume that the race committee placed the offset mark correctly (although that doesn't always happen.) Maybe the port tackers overstood the layline? Or perhaps there was a big left shift late in the race? Whatever the reason, this offset mark clearly isn't preventing the problem it was designed to solve.

I have heard talk this year of a different race management solution. Instead of the conventional offset mark defining a short reaching leg, place a mark a few boat lengths directly downwind from the windward mark with the idea that port tackers on the beat must pass it to leeward. (Not sure exactly what language you would use in the SIs to achieve this. No boat on the windward leg may cross the line between the windward mark and the offset mark?)

It sounds as if this variation of the offset mark would achieve the aim of keeping boats approaching on the port tack layline away from boats in the process of rounding the mark and bearing away, as the port tack layline would essentially be the layline to this new "offset" mark.

Has anybody heard of a race committee trying this option? Any experience or views on how well it would work?



And now over to you. Have you been involved in situations like this? Have you seen, or been involved in, similar collisions? What is your plan when you are the starboard tacker or the port tacker? Do we need any changes in the Rules to help make this part of the race course more safe? Are there other things race management can do?

Blowout of the Blowout

After sailing yesterday, my friends were talking about a couple of the videos I posted recently on this blog - the 2012 Semaine Olympique Française Finn Medal Race at Hyères and the 2011 Columbia River Gorge Laser Performance Clinic. Someone commented on the number of the number of capsizes in the Gorge video.

"You ain't see nothing yet!" I replied. "One year they had to abandon the Gorge Blowout because of all the carnage. I'll post the video of that."

So here it is. The 2010 Blowout of the Blowout…





0:20 One dude capsizes about 15 seconds after the start. Could this be an omen?

0:33 Nice whitecaps. Breeze is building.

1:40 Oops. Somebody lost it in a gybe.

2:00 Radial going faster than a train. No. Really!

2:15 Lonely sailor capsizes. Where has everybody else gone?

2:34 I know that guy. What is he messing about at? You are supposed to have the long pointy thing aiming at the sky.

2:40 Oh dear! That mast looks a little bit broken.

2:57 What's the dude with the radio saying? Is it, "Mayday. Mayday. Mayday"?

3:00 Laser sailors hanging out on a beach. What are they up to? Sunbathing?

3:22 This is my favorite bit. Radial sailor in the water holding his Laser near some cliffs with huge waves trying to smash him and his boat into the rocks. I wonder what is he going to do for his next trick?



Damn. Now I've posted this, none of my friends will want to come to the Gorge with me next year.

Reaching Finishes

Today we have a guest post from Susie Pegel. She does a pretty good of introducing herself at the start of her post, but by way of further introduction check out my 2009 post Susie Pegel - A REAL Laser Sailor and her 2012 opinion piece on Trapezoid Courses.

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I've sailed/raced a Laser since 1971. In that time I have sailed/raced my Laser throughout the U.S., Canada (with the exception of Alberta and British Columbia) and in Europe (Kiel Week). I have sailed locally, in district championships (I was 1984 District 19 champion), national, continental (I was 1980 Laser North American champion) and world championships (1979 IYRU Women's Worlds and 2009 Laser Masters Worlds).

I have sailed my Laser in drifters, winds gusting to 48 mph, flat seas, big waves, no current, strong current. I have raced my Laser against world champions and Olympic gold medalists. I have sailed my Laser on small ponds and the open ocean. I have raced in regattas with a handful of boats and regattas with more than 200 boats.

During my Laser career I have experienced W-L courses, triangle courses, trapezoid courses. I have experienced upwind finishes, reaching finishes, downwind finishes. I have experienced good race committees and race management, and horrible race committees and race management. I have experienced good and accurate recording of race finishes and scoring, and complete disasters regarding the same.

In other words, I have seen it all and experienced it all first-hand.

I know the challenges of handling a Laser in a variety of conditions, negotiating it around a variety of race courses and across a variety of finish lines. And trust me when I say this, the best way to go is an upwind finish preferably at the top of the race course.

It is the fairest for the sailors from a tactical and strategic standpoint and boathandling standpoint. It is the easiest for the race committee, setting a finish line of a correct length for the number of boats and conditions, a finish line square to the wind with no "favored" end of the line.

It is the easiest for the scorers. An RC person can sight the line from the line flag to the other end of the finish line (the RC boat theoretically sitting perpendicular to the finish line) with scorers right there to record the finishes, able to easily see the sail numbers of the Lasers that are sailing 45 degrees to the true wind.

Anything other than an upwind finish (preferably at the top of the race course) opens up a can of worms for the sailors, race committee and scorers.

When it comes to a "reaching" finish, I don't care how long it's been done, I don't care how many times it's been done, that doesn't make it the fairest for the sailors or the easiest for the RC or scorers.

The scenario for a Laser race with a "reaching" finish: The race goes along pretty much as normal, people sailing their Lasers close-hauled and tacking, not too difficult in a variety of wind, wave and current conditions. Then comes the downwind leg. Depending on the wind, wave and current conditions, some people may not even be able to survive the downwind leg not to mention jibing their Laser.

Now comes the last "leeward" mark that must be negotiated before the "reach" to the finish. Now your entire race is going to depend on being "inside" at that mark and executing the perfect jibe with nobody screwing you up. You have to be able to do this even in big waves, big current and howling winds. If you are not inside at this mark, executing the perfect jibe and nobody screwing you up, your race is over, you are going to lose huge numbers of boats.

So OK, now everyone who has gotten down there eventually jibes (with varying degrees of success) and now must sail that short "reach" leg to the finish line. Again, you have a variety of wind conditions (gusts to 40 mph, if you think I'm kidding you haven't been to too many Laser regattas), possibility of big waves (3-4 feet), and maybe even current as well. Some people will get in luffing matches, sailing higher and higher and now having to dive dead downwind to get back to the finish line. Some people will sail "straight" to the finish line. Some people will initially sail low to get away from boats to windward and then try to cross the finish line at a "hot" angle. From a sailor's standpoint, you have to make the transition from having just sailed downwind to now sailing on a reach. You have to readjust your outhaul tension, cunningham tension and vang tension for this last short "reach" leg. Not to mention your mainsheet. If you end up going dead downwind back to the finish line, your sail will be out accordingly. If on a beam reach, a different situation. If on a close reach, a different situation again.

There's no way the people calling and recording the finishes can see everyone's sail numbers correctly, not to mention the huge amount of overlapped boats, everyone sailing at different angles and different rates of speed. My experience has been that the finish line is usually set way too long and there is definitely a favored end. And some poor RC person who is supposed to be sighting the finish line from what is now the bow of the RC boat (since the RC boat is parallel to the finish line) has no idea what is going on as the Lasers go screaming by.

It also poses a problem for the sailors attempting to finish at the RC boat end of the line, how close can they get to the RC boat without hitting it with their boom OR EVEN WORSE how far out is the RC boat's anchor line and how close can I get to the RC boat without getting hung up on the anchor line?

What about the people who are supposed to be recording the finishes? Again they can't accurately see the sail numbers with everyone sailing at different angles, at different rates of speed, and often overlapped. (Don't forget the RC boat is parallel to the finish line) The RC just ends up guessing who beat who, and sail numbers are inaccurately recorded and some boats missed entirely.

I'm saying this all from first-hand experience at Laser regattas over the years. And did I mention some people will come around that last "leeward" mark and not jibe at all? They will just lay off and attempt to sail by-the-lee to and across the finish line. Anyone who is familiar with Laser racing knows that this is a real possibility depending on how the RC has set that finish line.

In my opinion, people who think a reaching finish is a good idea fall into one of these categories:
a) they have never sailed Lasers
b) they have never sailed Lasers in a variety of wind, wave and current conditions
c) they have never raced Lasers in a big fleet
d) they have never raced Lasers against good competition or seen Laser sailing done by experts
e) they have never been on a race committee
f) they have never attempted to record finishes at a Laser regatta, especially a Laser regatta attended by good to expert Laser sailors

In my opinion, it is also a courtesy to the sailors to give them that downwind sailing time back to the starting area to give them time to rest, drink some water and have a snack.

Also, the idea of "wouldn't it be nice if the RC could just sit in the same spot all day long" --WRONG!! Any respectable race committee is constantly adjusting the starting line for each race to take into account shifting winds and constantly adjusting the course to take into account shifting winds, sometimes during the race itself. If the RC is too lazy to do this, they shouldn't be race committee.

Just some food for thought. Now granted this only comes from someone with 42 years experience in the Laser class, people may have other opinions on the subject.

Susie Pegel

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So there you have it. One very experienced Laser sailor's opinion.

Please feel free to agree, disagree, debate, discuss, offer solutions, suggest more problems, misunderstand, or change the subject (as per usual) in the comments.

Here is a picture of me about to cross the line in a reaching finish at Cabarete in 2012.

Tillerman

Mommy Boats - What Real People Say

In polite society it's called "regatta coaching."

Most ordinary sailors refer to the phenomenon as "Mommy Boats."

Whatever you call it, there is no doubt that at major regattas in certain classes, especially Lasers, it has become commonplace for some sailors to have people driving around in powerboats in order to provide those sailors with such services as carrying their snacks and drinks and spare clothes, towing them to and from the course, and even providing them with advice on how to sail better in the regatta. Not only is this grossly unfair to the sailors who don't have Mommy Boats, the drivers of the Mommy Boats often behave very badly, getting in the way of the other sailors and interfering with the racing.

I've been ranting on about the evils of Mommy Boats on this blog for almost six years now.

But more recently it's not just this crazy old geezer Laser sailor who has been drawing attention to the problems caused by Mommy Boats and arguing that they need to be better controlled or banned altogether. Real people who are actually respected in the sailing world, real people who actually have some authority are also speaking out.



At the Miami Olympic Classes Regatta in 2011, Gary Jobson (at that time President of US Sailing) took to the air in a helicopter and observed Mommy Boat drivers behaving badly.

A group of Mommy Boat drivers (Jobson diplomatically calls them coaches) would take off to one side of the course and create waves that would "dramatically affect" the boats on that side of the course. Gary was bothered seeing how the waves from the bad Mommy Boats would cause the racing sailboats to lose distance and speed as they pitched through the waves.

A few days later Terry Bischoff wrote an excellent piece on this topic on Scuttlebutt. (See second item headed PUSSES AND WUSSES.) In the article Terry describes his philosophy of banning parents and coaches from the course in junior regattas, and explains the reasons for his thinking. He also added...

"If you need a coach to help you at your Championship, I don't think you're ready to sail in it! One more layer of cost to a struggling program. What's happened to self initiative?"

At Sail Melbourne in 2012, the inconsiderate and dangerous behavior of Mommy Boat drivers came to the attention of the International Jury who reported...

"When starting in the afternoon on Charlie Course the Laser Standard class and their coach boats caused problems by going through 2 course areas whilst earlier fleets were still racing. The jury were requested by the Charlie Race Officer to assist in clearing the boats, especially near the inner loop gate.  

This was done but numerous competitors were intransigent and the jury were moving close to one Laser when a fast moving coach boat came towards the jury boat and Laser. The driver had to make an immediate fast turn to port to avoid a collision which would have ended in damage. In doing so, the other judge who was sitting on the sponson talking to the competitor ended up in the water under the hull. The driver responded very quickly in turning off the engine preventing serious injury."

And in Scuttlebutt today, professional sailor and sailmaker Dave Ullman reveals his feeling about professional coaching during regattas...

 "When a regatta gets inundated with coaches and support boats, the result is a divisive environment of haves and have nots. For all types of racing short of the grand prix level, the emphasis should be on fostering a community atmosphere. I am not even sure there is enough value in event coaching to outweigh the expense."

You see?

It's not just me.

Real people who know something about sailing, real leaders in our sport, people who are respected see the problems that Mommy Boats cause.

So when are we going to do something about it?


Related Posts
Mommy Boats
Ban Mommy Boats NOW
One Hundred Mommy Boats
Fairness

Scoring Experiment

I see that at the ISAF World Cup racing in Miami this week, the organizers are experimenting with a slightly different scoring system for the Laser and Laser Radial Classes. The winner of each race is given a zero score - instead of one point. All other places are unchanged, i.e. 2nd place boat gets 2 points, 3rd place gets 3 points and so on.

I can only guess that the reason is to give a "bonus" to the sailor who actually wins each race?

Back in the day when I first started racing, the standard system was to give the winner of each race three-quarters of a point. This functioned as a sort of a tie-breaker because, for example, a first and a third place would be a better score (by a quarter of a point) than two second places. Although I think the current tie-breaker system is mathematically equivalent in all realistic scenarios I can imagine.

Any idea why it was decided to experiment in this way?

What do you think of it?

Trapezoid Courses

It's very common at major sailing regattas these days to have trapezoid courses. The above diagrams should make it clear what trapezoid courses are. If you don't even understand the diagrams then you will probably sympathize even more with the views expressed in the guest post below by Susie Pegel - a REAL Laser sailor.



Not too long ago, Torben Grael wrote a commentary saying that a lot of things invented in recent years "by some clever person" to change the ways things are done in modern sailboat racing, new course configurations, new ways of scoring races, etc. are essentially a bunch of B.S. They have not changed things for the better.

Being the old-school type of person I am, I had to agree with him. I think Torben currently has a daughter sailing women's 470 for Brazil, so I'm sure he is seeing the way things are run these days and comparing them to the way things used to be during his sailing campaigns.

The trapezoid is a classic example.

Whatever "clever person" (as Torben would say) invented the trapezoid
a) has never had to set a trapezoid
b) has never had to try to adjust a trapezoid
c) has never had to sail a trapezoid
d) has never had to score a race run on a trapezoid or
e) all of the above.

It takes a small army of people to set a trapezoid. If the wind shifts, it is impossible to adjust a trapezoid.

The trapezoid changes the nature of the sport and race itself, since you spend most of the race reaching and going downwind and very little time sailing upwind. I guess finishing at the top of the beat has become a thing of the past.

I can tell you from personal experience (Laser championships held in recent years at Hyannis and Buffalo) that the various "fleets" still get all tangled up together on the trapezoid, making the race almost impossible to score since you now have to untangle not only who beat who across the finish line, but what "fleet" they were in.

At Hyannis, at least the 4.7s were on a separate race course. But the Radials and full-rigs were on the same trapezoid, and I know from personal experience that one full-rig group ended up tangled up with another full-rig group.

At Buffalo, the full-rigs, Radials and 4.7s were all on the same trapezoid (the 4.7s had a shorter beat). I know from personal experience that one full-rig group ended up tangled up with another full-rig group.

Result: I think at both Hyannis and Buffalo the sailors were frustrated, the locals trying to run the regatta were frustrated, everyone was frustrated.

I think the Laser class should do a follow-up with the host club asking them what they think should be done to improve the running of a Laser class championship regatta. I'm sure they would have plenty of ideas based on their own experiences trying to do it.

Just having separate courses would improve the quality of the racing for the competitors and make life simpler for those trying to run the regatta.

Since we all seem to be into "surveys" these days, here is a unique idea: instead of surveying the people AT the Laser Masters Worlds what they like about it (which is probably everything otherwise they wouldn't be there), how about surveying people who AREN'T at the Laser Masters Worlds what they don't like about it that is keeping them from coming.

If the Laser Masters Worlds is in North America, I would like to see it made not as time-consuming as possible and not as expensive as possible so as many North American sailors as possible feel they can participate without going bankrupt in the process.

Just because "some clever person" invented all these ideas of how modern sailboat races should be run, doesn't mean they are good ideas. "Some clever person" also thought the stand-your-ground law was a good idea too. Some of these things need to be revisited and an honest assessment made of just how wonderful they are.

 --Susie Pegel

Thought for the Day

“All life is an experiment.

The more experiments you make the better.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Long Tack

Laser sailors sail the long tack first.

Well, the smart ones do anyway. It's conventional racing advice, something to do with maximizing your chance of gains and minimizing your chance of losses based on probability theory, non-Euclidean geometry, and the collected wisdom of Stuart Walker, Paul Elvstrom and some guy who I met in a bar in Sydney. I never quite understood the logic but I guess it makes sense to keep the pointy end aiming more or less where you want to go (the windward mark) instead of further away from it.

The first day of BBR last weekend was very frustrating. I blew the first race due to sheer incompetence. See Plan. You stupid boy!

Then we hung around for a few hours as the wind died and shifted around pretty much all points of the compass. I did drop hints to the race committee from time to time that instead of drifting around aimlessly in Buzzards bay we could be ashore boosting the bar revenues of Beverly Yacht Club, or that maybe they could order us some pizza... but they wisely ignored me.

Eventually a lightish breeze settled in just west of south and they got the Vanguard 15s started. Just before our start the breeze went left by about 40 degrees and I confidently expected the start to be postponed... but I was wrong. The starting signal sounded, the whole fleet flopped on to port tack (we could barely lay the line on starboard) and we were off.

Hmmm. Well this was pretty clearly one of those "long tack" situations so I stayed on port. I guess the wind did square up a bit to the original direction but it still seemed to me that I was pointing closer to the mark on port tack. Plus it looked like more pressure ahead on the right while the boats on the left seemed to be in even worse air than us. And so it was that about ten of us (out of a fleet of nearly fifty) kept going and going and going to Cornersville.

Not long after we tacked on to starboard a tad below the layline a huge righty shift came in and we could reach in to the mark. Woo hoo, top ten at the first mark at BBR. The guys coming in from the left on a huge header didn't look like they were shouting, "Woo hoo!"

The wind eventually went so far right that the "run" was now a close reach. There seemed to be a lot of confusion down at the leeward gate. The Radials hadn't started yet and some were drifting around near the gate. There were some horns sounding. I couldn't see what flag was flying. Had the RC abandoned the race? It would not be surprising if they had.

But no. We were still racing and the RC was signalling a change of course to a new windward mark, roughly in the same direction as it was for the morning race. Somehow on the "run" and on the final beat I dropped a few places but I still finished comfortably in the top twenty, with what would turn out to be my best finish of the regatta.

If I had been a PHRF sailor I would probably have gone to Sailing Anarchy and written some long abusive post about the supposed sins of the Race Committee. But, thank god, I am not one of those mean, angry dudes. I am a laid-back easy-going Laser sailor. I assumed that our Race Committee felt that completing two races on a day when the winds weren't very cooperative was better for the sailors that only doing one race and blowing off the second one in a vain search for perfection. Thank you Race Committee. Good call.

Laser sailors, "Sail the long tack first!"

R/C Assist

Check out the latest iPhone app for sailors. R/C Assist is a tool for race committees which provides complete countdown timer functionality for several of the most common starting sequences used in sailboat racing. It allows your iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPad to start the races completely with sounds broadcast through an amplifier, or to help your race committee time start sequences and use the proper flags and sound symbols at the correct time. See the support page for full details.

You may remember that back in 2008 I nominated the ubiquitous Ollie Box starting system as the Best Sailing Innovation Ever. I wonder if R/C Assist will be as successful. It's certainly a lot cheaper at $4.99.

Check it out. And by the way the creator of this nifty little tool is B.J. Porter who writes the sailing blog Sail Evenstar.

Bad Races or No Races?

A frustrating day and a good question...

Today was one of those frustrating days for sailboat racing. For the competitors... and for the race committee I suspect. First of all there was drizzle and no wind. Then a light northerly set in. We launched. We sailed one race.

Then the wind died. And shifted to eastish. And went patchy. And more shifty. We waited around. After an hour and a half or so the RC sent us in to the shore. It was a long slow sail to the shore. Eventually most of us were towed in.

After a short stay on shore, the RC told us to launch again. Another long slow sail out to the course. By now the wind was from the south but still very light.

One start. A general recall. Eventually the second race started around 4pm under a black flag. There was a right shift but we completed the race. Afterwards there was pizza. And beer I heard, but I never found the beer.

Just one of those days. But during the long wait after the first race, one of my friends made a very interesting (at least to me) comment...

It's always tough for a race officer to make the call as to whether to race in marginal conditions such as we had to today. Is it better to give the the competitors a bad race or no race? A bad race would be one in light shifty winds, with big holes in the wind around the course, unpredictable shifts and puffs, a total crap shoot, one of those races where you just know that some of the good sailors are going to be at the back of the fleet, and some bozo like me is going to be in the top five (woo hoo). That's what it would have been like if we had held some more races in that long wait in the middle of the day.

Of course it depends to an extent on the event. If it's the Olympic Trials, absolutely you want good fair races in reliable winds. There's too much at stake to race in "bad" conditions. But if it's just Wednesday night club racing then maybe most sailors would prefer to get some races, even if the winds are fluky, patchy and unpredictable.

Today was somewhere between those two extremes. New England Laser Masters Championships. A big deal for some guys. For most of the fleet probably their only chance to sail this week.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not blaming the race officer. He is the best in the world. Literally. Last month he was PRO at the Olympics. Today he gave us two pretty decent races in the best winds that were available all day.

But my friend's comment made me think. During the long wait in crappy winds after the first race he said, "Tonight I'd rather be pissing and moaning over a beer and pizza about how unfair the second race was, than pissing and moaning about how we never even got a second race in."

What do you think. Is it better to have a "bad" race than not to race at all?

Mallory Cup

Oops, I missed yet another story written for our Learning Experiences project, Lessons Learned from the Mallory Championships at Elephant Butte, where Pat reflects on lessons learned from running a men's championship elimination regatta.

Pat asks, "How many things do you think can go wrong in a sailboat race? More than you, as a competitor, might think. And, if we're really, really lucky, some of the mistakes may be small enough that competitors never realize they happened."

Also posted on Desert Sea - New Mexico Sailing are some pictures, a race summary, and lots of data.

Wanted: Good News

So here I am, trying to redress the balance after several posts I wrote whining about race committees and regatta organizers, deciding yesterday to be more positive and letting the world know of a story about how Malletts Bay Boat Club was able to post the results of the 2007 Laser US Nationals so quickly...

When some dude called Brian leaves a comment telling me about all the problems at the self-same regatta and letting all the air out of my balloon of optimism and positivity. Apparently Brian had to walk an eighth of a mile every day, and failed to make the time limit in one race, and suffered other gross indignities such as having to look at a sign saying "Member Parking Only"...

Well, I have to admit that dude Brian has the jump on me because he actually sailed in the regatta and actually has some hard facts, while I have just been soaking up the propaganda promulgated on the web by the regatta organizers. But even so...

I refuse to be brought down by dude Brian's negativity. I demand to hear good news about race committees and regatta organizers. So please tell me...

What was the best example you have seen this year of excellence in race management?

Which regatta organizers did a superb job in your view?

What regatta did you sail this year where you left thinking, "These folk just know how to run a regatta properly. I will be back."?

Give me some good news. I insist.

Bad News Good News

Captain JP asked a great question today: Are bad posts good?

His point is that the most popular post on his blog recently was about his Worst Ever Race. Apparently people love to read about others' misfortunes. I've had a similar experience. No -- I never tried racing a triple-reefed Topper in a Force 2 wind. What I mean is that on this blog too, the most widely read recent post was the one where I was whining about the Uncrustables in a regatta lunch. Folk apparently love a good negative story, especially if it bashes some poor, overworked, volunteer regatta-organizer.

I guess we shouldn't be too surprised. Check out your major newspaper or TV news program. It's the bad news that makes the headlines. And the talk shows are full of politicians rubbishing the performance of your country's selfless, dedicated, masterly government leaders.

I've done a lot of whining about regatta organizers and race committees lately. I do feel guilty about writing so much negative stuff. My only excuses are that I do also write about my own screw-ups in various capacities, and one can only hope that talking about other people's mistakes will make us all better sailors, race committee staff, sailing club leaders, sailing instructors, or purveyors of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for hungry sailors. No. Scrub that last one.

So to change to a more positive tone, let's give credit to a race committee that knows how to do things right. Check out the account of how Malletts Bay Boat Club managed to record the finishes of the 2007 US Laser Nationals accurately and post them so quickly to the web. It's a story of attention to detail, superb organization and planning, practice, well-designed processes, delegation, intelligent use of technology, and commitment to excellence.

Congratulations to Malletts Bay. Other RCs please note. It can be done.

We Have The Technology

There's been some whining in some quarters recently about the ability or willingness of organizers of major regattas to post results and news about their events on-line in a prompt manner. (Not here of course. I never whine about regatta organizers.)

So let's give kudos (and smarties and M&Ms too) to Malletts Bay Boat Club, host of the 2007 US Laser Nationals who have someone on the finish boat posting live updates about action on the water today and who by 2pm had already posted some of the results of today's races while other races are still going on.

Way to go Malletts Bay.

Dear Race Committee

Dear Race Committee,

Thanks for giving up your free time to run this regatta for us. I appreciate that you are all volunteers, would probably rather be sailing yourself, and that some of you may be relatively new to the sport and have been invited to make up the numbers on the RC boat so you can see what racing is all about.

Having said all that (and I do appreciate you, I really do, and I have been in your shoes many times) could I please offer a few suggestions...

1. If the sailing instructions say that the first warning signal will be at 11am, and the winds are steady, and there has been no postponement on shore, and all the competitors can easily sail to the course by that time... please, please, please be on station at 11am, have the marks in the water, and be ready to start a race. There is nothing more frustrating for us racers than to get up early on a Saturday morning, drive several hours to the regatta site, rig our boats, spend an hour sailing out to the course... and then have to sit around for another hour while you get yourselves organized.

2. You've been watching the America's Cup on TV haven't you? You saw how Peter 'Luigi' Reggio waited each day for the perfect wind, and adjusted the course and start line for every little windshift... and now you want to be just like Luigi?

Please don't. This is not the America's Cup. Luigi only had to run one race a day, and even if he didn't run a race today there was always tomorrow. For us there is no tomorrow. This is a one day regatta. We want as many races as possible. Please don't futz around for 40 minutes moving the course marks for every 5 degree wind shift. We don't care. We just want to go racing. In any case the chances are that the wind will shift some more by the time you position all the marks exactly where you want them, so forget about it. If the line and course are more or less right, then start the sequence and let's race.

3. Have you ever thought that the most important thing about the visual signals you make is that the sailors can see them? So if the fleet is going off upwind after the start and you want to signal a general recall, please don't ask the smallest person on your team to stand on the stern of the RC boat with a general recall flag that's totally obscured from the racers by the cabin on your boat. I know you're getting frustrated when it takes such a long time for all the fleet to come back to the start line after every recall. Have you stopped to wonder why?

4. And while we're talking about how you assign tasks to the members of your team, what were you thinking when you selected the guy to read the sail numbers at the finish line? Has he seen an optician lately? Or did he forget to bring his spectacles?

Here's a clue that he may not be the best man for the job: you find that a significant percentage of the numbers that he called don't match to any of the numbers of the sailors registered for the regatta, and on the other hand you end up with a bunch of sailors who are entered who apparently didn't finish some of the races at random even though you didn't spot anyone leaving the course or ducking out of any race.

5. We like to hear from you. If you are about to do something unusual then do us the courtesy of using that loudhailer that you have on the RC boat. For example if you signalled a two-lap course and then after a couple of recalls and postponements, you change your mind and decide to give us a one-lap course then please, please, please make sure we all know about it.

Don't just ask one of your team to erase surreptitiously the numeral 2 on the course board and expect us all to spot the change. Some of us are not that smart and have other things on our minds like "which end of the line should I start this time" or "will my wonky tiller extension universal hold together for one more race" or "do I have time to have a pee before the next start". We're not all mind readers. Please hail and let us know you've changed the course.


I think that's all for now. Thanks for being on race committee. I appreciate all your efforts. I really do.

Class Act

Our group writing project on worst race-committee screw-ups revealed some amazing tales of staggering ineptitude, conceit, foolishness and even intoxication. Why is that some of us who are probably highly successful in our careers as well as being excellent racing sailors suddenly become blithering idiots as soon as we step on to a race committee boat? Who knows?

On the other hand there are some extremely competent race committees and regatta organizers out there. One place that I can always rely on to run a professional event is the Hyannis YC, host of the Laser North Americans a couple of weeks ago. I've sailed several other major events there before, so with Peter Johns as regatta chairman and Tom Duggan as Principal Race Officer I had high hopes for a superb weekend of well-run sailing.

Thursday was a frustrating day with no racing because of high winds. I talked about this day in Waiting Game and discussed some issues relating to such days in Are You Experienced? There was some grumbling in some quarters about the decision not to race but personally I'm sure Duggan made the right call. Certainly I would not have taken 200 Laserites of varying abilities a couple of miles offshore in those conditions, no matter how many Mommy Boats were there to support me.

So the qualification series was cut to one day and we had an awesome day of racing on Friday with the best conditions one could hope for, and with the Hyannis YC race committee doing their usual top-notch professional job enabling us to complete the maximum allowed three races on that day.

The results of the qualification series weren't posted at the club when I left around 7pm that evening. Not that I cared. I knew that my scores were "good" enough to qualify me to sail in the silver fleet for the rest of the regatta. And I wasn't wrong. When I arrived at the club on Saturday morning and all the sailors clustered around the noticeboard to check the scores I had to squat down on the floor to find my name way, way, way down near the bottom of the list.

But wait. What's this? Some sailors are complaining about the scores. There appears to be a major problem. Some sailors who thought that they were at the front of the fleet haven't made the cut for the gold fleet. The committee is busy handing out forms and various sailors file their complaints. A postponement is signalled. A notice is put on the board explaining that some scores are in error. And we wait.

The problem is that we can't go sailing until the scores are corrected. Today we are going to be split into gold and silver fleets and it would certainly be unfair to put a genuine contender for the North American Championship into the silver fleet along with bozos like me. So we wait. And wait.

The breeze fills in to a juicy 10-12 knots and we all want to go sailing. A rumor goes around the boat park that the Standard Rig scores are now correct but they're still working on the Radials. More grumbling. Harsh words are spoken about the competence of the race committee. We wait and wait as the morning drifts by with the postponement flag still fluttering in the breeze.

But what else can the race committee do? Mistakes will happen when you are running a major regatta. Humans err. Equipment malfunctions. Anchors drag. Software fails (apparently what happened here). The measure of a good race committee is that they recognize when there is a problem and then go ahead and correct it as quickly as humanly possible. If you make an error in a starting sequence, blow off that start and do it again. If you signal the course wrongly and half the fleet goes the wrong way, abandon that race and start it again. Many of the stories told by contributors to the Top Race Committee Screw-ups last week are about race committees who were so ignorant or oblivious that they didn't even know they had made a mistake.

So what did they do at Hyannis? They corrected all the incorrect scores and re-posted a list of who had qualified for the gold and silver fleets. I checked the list again to make sure. Hmmm. I went up two places. How did that happen? In any case my name was still only a few inches of the floor and I was comfortably in the silver fleet.

We eventually hit the water around 11:30am if I recall correctly. Out on the racecourse the race committee had a tough time with shifty winds and a strong upwind current leading to many postponements and recalls. But they persevered and pulled off three fair races for the Standard Rigs. We were back at the club around 6pm so no real harm was done by the scoring screw-up.

At the regatta dinner that night one of the organizers apologised to all the sailors for the problems with scoring that morning. I was impressed. Having spent a good chunk of my professional life running an IT service organization I've been in that guy's shoes more times than I care to recall. Computers have glitches. Stuff happens. Real world activity has to be delayed while the IT guys clear up the mess. And the IT manager has to go to the users and apologise whether there was anything he could have done to prevent the problem or not.

Hats off to Peter Johns, Tom Duggan and all the volunteers who did a magnificent job in running the 2007 Laser North Americans. You guys are a class act. I will be back.

How to Run Sailboat Races

OK -- it's time to wrap up the group writing project on Top Race Committee Screw-ups. Thanks to all who participated. There were some truly awful stories of incompetence, arrogance, ignorance and stupidity of the highest order. It's good to see that the fine tradition of abysmal race management is alive and well at the grass-roots level. After all as my friend and occasional guest blogger Joe always says, "If a thing's worth doing, it's worth doing badly."

Here is the complete list of entries.

The RC is Always Right from M Squared.

Miller Genuine Draft by Carol Anne from Five O'Clock Somewhere.

No Foul by jsw225.

Sex Change Operation

T E A S by Chris Jordan.

April Folly.

Joe would be proud of you all.

Race Committee Mistakes

Four responses so far to my request for stories of race committee mistakes. Still plenty of time to add your stories to the list. Full details of how to participate at Top Race Committee Screw-ups.

The RC is Always Right from M Squared.

Miller Genuine Draft by Carol Anne from Five O'Clock Somewhere.

No Foul by jsw225.

Sex Change Operation by me.

There must be more stories. Keep 'em coming.

Miller Genuine Draft

Response by Carol Anne of Five O'Clock Somewhere to my request for stories of Race Committee Screw-ups (originally written as a comment and reposted here so I can link to it).

There was the time a committee boat was a big boat with a little anchor, and the wind was stiff, the the boat dragged its anchor way downwind between the start and the finish of a race, while the guy on the committee boat didn't notice anything wrong. By the end of the race, the committee boat was a half-mile from the pin, and because of the stiff winds, there were enough waves on the lake that the pin was invisible to boats trying to finish the race. They just all sailed toward the committee boat, and passed the committee boat based on the relative position that the boat and the pin had had at the beginning of the race. The race committee guy's comment at the end of the day: "I didn't realize that the pin was drifting so much."

Then there have been guys who decide to run something other than a strict upwind-downwind course, which are what the sailors are used to and which are supposed to provide more tactical competition -- reaching legs, in general, aren't good tests of tactics or seamanship. In particular, there was one guy who called a Harry Morgan course (two triangles and an upwind-downwind final lap) on an extremely light-air day. Some of the slower boats in the fleet would have been out past sunset, except that they all quit.

Then there was the mostly cruising sailor who clocked the finish when the last part of the boat cleared the line, rather than the first -- he was another one who called triangular courses rather than strictly upwind-downwind. His decisions were strongly influenced by Miller Genuine Draft.