RS aero

I note Nessa has a wooden solo for sale for a reasonable buck.....   but hey, hybrid has a green credential, and I can of course thoroughly bypass the fact that it's been shipped from Japan and the carbon load freight has to bare...

You will turn in to a wood botherer next......

I dunno- I ordered my new car today, it's got a hybrid engine; that's surely up there for sandal-wearing, carrot crunching, eco botherer brownie points?  

So, Chris, I'd agree that switching hulls for those of a completely different design is not on, and I'd also agree that upgrading to a carbon mast is OK, even if it is chequebook racing to some extent.

For me switching rigs in a Laser/Aero is also acceptable chequebook racing (probably as cheap as a carbon mast), for you it isn't, which appears to put rig switching in a sort of grey zone between the two extremes.  Which makes it unsurprising that some clubs allow it and others do not, and will continue to do so.

As I said earlier, we warned the Lasers that if their rig-switching led to them cleaning up, we would review the situation, but that doesn't look set to happen for one reason or another as explored above.  If the Aero also fails to clean up, I suspect rig-switching will be widely tolerated for that too.  So if you buy one, budget for two or three rigs!

re "I don't really see where this attitude ends"; I have the same problem in reverse, because I can't see where the "it's OK to change stuff" attitude ends either. Would it end when you had to have a full quiver of boats (or at least rigs) to win a hotly-contested PY series; you know, a Rater for light winds that are fading, a British Moth for light winds that are increasing, a Phantom for light winds with chop, all the way to a high-wind quiver consisting of a Contender, course slalom windsurfer, Opti and Cherub.

It'd be fun in lots of ways, but scarcely equitable. And IMHO the Laser sailor who does something similar by switching from Rooster 8.1 to Radial would have so much advantage over their one-rig competitors of similar standard that it would simply not be worth turning up to race them. I'm currently in the battle for my club's Laser title, where all three rigs are scored together under PY. If any one of the other contenders started switching rigs they would almost certainly win, which destroys the whole sporting contest IMHO.

There seems to be a significant difference between a Phant sailor who gets a new mast and an Aero sailor who switches sail sizes - one is carrying out a change within class rules, the other is changing classes entirely.

I can see the point of saying "just let people sail what they want", but it does seem that the opposing point of view is also reasonable. And my "don't let them change" position may be weakened by the fact that I reckon beginners should be allowed to change down rigs, which could be unfair to beginners who don't have small rigs, but IMHO that's just an extension of the normal practice of making rules stricter as the level of competition increases.