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Posts: 750 		Post Options Post Options   Quote H2 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Topic: GB Sailing Challenge - still confused
    Posted: 26 Nov 18 at 1:53pm
But lets face it lads - even if "handicap racing" could get dressed up and metaphorically give you a blow job you would still turn your nose up at her anyway so I am not surprised that she is not getting your vote. We know you like fleet race, we know you feel you are right, none of us care enough to argue.

So assuming that in this parallel universe of weird people that do find handicap racing fun - why not at least test out a different way to do it? Seems worth a pop to me!
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Posts: 2538 		Post Options Post Options   Quote turnturtle Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26 Nov 18 at 1:45pm
Originally posted by mozzy

No one is talking about Draycote specifically. Most here will have done their fair share of handicap and fleet racing, including mass participation handicap events. Certainly enough to have a well informed opinion on whether that format is worthwhile rolling out to a summer circuit.  


Precisely - and when such a format is being presented as the future of dinghy sailing, or certainly given an artificial level of gravitas behind the veil of data manipulation, I’m afraid a ‘dinghy development’ forum might well find a few people a little cynical about it.   

I guess my concern is that if dinghy sailing is pushed down this avenue, then we are set to lose even more of its past romance.  We form emotional attachments to boats. We give them names.   Those of us geeky enough have even give them genders based on the Northern or Southern Hemisphere design lineage.   I’m sure mine is not the only wife to compare the boat(s) in our lives to another woman in more heated discussions, and it’s not like I’ve been one of those guys disappearing to the shed to build or restore it for hours at a time. 
   
Personally I think we’d be better loosely grouping up into slow, medium and fast fleets and racing for line honours if we don’t intend to race properly anyway.  It would provide more meaning at the finish line and critically, throughout the activity.  I don’t actually think this degrades the racing experience over handicap racing, especially if we really are saying that every dog will have its day anyway.  I doubt for one minute it would turn dinghy sailing into an arms race - everyone’s too skint thesedays or too fecking tight when it comes to expenditure on boats.  The 90’s spate of chucking a 10-15k boat on the mortgage and barely noticing it monthly is finished.  As for channelling student finance into the coffers of Topper & Lasers’s asymmetric programme, that’s well and truly over.... certainly in the UK where most early adopters have known classes boom and bust leaving you either out of pocket, or permanently on the hunt for something new and different.  

The other major flaw in the plan is that I’m of the opinion there’s going to be a reasonably large bite-back on this data driven society we find ourselves in.  Sailing could well feature in that counter culture as what it offer - boat and nature - can be quite a cathartic break from the daily grind.  Leave eSports to the gamers, the thought that every race will turn into a GPS tracked dataset leaves me very cold.    

Data has become the norm in everyday life.  I know when asking Alexa to play a generic Amazon ‘adult alternative’ playlist a data bond will form.  This becomes a monetised value chain from me in my smart-enabled home to an artist I couldn’t even name via a large tech company and a record label taking the lion shares of the proceeds.  Ultimately I don’t really care that the ‘romance’ of buying an album of a band I follow has been lost in this process.... there are positives and negatives and I’m not a rediscoverer of vinyl like some people I know.  

However do we all really, really want sailing to go down this route where winners and losers are sorted by algorithm?  It won’t affect the ends of the fleet - the best will still be the best; the guy that capsizes five times but just about gets over the finish is still better than the chap who sailed in after the first lap.  But data granularity will affect the middles of the fleet - this is where the true battleground is, especially when you consider the top of most handicap events are industry participants and sponsored sailors anyway.  The middle is where true critical mass lies - e.g. the future and the viability of sailing as a sport.  These are where the historic bones of contention around handicapping boats stem from- we know this from experience, Merlin Rockets and Phantoms more recently - both very middle-of-the-road-ish options.  

I really don’t think pissing around with the numbers, making it even more complex to digest, is really a solution.  If anything, I think it’s even more of a turn-off for taking part if that’s all that’s on offer.  It certainly makes me even more contrite that bashing Lasers and other club boats which still offer decent club fleets was a totally poor choice of action in the past.  Irrespective at least there are still two decent clubs near my UK base offering fleet racing- even if it is in Lasers.  I hope it lasts for the foreseeable future .....        


Edited by turnturtle - 26 Nov 18 at 1:50pm
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Post Options Post Options   Quote Guests Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26 Nov 18 at 12:06pm
No one is talking about Draycote specifically. Most here will have done their fair share of handicap and fleet racing, including mass participation handicap events. Certainly enough to have a well informed opinion on whether that format is worthwhile rolling out to a summer circuit.  

Originally posted by H2

Try it, you just might enjoy it (and you might also find out you are not quite as good as you thought you were)
As it happens this year I've had the exact opposite experience with handicap events. It would be nice to conclude I'm a lot better than I ever thought I was. But thankfully for everyone I do enough class racing to keep my ego in check! 
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Posts: 2538 		Post Options Post Options   Quote turnturtle Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26 Nov 18 at 11:45am
Originally posted by mozzy


I do have a feeling that the success of the sail-juice series draws partly from the drop in participation at a local level and it's expansion to the summer months, whilst seen as good for the series, might be a bad indicator for the sport. 


Eloquently put!
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Posts: 750 		Post Options Post Options   Quote H2 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26 Nov 18 at 11:18am
Quick question - how many of the people on here were actually at Draycote? I only ask because I was and it was great fun sailing in a fleet of 100+ boats with everything from a foiling moth through to a Topper. I enjoyed beating a number of Blaze's over the water and being totally killed by the Aero Bandits as well as sailing against 7 other H2s who made it out on the water.

I suspect that many on here love complaining about the sport that the majority enjoy every weekend - its called handicap racing. Try it, you just might enjoy it (and you might also find out you are not quite as good as you thought you were)
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Posts: 3401 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Sam.Spoons Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26 Nov 18 at 11:04am
Originally posted by getafix



Bottom line, for me, is go sailing in a boat you enjoy, at a venue you like and suits your preferences and with people you like having a chat with in the boat park, bar and on the water.  People measuring rake and shouting rules can have their day, good luck to them, but I can't help thinking they are missing out on one of lifes' great pleasures;.. a good, relatively relaxing* day's sailing in good company.

BTW, PY will never be perfect, accept that and move on, while retaining the option to have a good 'debate' in the bar aferwards about boats, bandits and go-faster bimbles.

*as I like high performance dinghies so a good bit of exercise is part of it for me

Totally agree with this  Thumbs Up and, when the wind favours your chosen class you might just squeeze into the choccies is a bonus.
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Post Options Post Options   Quote Guests Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26 Nov 18 at 10:38am
Originally posted by JimC

That's the point though. If class racing was genuinely valued then once you got a fleet to a critical mass the brakes would be off and more and more people would pile in.

I often think this too. But, ultimately, a lot of club racing is just getting round the course in a decent shape. Adding the cut and thrust of fleet racing isn't doing loads for these participants. 

Once people are committed enough to be travelling several hours to race, then there also likely to value the sporting element a bit more. 

Plus order is a lot easier to disrupt than it is to create. Most people who leave a fleet are doing so in the hope others will follow. Not because they don't value fleet racing per-see, but they want to do it in a different class. New classes aren't a bad thing, as long as they're pulling in participants, rather than dividing those already at the club (same could be said at a national level). But it takes good leadership and compromises to achieve that balance. 
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Post Options Post Options   Quote Guests Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26 Nov 18 at 10:18am
Making the handicaps more accurate is missing the point that they are more accurately measuring an unfair comparison. At the end of the day, you're comparing how far above or below the average for their class each sailor is, then extrapolating out. Also, the more dynamic and intangible the handicapping system is, the less faith many will have in it, regardless of accuracy.   

If having a bit of fun, even if it's based on a flawed concept, for the sake of encouraging participation is you're aim, then a decent bit of error is expected and is part of what makes it so throwaway and carefree. 

But... there is so much more depth to the 'game' of fleet racing which makes the sport fantastic for me. Personally, I'm unlikely to ever commit much time to going to handicap event (I might for the social). 

I do have a feeling that the success of the sail-juice series draws partly from the drop in participation at a local level and it's expansion to the summer months, whilst seen as good for the series, might be a bad indicator for the sport. 
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Posts: 2143 		Post Options Post Options   Quote getafix Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26 Nov 18 at 9:05am
Originally posted by turnturtle

I agree totally on your last point, but wonder whether this quasi science with staitistics really is the right solution, after all numbers continue to decline and PY has been the club racing firm favourite for several decades now. Secondly, deep down, most of us know that if you want proper competition and some genuine progression, you need to put the miles in in a sensible class which at least vaguely suits our demographic, fitness level and body weight - how else can we explain the popularity of the Supernova?

Our local leisure centres are rammed with people doing fitness classes. Local five a side leagues are thriving. There are heards of mamils out every Sunday clogging our roads- and good luck to them. None of these community sports programmes even try to handicap their players- yet two which do, golf and sailing, are two which seem to definitely be the wrong side of a boom and bust model. I don’t think it’s solely down to handicap racing, but It can’t always be helping.

As I've said before, I think the emphasis on winning PY races is the downfall of all but a very few (usually the same people year on year) who go to a sailing club with winning as the sole determining factor on whether they enjoy their day or not.  There are shedloads more cyclists enjoying spinning along with mates or alone than there are entering club TT's and there are millions more gym members doing classes than there are entrants in competitive events.  The point? have FUN, you don't get much time to enjoy your leisure these days with time pressures from family, travelling, 24/7 shopping and the 'joy' of work finding you via your phone, in office hours or not.

Bottom line, for me, is go sailing in a boat you enjoy, at a venue you like and suits your preferences and with people you like having a chat with in the boat park, bar and on the water.  People measuring rake and shouting rules can have their day, good luck to them, but I can't help thinking they are missing out on one of lifes' great pleasures;.. a good, relatively relaxing* day's sailing in good company.

BTW, PY will never be perfect, accept that and move on, while retaining the option to have a good 'debate' in the bar aferwards about boats, bandits and go-faster bimbles.

*as I like high performance dinghies so a good bit of exercise is part of it for me


Edited by getafix - 26 Nov 18 at 9:08am
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Posts: 2538 		Post Options Post Options   Quote turnturtle Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26 Nov 18 at 8:46am
I agree totally on your last point, but wonder whether this quasi science with staitistics really is the right solution, after all numbers continue to decline and PY has been the club racing firm favourite for several decades now. Secondly, deep down, most of us know that if you want proper competition and some genuine progression, you need to put the miles in in a sensible class which at least vaguely suits our demographic, fitness level and body weight - how else can we explain the popularity of the Supernova?

Our local leisure centres are rammed with people doing fitness classes. Local five a side leagues are thriving. There are heards of mamils out every Sunday clogging our roads- and good luck to them. None of these community sports programmes even try to handicap their players- yet two which do, golf and sailing, are two which seem to definitely be the wrong side of a boom and bust model. I don’t think it’s solely down to handicap racing, but It can’t always be helping.
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