Personal Handicap

Unlike sailing, golf is not a racing sport.

The best personal handicap is to say, last year I got a run of thirteenths and this I'm up at about number 10. Cup for best improver.

Like I say, golfers can do what the heck they want but pers'handicaps should be kept out of sailing IMHO

Why reward bad sailing and why encourage people not to train?

If people have a boat which is too physically or psychically demanding on their time then get out and find something which suits your style.

That's the beauty of sailing over golf or most any sport - you can always go buy a type of boat to suit you and become competitive no matter your age, size, challenged mobility, fitness,  and budget

You can usually get into a boat that suits, enjoy it, get up the learning curve and measure your improvement in average places, be that OD or PY. Whacky algorythms not required thank you!

i think the anti personal handicap group are missing the point.  Personal ratings are required whether it be a fleet of different boats or One Design.  There is no enjoyment going down to your sailing club and beating up people you are better than week after week.  There is no reason to improve your boat or yourself.  Set up a rating system so that you need to beat people by a larger amount each week and that motivates everyone.  There is a pecking order in most fleets as there is a wide variety of skill levels and given that I have 20+ years experience of high level competition how am I going to get a decent race at my local club with 20 active sailors unless something is done to alter the basis of competition.

Yes I could travel to open meetings, but my family do not want that.  Yes I could find a club with a better standard of competition, but that would not be so close to home.  Yes I could give up and play golf with someone good and with a handicap so that we can both enjoy some competition.

gold/silver/bronze with 20 boats?  there is hardly enough for a fleet without breaking it down anymore.  No.  Quite frankly my loft is full of hideous pieces of glassware and i dont want any more.  I do not want or need to win when it comes to club sailing.  I just want a fun competition which means that I can sail every weekend.  I want the others to enjoy it as much as I do and want to feel that they want to come back each week for more. Personal handicapping works.  The system needs to be good.  Those who are improving their handicap need to be recognised, as do those who have the hardest handicaps.

it is not about rewarding bad performance or not training.  it is about increasing participation.  anyone who wins a handicap race be it portsmouth based or personal based should appreciate that their handicap was an important factor.

BUT we don't use personal handicaps for the normal Sunday fleet and handicap racing. This is where "the best man wins", but the personal handicap races do allow a lot of: "I can beat him on a Sunday, I should be able to beat him on a Wednesday" But when you are starting 3 or 4 minutes (and 20 boats!) behind him, it makes it very hard.

"Very hard" means you have to try harder, and try different tactics, and make sure you make no mistakes, and get the inside line on all the buoys, but still be to windward on all the legs, without getting luffed out of existence etc.

It gives different racing - and the variety seems to work well and attracts many different people.