D-Zero

Originally posted by rich96 Its always a shame to lose a customer but perhaps a silver lining in this case ? Could be wrong but I'm sure we could all imagine the negative posts about the boat within a number of weeks when those pesky Solos and Streakers are still winning at the lake ?

Do you see posts about pesky Solos and Streakers winning each week as it is? You might get the odd tale of woe, but you still don't get it do you? If you're improving which I like to think i am, it's a slow process these days, you need goals and beating a Streaker in particular, not the duffer, this guy is good is a target not yet attained, not even off 1060 against 1174, which they've given me and I don't like that eithr, but they have,I guess it gets spat out of that other computerised bollox system. I want to sail a boat to its proper handicap, that is my goal. So the handicap being attainable is part of any purchasing decision for me. To be honest according to the stats it's around Laser 8.1 territory which is raced quite competitively and I've never managed to beat either unless he falls in or something breaks and that's not a victory.

Anyway it's all academic, I'm that annoyed (as you may have noticed and in all seriousness I do probably owe y'all a bit of an apology going on so, it happens like that with me I get wound up like a watch spring) so I'm going to give it a break for a while, sailing that is, maybe do something else, you can spend only so much time butting your head against a wall, my crew is not that well, I don't really like single handing it's no different to windsurfing really and maybe this will all settle and once they get some sort of reliable handicap that I see as attainable maybe I'll return, but for now I think it's time to call it a day.

At least your Yardstick muppets will get some peace, duffers that they are, I can't tell you how incandescent that statement made me, I had to go down to the stable to kick the horses, then I realised we didn't have any so spent the afternoon burning old sails stored there.

f**k them is my last word on the matter with all due defiance, f**k them all.

Edited by iGRF - 20 Sep 14 at 5:34pm

Dan

Both of these are good ideas.  I'm not sure you really need some tame stigs for option (1).  If the manufacturer provided 2 boats that were given to a couple of competent club sailors sailing at a club with competitive handicap racing it wouldn't be too hard to calculate the pre-EN as long as you had some reference results with them sailing their normal class against the same boats.  I reckon a couple of months of results would be enough to establish a pre-EN.  You would need at least two boats at two different clubs though to cover relative performance between different classes.

Not so sure about the "IMS-style VPP" approach - tough to do that for a dinghy and tough to get enough results to cover the design space  - I'm not sure that it would end up any better than a regression analysis with a very coarse "design goodness" factor included (to reflect the difference in target markets) . . . and the regression analysis would be a lot easier to do. 

I have always thought that a published regression analysis would be a good way to go for the pre-EN.  It would be a known ("published") approach, and although designers might be able to game the rule, the existing performance based analysis that would kick in after year 1 would make that a short-lived gain. [Trouble is when Peaky did that Grf didn't like the answer ]

Whatever you do, clubs will always have the right to set whatever PNs they want for new classes.  Its up to the competitors to then decide whether they want to race under those conditions.


Edited by marke - 20 Sep 14 at 7:20pm

"RS think the Aero 9 is about 1040..." So that's where that number, 45 points above the GL number came from on the first battle of classes list then Simon..

2547 - Playing devil's advocate, the sport is fragmented between a lot of classes already - perhaps we should aim to follow a more french model of a few core classes.

For what its worth I think that the system as is works well, and I am very grateful to Chris, Bas, Jim and anyone who was worked voluntarily on it, and I believe that it has made real steps forward in the last couple of years.

I guess that re: launching a product, I had underestimated again what an emotive subject it is, and feel pretty sad to lose Graeme as a customer - it is one of the perks of designing for the boat, if not the yardstick, to have given him some pleasure.

The only way that we could do something less arbitary for new boats are:
1) Hire some independent industry professionals to sail the new boat against known benchmarks over an intensive period in the requisite full range of conditions and circumstances, and record performances. Use this as a "Pre EN" until the first year of returns come back when a proper number can be used.
2) Run a few major representative classes (laser, fireball, N12 in vogue design) through an IMS style VPP in light, medium and strong breeze and a representative variety of courses - weight these as necessary. Then when a new class comes out, do the same and use the difference in seconds per hour against the most similar benchmark to get a "Pre EN" -  this means not moving wholesale to such a system, but gives a rigorous engineering basis for the first year until returns are back (poss longer where its a niche class and not many samples in the statistical set)

Option 1 would be like herding cats, but option 2 could be relatively do-able and modest price wise. I suggest it needs to stay the property of the RYA though.

Originally posted by SimonW99 For once I am with IGRF on this point- Originally posted by Simon Lovesey " then guess at a handicap that is worst than the benchmark class so the new design doesn't whip everyone on its first outings.    " Py is fundementally flawed as it only measures one metric, but to then say we actually give all boats a deliberately low py to start with so they don't upset anyone is just so wrong. I think Simon might want to reflect on that statement. Perhaps it's why boats like the Alto, icon etc have struggled.

For once I am with IGRF on this point-