The Case for a VPP style handicap system.

So for those who (like me until very recently)have no idea what a VPP system is, I found this on wiki I'd been basing my thoughts on the SCHRS method for Cats the general idea being that a fixed formula be used as an initial base for boats to be rated against as a performance guide.

My views on the current system is that however good it currently is and despite the hard work the boys in the back room do, it can never be all things to all people, now I also understand a pure measurement system cannot necessarily take into account the micro adjustments that can occur with certain development classes, but it can deliver on adjustments like weight, sail size, mast measurement and material and most important of all, it can put stability at the heart of the system if nothing materially alters in a boat design.

If we take the case of the Solo, Streaker or Phantom, there were physical changes in weight, construction methods and possibly even hull form (this I do not know but surmise) either way, all points that could be mathematically calculated and a variation year on year spat out of a system.

The benefit? Owners of older boats retain their original rating and only new boats get the faster (or slower) rating

The benefit for reference by the Yardstick committee would be a fixed reference point, even the original system had the Island One Design as the null point of 100 about which to pivot other craft. This to my mind is the biggest failing that has resulted from the current system which appears to revolve about itself being pretty much statistically driven and many craft get lost (My own EPS case to point)or fail to register for years (My other boat, the Alto is an example of this). The 505 another example of a boat that has changed performance but with lack of activity in the inland water arenas of mass statistic generation has remained static.

So, yes designers could vary their boats if they got to know the formala and how it worked, but hell who cares if a faster boat results, either change the formula to accomodate whatever miracle has resulted, or let things ride, there would at least be a scientific explanation rather than the smoke, mirrors and doubt that exists at present.

Dinghies have a much broader range of performance than displacement yachts imv and the weather, planing and none planing conditions, foiling and none foiling, make the task impossible anyway, but if the boat is designed to foil then the formula records at that point, similarly if the boat is a planer then the optimum performance is the point at which the craft would be rated.

Beyond that what the Yardstick system makes of it would be no better no worse than the state of affairs we currently enjoy, but at least if we had a scratch guide rating to start with, there could at least be a point of solid argument based in fact upon which to build.

Is my thinking.

So flame away and tear it to pieces..

Edited by iGRF - 20 Dec 13 at 10:39am

from other thread - why cant you add wind as a factor? its not as if its hard to measure...

then take readings at various points or automate the measurement to get a total wind flux over the length of the race and use that

sounds fair

What I had in mind, was a device, wether it were a website or a download, that you put your own measurements into, it then spits out your rating, it could be a certificate, it would quite literally be different for every boat that input it's details, so given two solos identical but for weight, they'd get a different rating.

In a perfect world, you could then apply for a personal handicap based on height, weight, experience even.

Then like golf you race off your own adjusted handicap to start with and it only varies according to your experience/results or your equipment if anything changes.

Then even One Design class racing would be fair(er).