Class Racing v Handicap Racing compare & discu

Further to that RYA document which surfaced on the handicap thread, what actually is the state of play at your club, I've never experienced any sizeable class racing at either of my local clubs in the ten years I've been around and even if there were I wouldn't want it and certainly don't like the idea of the National Authority ramming it down our throat.

So a straw poll along with this to see just how prevalent it actually is at club level and I think to be fair class racing should have a minimum of what 6 boats of the same class to really constitute a class?

Edited by iGRF - 13 Jan 15 at 9:00pm

Calling it the offending document isn't very balanced - I've been a member at clubs with class racing in the past, and it can produce both good racing and a good atmosphere. It can also produce small fleets and an atmosphere where the classes don't talk to each other.

I looked at the title of this thread and thought "oh no not again boooooring"

I think we really only have one class that I would say has proper class racing and that is the Solo. However I do hear complaints from owners of older Solos that the new Solos are so much faster that even that fleet is split. Not to mention that if you then took out the over 60s from the mix you really wouldn't have much of a class left.

Lasers do get there own class start, but I hardly ever see more than 5 boats, mostly 2 or 3.

All the rest is handicap racing with groupings of boats having good boat on boat battles eg. RS300, Phantoms, Blaze and EPS at the fast end and RS200s, Albacores and Nat 12s in the middle.

We do have our first Aero at the club so it would be good if some critical mass was built around that - alas too small for me.

Well it was meant as much to asses the situation as it currently stands. My impression is that as is often the case the good folk at the RYA have not a clue as to what is actually going on in the real world and whereas it might be a fine ideal to wish, instruct or insist that as clubs class racing is given precedence when the reality of the modern day is that the trend is going in the opposite direction.

Perhaps if the classes on offer were to be more interesting, nothing I'd like more than a bunch of say Alto's or Icons, but GP14's? Merlins? 2000's? eugh!

And anything else requires getting into bed with RS, Ovington or whatever SMOD outfit is still in play, then that plays into the monopoly pricing game.