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DiscoBall View Drop Down
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Posts: 305 		Post Options Post Options   Quote DiscoBall Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Topic: Simple Racing Rules
    Posted: 21 Aug 15 at 7:28pm
Similar to that Chris -  I've been doing some kayak racing for the last couple of years. 

There are no 'when boats meet' type rules and, when the governing body tried to instigate some simple rules a while back, there was a strong attitude of 'we don't need no rules'.

It works fine at local level, where the vibe is very positive.  There's still a bit of confusion at marks due to there not being any defined priority, but any issues are usually resolved by apologies all round.

However, at higher level, it does (unsurprisingly) descend into a game of intimidation.  With problems of shouting, swearing and pushing and suchlike aggro.

Sailing does have similar problems. Arguably, it's as much to do with many sport's excessive focus on 'serious' competition, leading to a loss of perspective by those competing.  But at least the rules and associated protest system give you some comeback and control of bad behaviour, imperfect though they are.
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Chris 249 View Drop Down
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Posts: 2041 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Chris 249 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 20 Aug 15 at 2:45am
There's one form of "no rules" sail racing - pro slalom windsurfers.  They dropped the rules a few years ago due to too many "legalistic protests".

However;

1- they do very short races with just 8 competitors per heat;
2- the speeds are extremely high (500m speed record for slalom boards is about 44 knots IIRC) and therefore in a completely different dimension to dinghies;
3- they 'perform' in front of judges, who can inflict penalties for dangerous sailing - which seems as arbitrary as any protest.
4- the judges say "no rules implies you you have a different attitude on the course and have big b)lls and go for it" to compete.  They admit it might change when someone gets injured badly - not exactly what we want at a local club;
5- it's accepted that if someone "goes for it" and causes a crash, the other party will just have to deal with it.  "Sometimes it's unfair, but that's the way it goes."
5- there seems to be a fair bit of biff and aggro;
6- the equipment is less expensive to fix and these pros don't pay for it anyway, unlike most dinghy racers;
7- even a former world champ says that anyone who hits him too often will get "a payback" - not really what most of us want to get into in a dinghy club.

See the vid at   

http://www.surfertoday.com/windsurfing/12081-slalom-windsurfing-the-no-rules-rule-is-excitingly-dangerous

It shows some very angry people from 2:40-ish 2.50-ish.  Around 6:10 there's a dangerous high speed collision that led to the guy who got hit trying to punch his opponent out (around 7:30), and the closing credits show silly barging and aggro pushing, shoving and grabbing.

It doesn't look like fun to me.  Nor can I recall anything similar incidents when I was in slalom racing under ISAF rules, against some of the same pros.
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Chris 249 View Drop Down
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Posts: 2041 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Chris 249 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 20 Aug 15 at 2:18am
Originally posted by JohnJack

Originally posted by Chris 249

Originally posted by JohnJack

 I think the rules need to look at overtaking down wind. 
We are in Championship Season so all along the southcoast as we speak there is someone in the midfleet rounding the windward mark and stuffing high on the reach with a gaggle of faster boats trying to get over them.
Happens allot in Handicap racing as well. We struggle on our lake when with the kite up and trying to overtake slower Mono rigged boats they stuff us up well above the course to the next mark.
Once there is sufficient overlap the lower boat shouldn't be allowed to point further up

The rules should just be changed so the overtaking boats with their big rigs have to keep well above the slower boats. Tongue   Nothing worse than some *&^%$%$ coming past 2" to windward, blanketing you terribly, and then whining when you try to fend them off.  If they want an easy overtaking move then they should just go by two or three lengths to windward.

In some hot one design fleets I know it's accepted that when the fast guys are coming through on the reach after a bad first reach, they either go way up or way down, because no matter what class, anyone trying to come just to windward of a boat on the reach is going to get luffed.

If you are faster, stay clear!  I may add that our quickest bit of kit is the fastest or second fastest out of the 150 or so active racing boats in our city, and my slowest being a Radial which is one of the slower classes, so this POV is from someone who sees two sides of the story.

Obviously you have never sailed on a small lake where you don't have that much room.
It would make small lake sailing far less processional and a bit more interesting 

The normal course on our current lake can take us 9 minutes per lap, and we share it with several classes of dinghies and about 20-30 small racing yachts; that's a pretty small waterway for a 20' cat. The other club fits a fleet of 10-13 dinghies as long and fast as FDs on the same waterway.  Our old club had a 120m wide pinch point through which we had to tack a fleet of singlehanders that are as fast and manouevrable as an International Canoe, in a total fleet that could easily consist of 70 dinghies and boards.  Those are not huge waterways.

It wouldn't be very interesting for the sailors of slower boats if they were not allowed to avoid getting rolled by faster boats just to windward and being blanketed each time. While I'm not one for luffing duels, it is damn annoying when people come just to windward and slow you down and then get annoyed when you indicate that they could easily have gone just a bit further to windward and caused less hassle.

Faster boats normally have more options, including the option of going underneath the slower boats ahead.  For some reason some of them seem to think that it's unthinkable for them to be slowed by being to leeward of boats, but it's fine for other boats to be slowed by being to leeward of them.
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Presuming Ed View Drop Down
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Posts: 641 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Presuming Ed Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Aug 15 at 7:32pm
Like Bermuda fitted dinghy rules. AIUI, no port/starboard. If you can't cross (on either tack), hail & both boats must tack. Probably only works in small fleets. 
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Posts: 8956 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Rupert Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Aug 15 at 7:22pm
Are we looking at this all wrong again? Even the 7 rules are based on the same concepts as the RRS, using colregs as a starting point.

Why should port give way? Or even exist? Stupid, having words that only sailors really understand, and not even all of them? Why should one particular boat have to move? Easier to say that the boat that has to turn less gets out of the way. Windward leeward? Again, stupid, inaccessible terms. The boat that has to move less gets out of the way. No contact? Of course not. The boat that has to move less gets out of the way. The boats can't decide who has to move less? Simple. All the boats have been chipped. The computer tells you which, no need for judgement. Same at marks. Again "marks" "buoys" stupid, inaccessible words. We have corner markers. If the computer says you can go round first, you do.

That should keep things simple.
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Posts: 6662 		Post Options Post Options   Quote JimC Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Aug 15 at 4:58pm
Originally posted by Wobble

[...and I have been surprised at the looseness of the process, both in terms of procedure, fact-finding and decision-making rationale. 


Arguably that's because most club PCs don't get enough practice to learn how to do the job properly, and are also almost invariably under time pressure.

I ran what I think was our clubs first ever arbitration hearing last week (a few hours after posting zero in the how many protest poll!!), and although I'm pretty confident I had the right answer when I reflected on it the next day I came back with a whole list of ways that I could have done it better. Some of them were mutually contradictory of course!

Originally posted by sargesail


I'd add to that the tendency for subsequent, conscious or unconscious shaping of the rules aspect of the incident so as to be in the right, by both parties.

Mmm, never, never, never underestimate the power of wishful thinking and self deception...

Edited by JimC - 19 Aug 15 at 5:01pm
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Posts: 1459 		Post Options Post Options   Quote sargesail Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Aug 15 at 4:46pm
Originally posted by Presuming Ed

Originally posted by Wobble

 aim to achieve as clear as possible a code that is not subject to the vagaries of individual protest outcomes.

So are you saying that, for instance, room required at a leeward mark be precisely defined as no closer than, say, half a boat length. At which point, pond-based Firefly sailors think you're an idiot for needing positively acres of space, while big boat sailors at sea are cursing you because you seem intent on insisting that they wrap their toy around very large and very very rusty bits of steel, bouncing around a lot in big waves. 

Originally posted by Wobble

 Surely anyone who has been in a protest room can see how arbitrary the process is in practice?

I would argue vehemently that a properly conducted protest hearing is the very opposite of arbitrary. If you don't want a self policing sport - and AFAIAA, all these proposals are still based on a self policing sport process, then the option isn't new rules, but on the water umpiring or (next stage) refereeing. Good luck with getting club sailors to pay for that. 

Well said P Ed.
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Posts: 44 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Wobble Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Aug 15 at 4:07pm
Originally posted by Chris 249

Wobbler, can you give us an example of this code that can simply and easily cover all situations?

Personally I've not found the protest room to be arbitrary, but then I've only ever been inside them about three times; once as a jury member, once as a protestee and once as a protester.  On each occasion, it got down to a simple question of fact.

Then again, I don't know many of the appeals precedents either, and don't think that they really have much impact on the sport in reality.

Sorry Chriser  Wink, but that is beyond my ability. This would be a long-term collective process. 

Re arbitrary protest outcomes... I have been around perhaps 10 in a few different classes. I think most people who serve on protest committees are totally conscientious, but I have also observed that there are different agendas in the room (not least grandstanding) and I have been surprised at the looseness of the process, both in terms of procedure, fact-finding and decision-making rationale. 

And there has been at least one reference in this discussion to the purveying of porkies in the protest room, which seems to have gone unchallenged. 

I do agree that protests realistically are all we have as a mechanism for deciding individual rule disputes. But, however honourably-intentioned, they are imperfect and should not be the basis for building law that will be applied in the future.


Edited by Wobble - 19 Aug 15 at 4:09pm
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Presuming Ed View Drop Down
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Posts: 641 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Presuming Ed Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Aug 15 at 3:50pm
Originally posted by Wobble

 aim to achieve as clear as possible a code that is not subject to the vagaries of individual protest outcomes.

So are you saying that, for instance, room required at a leeward mark be precisely defined as no closer than, say, half a boat length. At which point, pond-based Firefly sailors think you're an idiot for needing positively acres of space, while big boat sailors at sea are cursing you because you seem intent on insisting that they wrap their toy around very large and very very rusty bits of steel, bouncing around a lot in big waves. 

Originally posted by Wobble

 Surely anyone who has been in a protest room can see how arbitrary the process is in practice?

I would argue vehemently that a properly conducted protest hearing is the very opposite of arbitrary. If you don't want a self policing sport - and AFAIAA, all these proposals are still based on a self policing sport process, then the option isn't new rules, but on the water umpiring or (next stage) refereeing. Good luck with getting club sailors to pay for that. 
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Posts: 1345 		Post Options Post Options   Quote davidyacht Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 Aug 15 at 2:58pm
Originally posted by JohnJack

 I think the rules need to look at overtaking down wind. 
We are in Championship Season so all along the southcoast as we speak there is someone in the midfleet rounding the windward mark and stuffing high on the reach with a gaggle of faster boats trying to get over them.
Happens allot in Handicap racing as well. We struggle on our lake when with the kite up and trying to overtake slower Mono rigged boats they stuff us up well above the course to the next mark.
Once there is sufficient overlap the lower boat shouldn't be allowed to point further up

Couldn't you have a rule where when the helmsman of the windward boat is in line with the mast of the leeward boat, he could hail something like "mast abeam" and the leeward boat then has to curtail the luff? ;.)
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