Prizes, Series and Occasional Competitors

It seems to me that a major challenge facing club racing is that so few people these days are able to get out regularly enough to get a whole series together, so club prizes tend to go to the most committed sailors rather than the best (although the two sets usually overlap considerably).

Things we've done at our club to try and deal with this include increasing the number of discards, which has its own disadvantages, and introducing a couple of 1 race per month series, where you can still get a series if you can make first Sundays of the month or third Sundays of the month.

However looking at the results it seems as if in practice people aren't able to schedule particular weekends, so it doesn't help much. So I think we, and maybe other clubs, need a new form of series competition that doesn't require people to return up regularly and rewards skill and ability. At the same time it would be good to distribute prizes as widely as possibly amongst those who deserve them, and not deliver up twenty glasses to the same hotshot.

One idea I came up with was a sort of a Champion of the day competition, where we record the person who gets the lowest score across all races each week, and then at the end of the year everyone who's got one or more Champions of the day gets a prize (one only each- don't want to be buying 52 glasses a year!). But that's got its problems too.

What else can people think of? Is there anything we can learn from other sports that works for them?

I've tried to persuade our lot (with not much success) to adopt a high scoring system, with a point for each boat beaten. "Qualifying" then become irrelevant - everyone gets a fair score based on the number of boats they beat - so no counting 157 points for the number of boats sailed in a series. 

I'm with turnturtle on this one.  Despite sailing regularly, I never have a clue where I stand in a series and just enjoy each day / race as it comes.  The real competition is at single class opens.  

I'd add I'm genuinely pleased to see the guys who turn out regularly do what they do- without them there's no way us 'part timers' would have the fun we have when we then get a chance to race. I'm certainly not flippant about that level of commitment, indeed hope to get to that point myself when the nest is empty and investments are taking care of themselves ... But hey, that's a way off and if I look to the reasons why Im not out tonight (daughters birthday) and won't be out on the last Wednesday of the month (big work commitment abroad) - I can't see how any machination of how the series will be scored could enable me to really put the standing in a sailing series above those other things, nor really care too much for my position within it come some prize giving in the autumn I'll likely as not, not attend.

Edited by turnturtle - 15 Apr 15 at 10:30pm

Less long series with qualification (max 3 consec Sundays, separate AM/PM series, 4 week break between series. In between, mix it up: regatta style one off club racing events with prizes, host open meetings, training days, match/team racing, mass club emigration to Stokes Bay/Poole Harbour, casual sailing with Treasure Hunts and stuff....Clubs need to move away from racing commitment and go for much more in the way of variety.