Handicaps and how much difference they make...

Originally posted by RS400atC Originally posted by JimC .....Its a problem that I am sure just about every class (handicap or boat on boat) in just about every club in the country is struggling with: how, in these days where people have so many competing demands on their time, can we make it easier for as many people as possible to start enough races to genuinely compete in a series? .......   It's a problem, but most of the participants really don't seem to care much about competing in the series, they are happy to go sailing when they can and enjoy the odd good result. Even the people winning the series may be more driven by personal goals such as finishing more races without capsize, tactical blunder or breakage, or just achieving a better level of competence in their boat.   If people don't want to be racing regardless of where the spreadsheet puts them, we have a bigger problem than the vagaries of the PY system.

Shorter series would help. Twelve or 18 race series are daft for a club event. Another thing that bugs me is the lack of structure to the season, especially at inland clubs that don't have a break. It just seems to go on and on, with little difference from week to week. Some way of differentiating between events would allow you to prioritise which ones to have a good go at.

Originally posted by Peaky Shorter series would help. Twelve or 18 race series are daft for a club event.

I dunno: if you have a short series on consecutive weeks is it any easier to turn up to (say) half the races than a longer series?

I keep meaning to do some number crunching on our club turnouts to see if there's any evidence that fewer or more people turn out for the weekends when its a special series rather than when its standard class starts.

Assuming most people can't make every week, I wonder if its easier for them to do every week for a few weeks, or say first sunday of the month etc. But I need to do the number crunching and see what really happens.

I've never really trusted what sailors *say/think* they want after listening to a class AGM voting for 6 races a day back to back at a champs, and the next year seeing half of them scooting back to the beach for a lunch break or skipping the last race of the day whenever they had the opportunity...

Years ago I used to care what the series was at the club. These days, with Junior group eating into some sundays, the odd open into others, back problems meaning missing others and family commitmentsgetting in the way too, I really don't care what the races I can do belong to, I'm just happy (or frustrated, depending on the weather) to be out there.