park run...

I dunno I can think of a lot of sports and pastimes that have multiple clubs in small areas. It's mainly a function of facilities.

I do think it would be good to dream up a racing format that was better suited to irregular turnouts than series racing is. The days when a significant percentage of a club fleet could make enough races to have a crack at a series prize are gone at most clubs. Unfortunately so far I've failed to think of anything

Edited by NickA - 31 Dec 18 at 6:09pm

Originally posted by NickA Don't think I understand the difference bdtween a "Park Run" race and a series race, if you just choose to treat every series race as an individual event. All but two (I think) of our club races are grouped in series; but I for one treat every race as a "Park Run"; hardly ever look at the series results and was suprised to get a prize in the post this year. On a nice Wednesday evening we can get 50+ boats out for a race (which is also part of a series)  but a small proportion of boats qualify for any given series. It does make a mockery of prizes - as the winner is sometimes just the person who turned out most (though such people are often the best sailors and own the fastest boats too). Personal handicaps and a beer token for every race won?

I think series are the glue that hold sailing clubs together, however the length of series and number of discards have scope for tweaking.  The benefit of series are that they encourage a hardcore of regulars, therefore creating a virtuous circle for the less regular attendees, by ensuring that there are a worthwhile number of competitors to race against.

If you look at what the DCA do, there are plenty of cruises in company around. The caravan and camping boating group do meets, too. The Minisail have met at Keyhaven a few times to sail in company. In the CVRDA, winning isn't the main point, or shouldn't be. Clubs will have family weeks, or camping weekends. So, this stuff is out there, just as social running was before park run. Maybe there is a catalyst to make an umbrella organisation and popularize the image, drawing more people in.