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Under 18's declarations for Club racing |
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chrisarnell1
Groupie Joined: 06 Sep 06 Online Status: Offline Posts: 89 |
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Topic: Under 18's declarations for Club racing Posted: 14 Jan 20 at 5:31pm |
Folks, wonder if you can advise here. We have parent declarations for Junior sailing activities. Covers usual stuff, acceptance of risks, photography, good behaviour etc. In the past year our Club came up with a "Dinghy entry form" that every member is supposed to sign and return before taking part in any races. We've added even more paperwork for the Junior sailors and have recently had to head off some over-zealous officers who were looking to give race officers the ability to ban under-14's from Club races if they wanted to. We've never had a serious incident involving Junior sailors in Club races but we're fighting an internal battle with a group of officers who seem to think our Juniors are in imminent danger of a safety incident or the Club being held liable. Does your club make any special provision for junior members taking part in Club races and are there any specific requirements or restrictions in place? We sail in a pretty shallow, sheltered harbour by the way. So I'd say our risks are low.
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423zero
Really should get out more Joined: 08 Jan 15 Location: United Kingdom Online Status: Offline Posts: 3406 |
Post Options Quote Reply Posted: 14 Jan 20 at 5:57pm |
I understood OOD could stop anyone sailing regardless of age ? When I am OOD I would stop someone sailing if I thought they couldn't handle conditions or they were misbehaving etc.
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Robert
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ian.r.mcdonald
Far too distracted from work Joined: 24 Feb 06 Location: United Kingdom Online Status: Offline Posts: 440 |
Post Options Quote Reply Posted: 14 Jan 20 at 6:15pm |
With the OD checking for anyone looking at their phone before racing or anyone with grey ( or no ) hair and chucking them out as a risk- it's going to be quiet on the start line.
Whatever happened to sense? |
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423zero
Really should get out more Joined: 08 Jan 15 Location: United Kingdom Online Status: Offline Posts: 3406 |
Post Options Quote Reply Posted: 14 Jan 20 at 6:35pm |
I would have thought OOD stopping people sailing was showing sense ?
OOD at my club runs the whole club for the day, that's from organizing races to galley and locking up at end of day, including all logs filled in etc. |
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Robert
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ian.r.mcdonald
Far too distracted from work Joined: 24 Feb 06 Location: United Kingdom Online Status: Offline Posts: 440 |
Post Options Quote Reply Posted: 14 Jan 20 at 6:49pm |
I am there with you. But any stopping should be based on looking at someones competence rather than just an arbitrary link to age
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Noah
Really should get out more Joined: 29 Dec 04 Location: United Kingdom Online Status: Offline Posts: 611 |
Post Options Quote Reply Posted: 14 Jan 20 at 7:36pm |
Every club and event that I have been involved with makes it clear that it is the sailor’s responsibility to decide whether it is safe to sail or not. What qualifications does an OOD have to make that call? On e.g. a water company reservoir, there may be stipulations about safety cover, in which case if the OOD doesn’t deploy the safety boats then racing cannot go ahead, but it’s a brave man who does that inland. Underpowered boats (420, Cadet) can cope with a lot more than a 49er. On the sea I would take advice from the RNLI cox or a joint crew decision.
It’s all about personal responsibility, not being TOLD what I can and cannot do.
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Nick
D-Zero 316 |
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Brass
Really should get out more Joined: 24 Mar 08 Location: Australia Online Status: Offline Posts: 1146 |
Post Options Quote Reply Posted: 14 Jan 20 at 7:39pm |
Chris, and others,
It looks like you are looking for advice about proportionate responses to some perceived safety and social behaviour issues. For that you have come to the wrong place, this is the Racing Rules forum. For advice about safety management and social control, I suggest you look to the RYA, perhaps starting with this page https://www.rya.org.uk/knowledge-advice/safety-mangement/Pages/hub.aspx and including discussions with you local RYA reps. FWIW, my experience is that extravagant, excessively risk averse responses are usually promoted by people who haven't done a proper risk analysis, but are just scare-mongering. Do your risk assessment and safety planning as the RYA recommend and this should come up with the right answers. The 'rules' answer to your questions are. Firstly, the Racing Rules of Sailing have gone to a lot of trouble to protect Organising Authorities and Race Officials from liability by means of rule 4
Your club is quite right to recognise that this is not absolute and that juniors may be legally incapable of taking this responsibility and parents need to be involved. Race Officials have no authority under the Racing Rules of Sailing to prevent a boat (and its crew) from competing in an event for which it's entry has been accepted. Rule 76.1 provides that a boat's entry may be rejected or cancelled, or a competitor may be excluded, but only if this is done before the first race of a series. After a boat's entry has been accepted and the first race, the only way a competitor, boat owner or support person may be excluded from an event is by a decision of a protest committee following a formal hearing under rule 69 Misconduct. An OOD can't cherry-pick among competitors and choose who to ban and who to allow to race. Just for starters, as Noah has said, what confidence would you have that a rostered OOD would be competent to assess the competence and capability of any competitor? It's certainly not within the competencies required of a Race Officer. If there was genuine concern about levels of competence, (which is probably more appropriate to higher risk environments, like open sea dinghy racing) then I might suggest that you could institute graded fleets or divisions, like Opti Gold, Silver and Green Fleets, then the RO could abandon racing for selected divisions in adverse conditions.
Edited by Brass - 14 Jan 20 at 7:46pm |
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chrisarnell1
Groupie Joined: 06 Sep 06 Online Status: Offline Posts: 89 |
Post Options Quote Reply Posted: 14 Jan 20 at 7:40pm |
We stopped short of giving R.O authority to stop someone racing, thank goodness. Causes problems with RRS 4 and RRS 76.1 if you try to do this and could be grounds for redress. Advising someone of the conditions and suggesting maybe don't go afloat seems like good common sense. We also have an SI that allows race committee to tell a competitor to accept help, retire or go ashore if in difficulty. I was mostly wondering if you've put in anything specific to junior sailors sailing in mixed fleets (i.e with adults)
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chrisarnell1
Groupie Joined: 06 Sep 06 Online Status: Offline Posts: 89 |
Post Options Quote Reply Posted: 14 Jan 20 at 7:53pm |
Thank you, Brass. A very considered and comprehensive reply. I decided to post the question here because, like you, I was sure the Club was encroaching into a minefield with RRS 4 & 76 in particular. Given that it's not unusual for under 18's to require a parental declaration of some sort before taking part in events, I wondered what other clubs were doing. Agree with your view that splitting fleets into Gold / Silver etc gives the R.O flexibility to cancel racing for less experienced sailors without having to make a judgement call that could look like discrimination. Until recently we just scribbled our boat names and sail numbers on a sheet of paper and went sailing. Seems like the good old days are well and truly over!
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JimC
Really should get out more Joined: 17 May 04 Location: United Kingdom Online Status: Offline Posts: 6649 |
Post Options Quote Reply Posted: 14 Jan 20 at 8:09pm |
The RYA has a competent legal team and devotes a lot of effort to these sorts of issues. They're always ready to help out affiliated clubs, and I believe see that as one of their major responsibilities. Talk to your RYA rep.
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