The following is intended to assist all members’ understanding of dinghy racing handicaps

Comment on RYA Published PYs 2008

Not a lot if anything in term of numbers from 2007.

Quite a few classes have been moved down is "status" groups, those of interest to Delph:-

Comet from Primary to Secondary and Mirror

Miracle from Secondary to Recorded, and RS300, Graduate, Byte (Byte CII still Trial), Pico.

RSVision up from Trial to Recorded

RS Vareo from Recorded to Trial

New Trial RS Feva XL ( RS Feva also in Recorded might create confusion).

No PY for Solution (perhaps we need to include this in return for 2008 to support class)

Extract from the Feb Newsletter

SAILING COMMITEE

History was made the other night when the committee decided to alter the Portsmouth Yardstick (PY) rating on a number of boats in order to make the racing more competitive and give everyone a sporting chance of winning something. However, you have still got to turn up and race in order to get a prize, for a trial period the following amendments have been made to the PY;

Topper plus 5%

Miracle plus 2% making 4% over current RYA suggestion

Laser radial plus 3%

Solution plus 1%

Laser plus 1%

Phantom minus 1%

RS 300 minus 1%

The figures were agreed unanimously and will be compared and reviewed once the RYA publishes its own figures and in any case following the Wednesday Evening Handicap (A)

Why?

Few members will have read the information available from the RYA on the question on Yardstick handicaps. The extract below perhaps encapsulates the issue:-

7.2 When deciding upon which of the Sailing Instructions listed at 2 above they should use, the club should remember that the listed Portsmouth Numbers are derived from Yardstick Returns of racing on all kinds of water: sea, estuary, river and lake. The Numbers are therefore an average and thus, particularly with dinghies, may not necessarily be applicable to any one club. Accordingly, if after racing, a listed Portsmouth Number appears to be inequitable a club should not hesitate to change the Number, including Yardstick Numbers, particularly for dinghies and when racing mixed category fleets (e.g. dinghy and keelboat, keelboat and cruiser etc.).

You may have noted various communications in the yachting press about handicaps and PYs which have been responded to by the RYA referring to the information available at http://www.rya.org.uk/KnowledgeBase/technical/pys.htm

How can adjustments be made?

For the uninitiated:- essentially race results can be analysed to establish the effective handicap that each sailor sails a dinghy. This is achieved by taking the average finishing time of all and saying that this equates to a handicap of 1000. Each sailor’s time is then converted into an effective handicap that the dinghy was sailing at. These are then averaged for different classes and a class effective handicap derived called a Club Number. The fewer boats in a class the more difficult it might be to arrive at an average.

The RYA regularly complains that Clubs do not do this adjustment, and that in the requested annual returns from Clubs that they are only given another list of the advisory information they have issued.

What has the Sailing Committee done?

They have attempted to apply the principles of the RYA Yardstick scheme to handicap racing in 2008, and this has been endorsed by the General Committee.

What are the consequences of these decisions for a competitor?

Handicaps are just a way of processing race finishing times for a range of different dinghies in order to get a ranking for the race.

So there shouldn’t be any, but from experience the response to changes from the RYA advisory numbers is met with apathy, ambivalence, or outrage. Historically Delph has had Club Numbers for some classes. This year applying the recommendations, which hasn’t been done for some time, may have produced different effects to various classes.

For classes were there are a range of helm abilities sailing regularly, then an average can be arrived at and a Club Number will probably equate to RYA PY. This would appear to be the case with classes such as RS200 and Solo.

Where there is only one boat of a particular class sailing the concept of average can’t be applied and so the RYA advisory figures stand:- FevaXL, Byte CII, RS Vario, RS Vision, Pico, Graduate, etc.

For classes where some form of average can be achieved, but where they may be a bias in the helm’s ability then the application of the RYA principles is likely to result in a Club Number shifted from the RYA PY recommendations:- Topper, Miracles, Lasers, Phantom,RS300.

Where there is no recommended number then the Yardstick Scheme insists some Trial number should be established, if there are regular sailors this is easier to achieve:- Solution.

Tony Cropper

PRO Delph SC

March 2008