Hi Jon,
I’m attempting to address the issues with the current TLE scoring method. I’m wondering if we could implement a scoring code method where the score is based on the points of the last boat to finish and not receive a letter score, plus n points.
I understand that I could manually calculate this for each race, but I’m hoping to avoid that.
Hi Peter,
I’ll have a look and see what I can do.
Currently scoring at the RS 30th Anniversary Event
Jon
Hi Peter,
The key bit of course is ‘the last boat to finish’, i.e meet definition of finishing in RRS, within the time limit. However, the formatting can already configured so that only the points show.
Personally, I would like code showing so that it highlights that a competitor has not met finishing definition.
I presume because of the RRS definition of finishing, a boat given TLE is not considered to have finished?
The impact of having a TLE code needs to be considered for long series racing RRS Appendix A A5.3. Would it be fair that a boat could be be finished under TLE procedure but be scored more points than boat recorded DNF, RET, OCS, UFD?
Have I missed something in my understanding?
Kind regards,
Huw
Hi Huw,
It’s clear that I didn’t explain it correctly and we would never use it for long series.
Let assume we had a race with the following results:
Boat | Result | Comment | Posted score |
- | - | - | - |
A | 1 | | 1 |
B | 2 | | 2 |
C | 3 | | 3 |
D | 4 | | 4 |
E | RET | did meet the definition of finish ( retired after finishing) | 11 RET |
F | DSQ | did meet the definition of finish | 11 DSQ |
G | RDG | 2nd place redress awarded | 2 RDG |
H | UFD | did meet the definition of finish | 11 UFD |
I | UFD | did not meet the definition of finish | 11 UFD |
K | TLE | | 5 TLE |
In the above example, a TLE score would be 1 point more than the points of the last boat that finished and didn’t receive a “letter” score.
I am attempting to avoid the Race Committee having to track whether certain “letter” score results meet the definition of Finish or not and to avoid having two scoring codes for those “letter” score definitions (e.g., an UFD code for boats that met the finish definition and an UFD code for those that didn’t meet the finish definition).
I am aiming to use TLE, but not with the current World Sailing suggested instruction, which has a major flaw and adds more requirements for the Race Committee.
The current WS suggested instruction:
The Finishing Window is the time for boats to finish after the first boat sails the course and finishes. Boats failing to finish within the Finishing Window, and not subsequently retiring, penalized or given redress, will be scored Time Limit Expired (TLE) without a hearing. A boat scored TLE shall be scored points for the finishing place [one][two] more than the points scored by the last boat that finished within the Finishing Window. This changes RRS 35, A5.1, A5.2 and A10.
Let assume that boat H was the last boat to finish within the window. With the above instruction, Boat H would receive 11 + 1 or 2 points, which is not the intended outcome.
I did submit a WS Q&A over one year ago regarding this, but I have not received an answer as of today.
Peter
Peter,
If boat H was scored UFD, i.e. infringed rule 30.3, doesn’t that mean that she failed to Start, thus can’t be considered to be a finisher?
Hi Peter,
I agree you might not use TLE for a long series but there could be clubs who would want to 
Kind regards,
Huw
Malcolm,
There have been discussions regarding this in the past, but I’ll explain it for boat H in a UFD scenario.
For a boat to be a finisher, she has to meet the definition of “Finish” and she needs to meet the definition of "Start" because it is part of the definition of Finish.
In my example:
Sent a replacement!!
Formatting seems to have been totally messed up – RESEND
Some general and specific comments:
I tend to think time limits in general are a BAD policy. The usual
argument for the policy is “to allow additional races to be run” but in
my experience the boats that end up getting cut off are usually sailing
as fast as they can toward the finishing line anyway so there is no real
time gained for an additional start by having a time limit.
The obvious exception is when the wind completely dies and no more boats
are ever going to finish within any reasonable time. In some places that
might happen fairly often but in others (like where I race) it will be
very rare. I think a good RC will recognize when a dying wind “scr**s” a
significant portion of the fleet and will abandon the race as allowed by
RRS 32.1(d). That makes the TLE problem go away.
You probably want the TLE score to relate to all the boats that
“competed” in the race. You know a boat “competed” when she sails around
the course and crosses the finishing line. Pre-2021, all boats that
crossed the finishing line from the course side had “finished” and so
were finishers. The 2021-24 RRS caused a problem by saying you cannot
“finish” unless you “started” correctly. That will change on January 1,
2025 when “after starting” will be changed to “after her starting
signal” in the Definition: Finish. So, it should be possible to go back
to using “finishers” for calculating a TLE score. We’ll have to wait
until World Sailing releases the text of the new rulebook to the public.
If you want to have a special score for TLE I’d suggest “2 more than the
number of boats crossing the finishing line.” Why not “1 more than …”?
– a boat that recognizes what is happening and is the last boat likely
to finish before a time limit will get the same score whether or not she
actually crosses the finishing line (as last finisher or last finisher
before her plus one). You don’t really want that, you want boats to
continue racing up until the time limit and so “2 more than …” gives a
boat an incentive to improve her score by one point by continuing to
race until the time limit. Of course, you could give a bigger incentive
by using a number greater than 2.
IMHO World Sailing really messed up the concept of “finishing” in the
current rulebook. The new 2025-28 rulebook is expected to fix that but
we won’t know that for certain until the final text of the new rulebook
is released on July 1, 2024.
Art
