A little followup, in case folks are interested. I put this together
for our club’s Racing Committee…
I thought I had this all correct, until I got the US Sailing link I
forwarded in my previous e-mail.
Apologies to Colin for hijacking his mailing list with Rule
Interpretation, and not Sailwave questions. 
Regards,
Patrick
SUMMARY
OF THE QUESTION
···
Does the late entry of a boat in a series impact the DNC calculation of
races
sailed prior_to the date it registers for the series?
FACTS
----------
Per RRS Appendix A, Section 9:
RACE SCORES IN A SERIES LONGER THAN A REGATTA
For a series that is held over a period of time longer than a regatta,
a boat that came to the starting area but did not start, did not finish,
retired after finishing or was disqualified shall be scored points for
the
finishing place one more than the number of boats that came to the
starting area. A boat that did not
come to
the starting area shall be
scored points for the finishing
place one
more than the number of
boats entered in the series.
Per BHYC SI’s:
3.1 In order to be scored in any Club race, a boat must be
owned/chartered by
a BHYC member and must be registered on a 2006 Race Entry Form, filed
at least 24 hours prior to that race.
Race Entry Forms are available at the
Club bar and should be delivered there, addressed to the Rear
Commodore of Sail.
10.2 A boat shall declare the
class in which
she intends to compete before
the start of each series.
Thereafter she may
change only upon written
request and subsequent written
consent of the
Rear Commodore-Sail.
Such a request will only be granted
once
within a series. Any such
change will not take effect until
24 hours
after the written request is
received. All races prior to the
change in
class will be discarded from all
series results including class
champion.
A notice of the approved
change of class will be posted on the Sailing Notice Board before 1200
hrs on the day it is to take effect.
INTERPRETATIONS
------------------------------
Per RRS A9, the scoring of DNC will be “Fleet + 1”.
Example: If 9 boats are entered in the series, a boat not competing in
a race
shall be scored 10 points for that race.
The interpretation of A9 is simple, IF the number of boats entered in
the
series does not change throughout the series. If 9 boats register at
the
beginning of the series (and are thus “entered in the series”), and
no new boats register throughout the series, then the DNC value for all
races
would be 10, regardless of whether or not all 9 boats race in the
series.
If 9 boats register at the beginning of the series, several races are
sailed,
and a 10th boat then registers for that series, it is clear that the
DNC value
used for all races from that point forward would be 10+1 = 11. But
what
of the races sailed before that date? Should the DNC value be 9+1, or
10+1?
Our SI’s permit a boat to “change divisions”, or register for a
series late. This is “non-standard”, and is not explicitly
covered by the RRS. A9 certainly doesn’t explicitly state how to deal
with late entries as they relate to DNC’s. Our SI’s permit late
entries, but do not make any consideration for how they impact a
series.
In light of this ambiguity, I attempted to make the most accurate
interpretation of the rules I could. In this case, I took some advice
from a 3rd party, and looked closely at the grammar of A9. The first
sentence is clearly written in the context of a specific race. Here is
some clarification on what I mean:
“a boat that came to the starting area but did not start, did not
finish,
retired after finishing or was disqualified shall be scored points for
the
finishing place one more than the number of boats that came to the
starting area”
It is clear that this sentence is meant to be applied at the time of a
specific
race. For example, a boat can’t “start”, “finish”, or
“retire” in the context of a series. Therefore, this must apply
to the time of a race. The next part of the paragraph does not
indicate a
change of tense:
"A boat that did not come to the
starting area shall be
scored points for the finishing
place one
more than the number of
boats entered in the series."
Thus, I believe that this sentence could be written as follows:
"A boat that did not come to the
starting area shall be scored points for the finishing place one more
than the
number of boats entered in the series at the time the race was sailed."
I concluded that the A9 sentence has the exact same meaning as this
second
sentence. THIS is the conclusion which is at the heart of the debate,
and
is the issue that we have to collectively make a decision on.
IMPACT
------------
The impact of all of this is actually significant.
Cracker Jack was brought to the club mid-way through the season, and
registered
for FS2 in time for the Aug 10th race. The decision above determines
what
value is used for the DNC of the other boats in FS2 for all races PRIOR
to Aug
10th.
Prior to Aug 10th, there were 12 boats registered for FS2. For the Aug
10th race, there were 13. I used a DNC value of 12+1 for all races
prior
to Aug 10th, and those results are posted on the club web site: http://www.bhyc.on.ca/club_racing/thursdays_2006/final.html.
You will note that with DNC=13, both Heart Breaker, and Whisper II have
22
points. Appendix A8.1 breaks the tie in favour of Heart Breaker.
If DNC = 14 (to include Cracker Jack in the races prior to Aug 10th),
Heart
Breaker would have 23 points, and Whisper II would have 22, thus,
Whisper II
would take 1st place.
My apologies for the long-winded e-mail. I hope that I have accurately
described the situation, and given an un-biased view of the facts.
Obviously, there is potential ambiguity in the rules, and this has the
potential to cause some concern for those impacted. Thus, it is
improper
for me to decide this matter unilaterally, and therefore, I solicit
your
feedback, and discussion.
Regards,
Patrick