Ahoy Sailors,
Welcome to the new racing season and a fun change to our race program. This year we are going to introduce an August Race Series. The goal is to get more people participating in racing by having experienced racers introduce non-racers to the sport and to give crew a chance to build their skills at the helm. Prizes awarded for participation and how many new sailors you introduce to the club! (Not to worry, the regular series remains and rewards the racers.)
More people on the race course means more fun and better competition. The August Race Development Month will recruit new members, introduce cruisers to racing, and encourage crew to buy their own boat.
We get many requests from adults who want to try sailing or racing but don’t have a point of entry. This year, the club is ensuring both members and non-members have the opportunity to learn and join in the fun.
This year we are having a big recruiting effort with open house weekends to grow our membership and the August Series and Sunday chalk talks to increase racing. We need your help to make these initiatives success. It takes the entire crew to sail a tall ship ….. or to build a club. So plan who you want to invite to sail and we’ll do potlucks, after race libations and general merriment. We have a lovely, vibrant club—let’s share it.
See below for a full description of the series.
See you Sunday on the water for the first race of the season!
- Carolyn Price
August Race Development month
August 5-26
A month to develop your favorite new members racing skills. Bring out Friends, Family, Neighbors, Co-workers. Give your long time crew the helm! Scores do not count so the pressure is off- have some fun and teach!
Each race sailed will make you eligible for special August series prizes and trophies and increase your allowed throw outs for the season championship.
Objective: To increase new members exposure to sailboat racing without serious racers forfeiting their seasons scores.
Races: One standard race course, one “creative” course each Sunday during the series.
Scores are recorded but do not count for the season
Everything else is the same as every other Sunday!
Participation Incentives:
Incentive 1. While the scores for the races do not count, the number of races finished will be added, to the total number of throw outs you are allowed for the year. Races count regardless of who’s boat you sail in or whether you serve as skipper or crew.
Incentive 2. The races will count towards a special August series. Points will be given for sailing with a non member, non-racer or crewing for a new skipper.
Scoring for August series:
· 2 points per race sailed with 1 non club member. Up to a maximum of 4 points per race.
· 1 point per race sailed with a non-racer. Up to a maximum of 2 points per race.
· 1 point per race crewing for a new skipper
How August series affects scoring for Season Championship
· Sailors still need a 40% minimum races sailed to qualify for the season.
· They would only be able to exclude a maximum of 15 % of their total races sailed, plus the bonus of earned throw outs from the August event. As written in 20.3 (d).
· Both 20.3 (d) and 20.3 (e) need to be taken into account to fully define the throw-out calculations.
· Six races must be sailed in the August series to earn one throw out.
A few examples - Both assuming 53 races available which requires 21 races sailed to qualify for the season.
A) JOHN RACER sails 21 total races, He will qualify for the season and get no throw-outs. Rule 20.3 (d) as re-written states he must still have his score calculated with a minimum 40% of races unless altered by earned August throw-outs. JOHN RACER attends the August event and earns 1 throw-out (i.e. he participates in ≥6 races). He would then get to exclude one race score and would have his average calculated for final finish position of season scoring based on 20 races.
B) MARY SKIPPER sails 27 total races, She will qualify for the season and have 4 throw outs based on the 15% rule (20.4 e). MARY also attends the August series event and earns 1 throw-out. She would then get to exclude a total of 5 races total for the season. Her average would be based on 22 total scored races.
C) BRUCE SAILOR sails 19 total races. He does not qualify for the season based on rule 20.3 (c). BRUCE attends the August series event and earns 1 throw-out. BRUCE has no calculated score for the season since he does not qualify and the throw-out does not apply.