IRC racing

KREW2 said:
I was told they could not do that because they did not have a non spinnaker class.
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That was completely wrong. The idea of making the 4% allowance is to permit non kite boats to race with kite boats. If they could only do this in kite / no kite fleets then there would be no point in making the adjustment. It also sounds as if your club wasnt mnaking the race by race alterations they should have been doing either. So in effect you were racing on an IRC type system but using base PY numbers.

You need a new sailing secretary!

KREW2 said:
Just assigning a number to a boat and not bothering to check and monitor it is not the way to go.
Too late now though as the PY system has been dropped, and it seems to me that the only way I can get a just handicap is through the NHC system, cos if the powers that be will not do anything the computer will.
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The NHC system gives your club a choice of two PC programs ( we use HAL's Race Results - google it, free download so you can ensure the sailing sec doesnt play silly bu66ers) which alter the handicap race by race depending on previous results and as such will after a few races give you a fair no kite handicap. If your club uses the software as the RYA expects them to do, and indeed requires them to do in open competitions. If they dont do this race by race adjustment you would be better off with IRC but only because you could get a no kite number. If that is your club wouldnt use the spurious twpo fleets argument again.
 
I always liken the handicap situation in sailing to that in golf. The pros, the hotshots in golf dont go off handicaps. Neither do the really hot sailors as in the olympic classes, the volvo ocean races, americas cups and even sigma 33, sigma 38, contessa, J109 one make fleets. IRC is a funny hybrid intended to make multi boat fleets as near as possible into one make fleets based on an evaluation of boat design criteria

The weekend golfer who doesnt play that well with any consistency and does play for fun anyway plays off a performance based handicap analogous to the NHC system. He does this because he can go out each sunday with the hope, however forlorn, that this week he might just manage a win.
 
birdseye said:
That was completely wrong. The idea of making the 4% allowance is to permit non kite boats to race with kite boats. If they could only do this in kite / no kite fleets then there would be no point in making the adjustment. It also sounds as if your club wasnt mnaking the race by race alterations they should have been doing either. So in effect you were racing on an IRC type system but using base PY numbers.

You need a new sailing secretary!



The NHC system gives your club a choice of two PC programs ( we use HAL's Race Results - google it, free download so you can ensure the sailing sec doesnt play silly bu66ers) which alter the handicap race by race depending on previous results and as such will after a few races give you a fair no kite handicap. If your club uses the software as the RYA expects them to do, and indeed requires them to do in open competitions. If they dont do this race by race adjustment you would be better off with IRC but only because you could get a no kite number. If that is your club wouldnt use the spurious twpo fleets argument again.
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Well that's an eye opener, I thought PY was fixed. To my knowledge, for the three years I raced prior to NHC no adjustments were ever made.
I do believe we used to, and maybe still do use HAL's. So would the adjustments have been automatic.
 
BlueSkyNick said:
Nail number 3 hit ....you get my drift.
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I was talking to a fellow racer the other night. On Wednesday's he races against similar yacht in the fleet, a Jeanneau Fantasia.

He is full laden, and more, the other one is striped to the bone. He doesn't want to remove his cruising gear, so he maintains IRC will make him more competitive.
My understanding is you are rated on the makers weight figures.
We were told that you are only allowed to remove things that, "If you turned the boat upside down it would fall off"
I think he has gotten hold of the wrong end of the stick, I was trying to tell him he would be better off on NHC.
I'm not going to get into too much of an argument with him until I am sure of my facts.
 
mrming said:
An endorsement wouldn't help as the boat is weighed with no removable kit on board.

He would absolutely be better off under NHC. Under IRC, if the other boat is in racing trim, he would also need to be in racing trim to compete.
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Unless he's concerned about people not taking his NRC results seriously?
It's fundamentally a self-adjusting system that has no information about the actual speed potential of the boat vs the ability of the crew.

If you want to do well, empty the boat, polish the bottom and get some coaching.
 
KREW2 said:
Well that's an eye opener, I thought PY was fixed. To my knowledge, for the three years I raced prior to NHC no adjustments were ever made.
I do believe we used to, and maybe still do use HAL's. So would the adjustments have been automatic.
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Yes they would now be entirely automatic but you would know the handicap you have race by race. One of the objectives of the rya in designing the new system was to get sailing secretaries away from the aggro they would get if they had any discretion. Under py some clubs did not do the race by race adjustment so your club is not unique.
 
We are having the same discussion in our club mainly as a result of the latest IRC price reduction offer. We have been running NHC for two years prior to that PY but with revision through ' the programme' after each series.

If we are to adopt an IRC. class and we have no modern racing yachts then dual scoring with NHC is a fundamental necessity to avoid discouraging anyone.

There will be an advantage to those few boats that do go for an IRC rating in that they will have a rating that will travel and will go with them if they venture round the corner to enter a regatta or race with another club. Importantly this rating will give the host rating committee less opportunity to tinker with ratings to ' favour' local boats as if that would ever happen of course.

NHC is only good if you race the same boats consistently within the same club. Having experienced it for two years and with the adjustments that RYA are making each year it is beginning to work affectively. It is under resourced and RYA could be doing more to make it work but from the out set the aim has been to affect a greater take up of IRC.

IRC undoubtedly favours modern design and is a Grand Prix formula, and I suppose it should be as those that spend £1M on a development yacht would be pretty pi**ed at getting beaten by a 30 year old Westerly for example. It's just a shame that there are generally not enough older boats competing because so often class 3 & 4 are amalgamated into the faster classes and courses set accordingly and it's game over.
 
H4B said:
NHC is only good if you race the same boats consistently within the same club.
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This is certainly true. Have just seen some analysis of local fleet racing results using long standing club handicaps and NHC using the RYA base list, the best compromise seems to be the NHC/Sailwave system but using local handicap as the starting point.
 
Yes there is a very real problem when new boats enter an established NHC fleet. The maths of the NHC adjustment system seems to cause a numerical drift upwards so new boats entering a fleet are bandits initially.

Whats more the RYA view that you should run the NHC numbers seperately for say the tuesday evening fleet and the sunday morning fleet and the annual regatta etc just confuses everyone. My boat would have several different NHC numbers which contrasts witrh the old PY system
 
Another common misconception is that the NHC base numbers are any good other than for what they are intended for. They are 'broad brush stab in the dark' starting points, that will change in subsequent races between the same boats pending on performance and therefore set up and crew ability. They are most definitely not suitable to be used as tcc throughout a series without amendment. If this is done there will most definitely be both advantaged and disadvantaged boats.

Fundamentally and it shouldn't be any other way , because we are racing are we not? , the best competitors ( define as you wish ) appear to win regardless of the rating systems in use.

It would be ludicrous for the complete duffer at the back of the fleet with completely sha**ed sails to have a notion that they might win. They will take what they wish from participating.

Or have I got this all wrong ?
 
H4B said:
IRC undoubtedly favours modern design and is a Grand Prix formula, and I suppose it should be as those that spend £1M on a development yacht would be pretty pi**ed at getting beaten by a 30 year old Westerly for example. It's just a shame that there are generally not enough older boats competing because so often class 3 & 4 are amalgamated into the faster classes and courses set accordingly and it's game over.
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That's not actually true... IRC is in fact supposed to protect the existing fleet first and foremost. I could give many examples of old boats doing well. The fact that most good sucessful boats are new is actually a mark of its success in this respect , as to put it simply new boats attract the best crew. Where an old boat has a top crew they do well.
 
flaming said:
That's not actually true... IRC is in fact supposed to protect the existing fleet first and foremost. I could give many examples of old boats doing well. The fact that most good sucessful boats are new is actually a mark of its success in this respect , as to put it simply new boats attract the best crew. Where an old boat has a top crew they do well.
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Whilst in theory I would like to agree with you in reality an older boat would have to be seriously pimped to compete with modern designs and as courses , in my admittedly rather limited IRC experience, tend to favour the front of the fleet rather than the back or even middle of the fleet, any boat with a rating less than, say, 0.870 will struggle when competing in an amalgamated fleet.

I think it crucial that yacht owners with older cruiser/racer yachts of the 80 's 90's be encouraged to race as they surely make up the main stay of club memberships and would achieve bigger turn outs in the appropriate classes.
 
I suppose the real question being. Is it possible at all to have a common rating/ handicap system that will ever be fair ? To cater for the hot shot pro semi /pro crewed racer against an old cruiser racer of a different era with a few mates on board and average fit out. ?

Probably not.

NHC & IRC are complimentary and overtime will be the accepted way forward IMO.

Handicap racing is never going to be entirely fair to everyone all the time.
 
H4B said:
Whilst in theory I would like to agree with you in reality an older boat would have to be seriously pimped to compete with modern designs and as courses , in my admittedly rather limited IRC experience, tend to favour the front of the fleet rather than the back or even middle of the fleet, any boat with a rating less than, say, 0.870 will struggle when competing in an amalgamated fleet.

I think it crucial that yacht owners with older cruiser/racer yachts of the 80 's 90's be encouraged to race as they surely make up the main stay of club memberships and would achieve bigger turn outs in the appropriate classes.
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Slightly separate argument, but yes, smaller boats with low ratings do struggle in ww/lw racing, but that's often more to do with getting clean air and having your tactical choices cut short than it is with the rating. Worth noting that often the reverse applies offshore, and the smaller, older boat does very well. Especially when crewed by a good sailor who's had it for years. As ever, having tight rating splits gives the best racing, but not always possible when there aren't many entries.
 
flaming said:
Slightly separate argument, but yes, smaller boats with low ratings do struggle in ww/lw racing, but that's often more to do with getting clean air and having your tactical choices cut short than it is with the rating. Worth noting that often the reverse applies offshore, and the smaller, older boat does very well. Especially when crewed by a good sailor who's had it for years. As ever, having tight rating splits gives the best racing, but not always possible when there aren't many entries.
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It is the absence of tight rating splits that is putting the aged cruiser racer fleet off getting an IRC rating.
 
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