Rating queries

[Daydream believer]

A couple of weeks ago I was sailing SH to harwich. I was really badly sea sick & needed to reef but could not for quite a while as winds reached 22kts. Going upwind in a short lumpy sea.
A crewed Sigma - Presumably from Burnham- came through the Swin Spitway & passed ahead about 100 yds. Oddly enough the same boat ( recognised by the brown jib & dark main) that did exactly the same thing a year earlier. It proceeded to leave me behind. I did eventually reef & then it was about 1 mile ahead.
After 10 miles, it was 200 yds ahead but then I was chucking up again & it just disappeared into the sunset .
In the past I have matched Sigma 33,s - but this one easily passed me. It was suggested that it might have been a 36. So I looked up the data on the RYA site
I cannot believe that a 33 ft & a 36 ft racing boat should rate lower than a 31 ft cruising boat.
So do forumites ever use these ratings in races? Surely this cannot be a fair rating for a Hanse 311.
So from that i went to the ORC data & pulled out typical data for a sigma 33 & a Hanse 311
However i do not understand the abreviations.
Does anyone understand them please & can they interprete them & tell me if it agrees with the RYA?
Thanks
RYA site
SIGMA 33 OD----- 0.909
SIGMA 36 -----------0.944
HANSE 311 ---------0.947
ORC Data

sail number	type	designer	owner
NED/NED3525	Sigma 33 OOD	D.Thomas	-
length	beam	draft	displacement
9.868m	3.21m	1.79m	4297 kg

main	genoa	spinnaker
26.2m²	19.13m²	60.42m²

GPH	OSN
714.6	692.9

offshore TN 0.7243, 0.9516, 1.0752

inshore TN 0.5604, 0.7683, 0.9003

sail number	type	designer	owner
ITA/ITA17414	Hanse 311	Judel/Vrolijk	-
length	beam	draft	displacement
9.45m	3.2m	1.71m	3918 kg

main	genoa	asym. spinnaker
26.27m²	28.4m²	60.89m²

GPH	OSN
692.5	677.2

offshore TN 0.7675, 0.9747, 1.0655
inshore TN 0.5916, 0.7837, 0.8759

 

[Birdseye]

The Sigmas are not "racing boats" but cruisers and boat design has progressed in the 25 years between their design and your Hanse. The RYA NHC numbers are based on a simplified version of the IRC system and are in effect a VPP using boat design criteria. In short, you should beat a Sigma 33 . You have a slightly longer water line length and a better power to weight ratio from your sail plan.

 

[Daydream believer]

I do sail with a self taking jib which is 18.94 M2 which is smaller than the Sigma jib. So perhaps this puts me at a disadvantage. But i still find it odd that i have to give time to a 36.; albeit very small
What is "VPP" please?
I still do not know what the rating is supposed to be on the ORC data site from all the figs presented

 

[michael_w]

VPP stands for Velocity Prediction Program. ORC has different ratings for different wind speeds. I note the Hanse's rating includes a genoa of 28.4 opposed to the Sigma's 19.3.

The Sigma 33 OOD has a single spreader mast. The 36 has a twin spreader arrangement. Or was the boat one of the others from the Sigma family? 362, 38, 41 or 400?

 

[01_Anna]

IRC used predominantly in GB is a simple system, based on a limited number of boat measurements. Essentially a "fixed" number, allocated to each boat.
ORC is a system which takes into account both the boat measurements AND the conditions while the race (or sailing) takes place. So there is never a "single" number attributed to the boat.

 

[ridgy]

A crewed sigma...how many people on the rail? Makes a difference. Do you have old dacron sails and them new carbon ones? Are you playing the traveller in the gusts? Lots of these older boats go very well to windward as their lwl increases by heeling but the rating is a blend of upwind and downwind performance and I would expect you to recover the time off the wind.

 

[Daydream believer]

All up wind & I was as sea sick as %^$& . That is why I was unable to reef at first & the mainsail stopped where it was. Eventual reefing meant I stopped for a long time, hence the 1 mile+ gap opened up.
I was hoping an east coast sailor might have recognised the boat as they are not , as far as I know, standard Sigma 33 sails which I understood were Genesis. Or are they no longer made & the class allows a variety of sails now?
The sails on this boat stand out as different from the norm

 

[penfold]

S33 is no longer single maker class as Sobstad took the pee with quality and price too many times; UK Sails, Elvstrom and North are the approved makers now I think.

 

[doug748]

The problem seems to be magnified for a lot of mid size modern cruising type boats which have to race to big handicaps, are left behind on the water by boats like Sigmas and have the indignity of corrected times that put them even further back.

One answer is to race locally to NHC or such like, where the local handicapper will sort it out in the end - based on actual performance.
.

 

[mrming]

The ratings in the NHC list are only a base number. Each boat’s rating is adjusted after each race in a series based on it’s performance (there’s a spreadsheet for it). So the system rewards participation. It works well in clubs where the same boats turn out regularly, but it doesn’t cope so well if boats race sporadically. Getting an IRC cert is better for that, and is actually very straightforward, but in my experience running club racing, occasional racers don’t want to do the admin / pay the small fee. The result is that casual handicap club racing really should just be treated as a bit of fun. There is no real fairness and seeking it is a bit pointless. Better to just enjoy the sailing.

 

[flaming]

The Hanse is 300kg lighter and sets more sail. In addition it has a significantly more powerful hull shape. With everything else (condition of sails, crew ability, number of crew on the rail) being equal I would expect the Hanse to be comfortably the faster boat in "needed to reef" conditions upwind, and considerably faster on a reach. Gap would probably narrow a bit downwind, but I'd still expect the Hanse to be faster, and I'd expect it to surf earlier and for longer than the Sigma.
Where the Sigma might be expected to be marginally faster would be in lighter winds when the hull shape of the Hanse has more drag.

Sigmas are fantastic boats, but the last one was built in 1989 I think... The world has moved on.

 

[Birdseye]

All up wind & I was as sea sick as %^$& . That is why I was unable to reef at first & the mainsail stopped where it was. Eventual reefing meant I stopped for a long time, hence the 1 mile+ gap opened up.
I was hoping an east coast sailor might have recognised the boat as they are not , as far as I know, standard Sigma 33 sails which I understood were Genesis. Or are they no longer made & the class allows a variety of sails now?
The sails on this boat stand out as different from the norm

The colour of the sails suggests that it was equipped with laminates and you also said fully crewed. Maybe was a race boat out for practice. I used to sail in a race fleet with two Sigma 33s. One was in bog standard cruising trim and the other was a well sailed and crewed ex race boat. The first I left in the weeds, the second used to beat me by a small margin upwind and lose down wind - and I was in a more modern 36 footer. It was a good illustration of the difference that equipment and crew make to performance. And if you really were that badly sea sick there would be no way that you were getting the best out of your boat.

Then of course there are other issues like the state of your hull ( that can easily be worth half a knot) and your prop design plus all the rubbish on board, full tanks etc. On one of my boats just filling the water tank made half a knot difference upwind.