How to solve the rating problem once and for all. Bassani explains

Allowing cabin boats that differ in size and type to participate with an equal chance of winning races is one of the noble purposes of the sport of sailing.

It has been 120 years since the brilliant designer Nathanael Greene Herreshoff drafted the Universal Compensation Rule, the first rating formula that allowed different boats to race, in theory, on equal terms(one of his many inventions).

Unfortunately, the rating problem has not yet been solved and even today different fee systems coexist (IRC, ORC, ORC Club…) that determine different rankings in the races where they are applied). You only need, for example, to look at the rankingsof the last Rolex Middle Sea Racewhere the positions of the boats change, and not a little, depending on whether the IRC or ORC system is used.

Luca Bassani, founder of Wally (which recently launched the new wallyrocket51), gives us his interesting perspective (published in the pages of Top Yacht Design).

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The rating mess (by Luca Bassani)

Offshore boat racing cyclically proposes the issue of ratings and their application. We are also back to having two or three measurement systems, and this confirms that the confusion is not over. In my opinion, the problem recurs because the error is upstream, on the part of everyone: competitors, organizers, performance calculation systems. I have always maintained that professionals cannot race against amateurs and vice versa, just as boats of different categories cannot have unified rankings.

Would you see in motor racing a Formula 1 rally against spec cars? Or conversely a grand prix on a circuit like Monza? That would be absurd. Or Sinner doing a championship against an amateur? Yet in regattas this happens without anyone really protesting. In this situation no rating formula could properly calculate the relative performances and compare them to make a ranking. Organizers, i.e., sailing clubs, always try to have a large number of participants both to get more entries economically and to get more sponsorship. And to satisfy these goals they make large classes by piling up competing boats that can never compete with each other. In this way the results satisfy only those who win because of a rating that favors them. The same goes for crews and helmsmen: professionals win 99 times out of a hundred against true amateurs because they have more experience, prepare the boat better, helm better, and know how to apply more correct tactics in every wind. Not to mention the economic aspect that allows those who spend more to certainly have a faster boat, fresher and more efficient sails, and a better crew both in maneuvering and in getting better performance from the boat.

The Giraglia case

The last long race of the Giraglia also confirmed this problem of absurd piling up of boats with non-comparable characteristics and performance: the weather forecast gave for certain 24 hours of strong mistral that would take all boats on the slack from the start (apart from the first 20 miles) to the finish. A race then that would have clearly favored planing and empty boats (i.e., with no interiors for cruising). In the Maxi Class, the one clearly best suited for a regatta of this kind, out of seven boats only two started, i.e., those clearly favored in downwind gaits. The other five knew they could not race to win. They then asked themselves why risk doing a few hundred thousand Euros of damage (I’m only talking about broken lasco sails due to wind strength) to race against no one? That is, with no chance of winning. They certainly looked bad as sportsmen, but certain figures are important for everyone’s consciences. If those two Maxis had raced each other and the other five as well, surely they would have participated.

Let us not forget that, as in cars, one’s Ego is proportional to the size of one’s boat!!! However, even in this case the problem of the ” pile” has generated a very bad sporting situation.

So the beginning of the solution is for everyone to agree to let only comparable boats and crews compete against each other.

Luca Bassani

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Do you agree with Bassani’s opinion? What do you think of the current regulation and compensation systems? Let us know with a comment.