One of a full set of Vector carbon pedestals that were custom designed for Cannonball by Jon Williams of Stay In Phase. As the first new Maxi72 in three years and the first from Botín, the launch of a very dramatic new design is making the rest of the class a little nervous...
Who could then foresee that 15 years later in 2016 we would
see more blood on the carpet in a debate about adding three innocent words to World Sailing Regulation 25.5.3 in order to accept the ‘secret heart’ of IRC being judged by World Sailing as scientific enough and thus opening up to giving RORC/UNCL the right to organise an IRC world championship. Silly thing is that what IRC lacks in transparency in how it calculates its ratings is in my opinion matched or even outweighed by the inherent lack of transparency in how ORC measures boats. A sailor cannot check the correctness of the ORC hull scan, nor
of the ORC inclining, and so relies on others for control… just as it is now proposed to use World Sailing to confirm the correct use of science by IRC. Only recently have ORC hull scans improved enough that, when carried out by an expert, they can be good enough to match the claims of precision that ORC has now been making for decades… That still leaves the use of inclining to measure stability. In my
opinion, having witnessed and seen the results of dozens of inclinings of TP52s, it is a measurement that is impossible to repeat for the same result and is very easy to manipulate; inclining may be con- sidered a good way to get a loose idea of a boat’s stability but not to be used as a major component – or driver – of accurate rating. In Barcelona there came a moment when ORC chairman Bruno
Finzi realised that, despite a likely majority in the Offshore and Oceanic Committee to reject the submission, this was no guarantee the rejection would get support further up the ladder; it was also becoming clear that ORC would be on the receiving end of a great deal of negative publicity over how it had approached the RORC/IRC submission. So Finzi chose to follow the chairman’s pledge to give the parties another chance to broker a solution along the lines of what was proposed one year earlier at the 2015 conference, to hold a joint ORC/IRC World Championship. To make a long story short, the following was agreed between
ORC and RORC and embraced unanimously by a relieved Offshore and Oceanic Committee: Purpose or Objective… To acknowledge that sailors competing under all international rating systems have the same rights to compete in a world championship. ORC and IRC commit to work jointly towards the following combined events: 1. Starting in 2018 and subsequent years a jointly scored World Championship. 2. Starting in 2018 a team World Championship based on the same event. 3. A new combined Offshore World Championship based on existing offshore events. The commitment to a joint worlds is currently based on trust as
the purpose/objective is not binding, whereas the three-word addition to Regulation 25.5.3 (‘or World Sailing’) giving IRC equal claim on world championship titles certainly is. For the sake of sailing I can only hope and, where I can, possibly
support that we see a first joint IRC/ORC World Championship in Scheveningen (Holland) in 2018. This will need some forgiving and a softening of attitude from both sides. From there it will be a long and tricky road to real progress towards
the holy grail of a true single rule. Possibly for international events only, but wouldn’t that be great? Rob Weiland, Maxi72 and TP52 manager
CARIBBEAN SAILING AT ITS FINEST.
racing in paradise since 1972
24-26 MARCH 2017 SEAHORSE 29
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