PART 4
Rule 44.2 does not require a boat that takes a One-Turn Penalty to complete a full 360° turn, or a turn of any particular number of degrees, and it does not prohibit taking the penalty while making another manoeuvre, such as rounding the mark.
All four illustrated turns comply with rule 28.1. Provided that the string representing the boat’s track when drawn taut lies on the mark’s required side, the boat would comply with rule 28.1 even if (as not illustrated) a penalty turn resulted in the boat making an extra 360° turn around the mark1.
The following observations can be added: • Although the case speaks of first getting clear, in practice, to take the penalty in one of the ways shown, a boat will have to have been already well clear of others when she touches the mark, and far enough away from others for her to remain well clear while turning.
• If she is able to take a penalty while other boats are nearby, doing little or nothing more than she would have done had she not touched the mark, she and other boats nearby must remember that until both the tack and gybe have been completed, she is temporarily a keep-clear boat with respect to boats not taking a penalty. If they had been required to keep clear of her until she started to take the penalty, they have gained right-of- way because of her actions, and so they do not have to give her initial room under rule 15. However, she, on completing her tack-and-gybe turn, will have to give them initial room to keep clear under rule 15 if at that point she regains right of way. While she is taking her penalty, they will break rule 23.2 if, while not sailing their proper courses, they interfere with her
• These options are additional to the full turn that has always qualified as the taking of the penalty, and which is how it is more likely to be taken when other boats are near.
• It is possible to take a penalty without realising it: I have observed a single-handed boat make the lightest of contacts with a leeward mark as in the bottom right example, and almost certainly unknown to the helmsman. She then gybed and tacked as part of her normal mark rounding. Had the incident come to protest, I believe she could not have been penalised for touching the mark, since she had unwittingly taken a penalty for an infringement she was unaware of committing.
• If a two-turns penalty is taken, only one of them can be taken as shown, and the other will have to be a conventional full turn.
It may also be that a one or two-turns penalty taken at the finishing line will validly include the looping of a finishing mark.
Penalties at the Finishing Line
Iris Daffodil
Rotating round a mark is permitted - but has Iris taken a penalty?
It does not matter if Daffodil, having not kept clear of Green, takes her turns round the mark, as long as she completes two gybes and two tacks, and so has reached a close-hauled course, before cutting the finishing line for the third time.
1 As long as the rule 28.2 string is on the required side of the mark, it does not matter that it is there twice. This applies to a starting mark and a finishing mark as well as to a course mark. Many years ago, the rule 31 penalty required the turn to be taken as a loop around the mark. That was dangerous, and so it became optional rather than compulsory – but I still come across people who do not realise that the rule has changed. If a boat is looping a mark, it is unclear which leg she is on at any particular moment for the purposes of rule 24.2.
162 RYA The Racing Rules Explained
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124 |
Page 125 |
Page 126 |
Page 127 |
Page 128 |
Page 129 |
Page 130 |
Page 131 |
Page 132 |
Page 133 |
Page 134 |
Page 135 |
Page 136 |
Page 137 |
Page 138 |
Page 139 |
Page 140 |
Page 141 |
Page 142 |
Page 143 |
Page 144 |
Page 145 |
Page 146 |
Page 147 |
Page 148 |
Page 149 |
Page 150 |
Page 151 |
Page 152 |
Page 153 |
Page 154 |
Page 155 |
Page 156 |
Page 157 |
Page 158 |
Page 159 |
Page 160 |
Page 161 |
Page 162 |
Page 163 |
Page 164 |
Page 165 |
Page 166 |
Page 167 |
Page 168 |
Page 169 |
Page 170 |
Page 171 |
Page 172 |
Page 173 |
Page 174 |
Page 175 |
Page 176 |
Page 177 |
Page 178 |
Page 179 |
Page 180 |
Page 181 |
Page 182 |
Page 183 |
Page 184 |
Page 185 |
Page 186 |
Page 187 |
Page 188 |
Page 189 |
Page 190 |
Page 191 |
Page 192 |
Page 193 |
Page 194 |
Page 195 |
Page 196 |
Page 197 |
Page 198 |
Page 199 |
Page 200 |
Page 201 |
Page 202 |
Page 203 |
Page 204 |
Page 205 |
Page 206 |
Page 207 |
Page 208 |
Page 209 |
Page 210 |
Page 211 |
Page 212 |
Page 213 |
Page 214 |
Page 215 |
Page 216 |
Page 217 |
Page 218 |
Page 219 |
Page 220 |
Page 221 |
Page 222 |
Page 223 |
Page 224 |
Page 225 |
Page 226 |
Page 227 |
Page 228 |
Page 229 |
Page 230 |
Page 231 |
Page 232 |
Page 233 |
Page 234 |
Page 235 |
Page 236 |
Page 237 |
Page 238 |
Page 239 |
Page 240 |
Page 241 |
Page 242 |
Page 243 |
Page 244 |
Page 245 |
Page 246 |
Page 247 |
Page 248 |
Page 249 |
Page 250 |
Page 251 |
Page 252 |
Page 253 |
Page 254 |
Page 255 |
Page 256
