INTRODUCTION Rule 91


PROTEST COMMITTEE A protest committee shall be (a) a committee appointed by the organizing authority or race committee;


(b) an international jury appointed by the organizing authority or as prescribed in the World Sailing Regulations. It shall be composed as required by rule N1 and have the authority and responsibilities stated in rule N2. A national authority may prescribe that its approval is required for the appointment of international juries for races within its jurisdiction, except World Sailing events or when international juries are appointed by World Sailing under rule 89.2(c); or


(c) a committee appointed by the national authority under rule 71.2.


Matching the structure in rules 90 and 91 (and in rule 89.2) to what actually happens at club level is sometimes not obvious, especially when some people wear more than one hat. The club itself may be the organizing authority, but most likely it will delegate some or all of the duties to a sailing or racing committee. The committee devises the club programme for the season, which is published in the club handbook. This is the notice of race, even though it may not describe itself as such, and my experience is that many of the relevant items referred to in J1.1 and J1.2 are often not explicitly covered. Rule 89.2 says that the organizing authority appoints the race committee. One of the duties of the race committee is to publish sailing instructions, but this is often done by the same committee as published the notice of race. The race team that actually runs a day’s racing is the race committee for the purposes of the racing rules1


, but it is quite possible that none of the officials in action on the


day will be members of the club’s racing/sailing committee. While rule 89.2 says it is the organizing authority that appoints the protest committee ‘when appropriate’, it is often not appropriate, and the protest committee may in fact be an ad-hoc assembly of members gathered by the race officer when a protest materialises, in effect a race committee appointment as contemplated in rule 91(a). If you ask the average club member to identify the organizing authority and the race committee of the club, you may not get a sensible answer. Nevertheless, life goes on, and racing happens.


In addition to rule 90.2(b) requiring the detailing of applicable prescriptions in the sailing instructions when foreign competitors are expected, rule J1.2(4) also requires publication in the notice of race of any national prescription where compliance by an entrant from another country needs prior notice.


By rule 90.3, Appendix A, Low Point, is the default scoring system if no other system is mentioned in the sailing instructions, and Rule A2 says that the default is then one discard2


, unless more, or a number that changes with


number of races completed, or none is specified. The fact that one discard is automatic unless it is modified is often not realised. When the sailing instructions simply repeat the fact that there is to be one discard, there is no problem. But when it is intended that there will be no discard, for instance in a two-or three-race series, the need to say so explicitly in the sailing instructions is sometimes forgotten. (If it is to be a no-discard event, I think that fact should be in the notice of race, as it may affect a decision to enter if it is possible that the boat will not be able to sail in every race of the event). The only significant changes to Appendix A (reproduced with guidance below) are a requirement (A2.2) that any boat that enters any race in a series is to be scored for the whole series, and the inclusion of UFD as the abbreviation (A11) for a disqualification under rule 30.3 the U Flag Rule.


1 See under Terminology 2 The rules refer to races whose results are ‘excluded’, while the term ‘discarded’ and ‘thrown out’ are commonly employed on either side of the Atlantic.


RYA The Racing Rules Explained 241


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