Achieving fair racing across a range of different boats of varying size and speed is the holy grail of handicap racing. The Great Lakes group in the UK is attempting to achieve just that with some detailed and dynamic analysis of dinghy racing in the UK.
Chairman of the Great Lakes, Andrew Craig, explains in this conversation with SailJuice.com's Andy Rice....
Here are a couple of excerpts from the interview....
SailJuice: Some of the handicap numbers and the Great Lakes have moved a lot and others have hardly moved at all. Can you explain the process by which the Great Lakes committee has readjusted the numbers?
Andrew Craig: We started the process at Queen Mary with the Bloody Mary and using data that we had borrowed from a couple of clubs. By combining the other venues in the winter series, the whole process has become much stronger. The first thing we did when the RYA system was up and running this summer, we backloaded the last three - and in some cases - five years results from the winter championship series - about 90 races in total and over 2,500 results. From these, the major classes such as the Phantom, the Merlin and the Laser, it gave us a pretty good idea of what handicap changes would be needed to equalise the average performance of these classes. That is what we are aiming to do at the moment - but before we do that, we do discard the poorest performers. So people who are new to the boat, new to the sport or really having a bad day such as being late to the start don’t have undue influence on the results. We only discard the poorest and then we average the performance of the classes using this technique.
SailJuice: Two or three years ago, the Merlins and Phantoms were dominating the top 10 of many handicap events. Now we see a broader set of classes having a chance of winning....
Andrew Craig: That is our aim. The aim in our handicapping is to give the top sailors in each class an equal chance of winning. There are a lot Phantoms and Merlins and Fireballs that turn up to these winter championships events. We have got over 200 results from the Phantoms, over 150 for the Merlins and the Fireballs, but there are also 160 Lasers in the results data and where were the Lasers in the prizes? Just nowhere. So what I am pleased about is making these adjustments, now the top Laser sailors are getting into the top 10 and top 20 but still the top Merlins and Phantoms sailors are up there in that top 20 list, but isn’t now dominated by midfleet sailors who previously were getting into the top 20. Now they are relegated to midfleet [of the handicap events], which I think is appropriate. Certainly I went to as many of the winter championship events last year and talked to as many people as I could and the overwhelming feedback was they thought that was appropriate too.
If you have a question for the Great Lakes committee, go here:
To find out more about the GJW Direct SailJuice Winter Series, which uses the Great Lakes numbers, go to: www.sailjuiceseries.com
The third edition of the SailJuice Global Warm-up brings together five of the biggest winter handicap racing events into a unified series, to find out just who is tough enough to race their way through the brutal cold of a British winter. It kicks off with the Grafham Grand Prix on 2 January 2012.
The second edition of the SailJuice Global Warm-up brings together four of the biggest winter handicap racing events into a unified series, to find out just who is tough enough to race their way through the brutal cold of a British winter. Earlier this year competitors battled their way through the first ever Global Warm-up, and this winter's early snow hints at another tough challenge ahead....
Where Peter Barton had capsized his way around the Bloody Mary three weeks earlier, the more moderate conditions suited his T-foiled Cherub to a T, with Barton and crew David Ellis winning both races of the Asymmetric fleet. After two events, victory at the Bloody Mary plus their 3rd at the Steve Nicholson keeps Andy Smith & Tim Needham's 505 in pole position, but just a point ahead of Barton's Cherub...
After a sub-zero Bloody Mary earlier this month, dinghy racers are getting ready for another cold battle this Saturday at the second event in the SailJuice Global Warm-Up, the Steve Nicholson Memorial Trophy at Northampton Sailing Club....
"Looking at the heinous forecast, under normal circumstances there would have been no way that I would have bothered to get out of bed that Saturday morning. With sub-zero temperatures, and a wind chill from a strong northerly breeze threatening to make a freezing day feel Arctic, the prospect of competing in the Bloody Mary was not my idea of fun...." Andy Rice reports from a shattering experience competing in a Devoti D-1 at the Bloody Mary....
With sub-zero temperatures, bone-chilling winds gusting over 25 knots, just 61 entrants and 29 finishers, this year's Bloody Mary must go down as one of the toughest in its 37 year history. This classic pursuit race throws up many different kinds of winners, and this year it was the turn of a 505, immaculately sailed by Staunton Harold's Andy Smith and Tim Needham, to lift the coveted trophy.
The basic facts on this brand new series:
How Andy Rice & Nick Murphy won the 2003 Bloody Mary in the 49er. "We expected to have a fight on our hands with Dave Hall and Simon Hiscocks, but when their jib came separated from the forestay on the first tack, we had a clear jump on the rest of our fleet. This was a huge benefit for us, as now we could focus on looking forwards...."
Mike Lyons ghosted to victory in his Blaze singlehander to win the inaugural Oxford Blue, the fourth event to take place in this season’s GJW Direct SailJuice Winter Series. For a first-time event, 115 entries was an impressive turnout. No doubt most competitors were fearing a windy outing, hoping for a less breezy gap in the storms that have been battering the UK in recent weeks. Well they got their wish, and then some....
Datchet Water’s Ben Schooling raced his Musto Skiff to victory in the 2013 Fernhurst Books Draycote Dash, the first event of the GJW Direct Sailjuice Winter Series. On being asked the secret to his success at Draycote, Ben Schooling offered five observations about his performance....
