Decision Time for World Sailing Council

World Sailing’s 2016 Annual Conference brings together international delegates this week in Barcelona, Spain. Here’s an update from November 10:

Today’s session at the 2016 Annual Conference saw the Committee meetings of Events, Constitution and Oceanic & Offshore as the debate and discussion in advance of World Sailing Council’s meeting on November 11 and 12 concluded.

The day opened with a statement from President Carlo Croce and the Board of World Sailing and an announcement of Santander, Spain and Kiel, Germany as host venues of the 2017 and 2018 Sailing World Cup Final followed, generating conversation around the Renaissance Fira Hotel.

Events Committee
As a Committee, Events features several experienced and well decorated sailors and team leaders. Names such as Alejandro Abascal, Spain’s first Olympic sailing gold medallist, Sari Multala (FIN), three-time World Champion and Olympian, 2008 Olympian and Chairman of the Athletes’ Commission Yann Rocherieux and a number of Olympic sailing team leaders sit on the Committee.

A Rio 2016 Olympic review opened the meeting with a number of records presented. Sixty-six nations sailed at Rio 2016 and 17 nations won medals, both numbers were records for sailing. A full overview of the Olympic Games including sports presentation, broadcasting, qualification and the competition itself was given.

Tokyo, Japan will host the next edition of the Olympic Games in 2020 and Enoshima, the 1964 venue, will hold the sailing competition. Preparation for Tokyo 2020 is full on and teams have already started to train and compete on the waters.

The International Olympic Committees Agenda 2020 was a leading topic with gender equity, innovation, format and the possibility of showcase events all discussed.

Looking further afield, a presentation on the 2024 Olympic Games was received. A decision on who will host the 2024 Olympic Games will be made in September 2017 during the IOC Session in Lima, Peru. The following cities / nations are bidding to host the 2024 Games with their sailing venue recommendations below:

• Budapest, Hungary – Lake Balaton
• Los Angeles, USA – Long Beach
• Paris, France – Marseilles

To get to the Olympic Games sailors often go through the youth pathway, sailing at the Youth Olympic Games and the Youth Sailing World Championships.

Buenos Aires, Argentina will host the next edition of YOG in 2018 and the committee received a report on how YOG is a laboratory for sporting innovation, aiming to reach and engage the youth of the world. Coming up next though will be the Auckland 2016 Youth Sailing World Championships in New Zealand from 14-20 December. A progress report was received from the Youth Worlds Sub-committee and the Auckland 2016 organisers are set to host a memorable championship.

A number of submissions placed on the table were discussed and the committee made their relevant recommendations to World Sailing’s Council.

Oceanic and Offshore Committee
The Oceanic and Offshore Committee meeting began with updates from the working parties to the Committee and observers. The working party presentations included the universal measurement system regarding unified boat passports for rating systems, the World Sailing incident reporting scheme which would investigate offshore incidents to learn about safety in the discipline and structural integrity to investigate a scheme for in-build inspection of new racing yachts.

Reports followed with presentations from the three international rating systems – ORCi, ORC Club and the IRC.

From the reports, the discussion moved to the submissions which included a lengthy debate about an IRC World Championship. This resulted in a recommendation for a combined rating World Championship in 2018 (Submission 045-16). The recommendation was voted a unanimous yes. The decision is subject to ratification by World Sailing Council and further work from the respective rating systems.

Included in the meeting was a discussion around ideas for Offshore sailing in the Olympic Games. Ideas included overnight offshore racing, on-board video and virtual regattas to compliment the showcase.

With the meetings programme concluding today, the recommendations and reports will now go to the World Sailing Council who will meet on Friday November 11 from 13:00 – 18:00 local time, 12:00 – 17:00 UTC. The meeting will be streamed LIVE on YouTube:

Conference details – Live blog – Facebook

Source: World Sailing

About World Sailing’s Annual Conference
World Sailing’s Annual Conference brings together up to 700 delegates every first full week of November. It is the central meeting point where the strategy of sailing is reviewed, discussed and celebrated. Over the Annual Conference, participants plan for the future, make key decisions to drive the sport forward, share best practice and generate new ideas. The 2016 Annual Conference will be held in Barcelona, Spain at the Hotel Renaissance Barcelona Fira on November 5-13.