Racing Rules of Sailing Revised for Olympics

Southampton, UK (April 1, 2016) – In their ongoing effort to simplify the racing rules, World Sailing announced today that, effective one week before the Olympics, the “room at the windward mark” rule would be changing to eliminate the advantage starboard tack has over port tack. This change will cause the rule for fleet racing to follow the rule used in the America’s Cup match races.

Under the new rule, the first boat to get to the three boat length circle is entitled to room, no matter what tack they are on. “We have seen this work fantastically in match races,” noted Oracle Team USA CEO Russell Coutts, who has been actively re-engineering the entire sport of sailing. “If the boat on port has room then the boat on starboard just needs to luff up and provide room.”

Since Coutts has discovered that match racing is boring, and his goal of creating a broadcast product out of the America’s Cup is futile, World Sailing agreed to work with Coutts on testing the AC racing rules at the Olympics to prepare for when the America’s Cup shifts to fleet racing in 2020.

“If a starboard tack boat cannot provide sufficient room to all the port tack boats that ‘beat them’ to the circle (or were overlapped inside the port-tack boat that ‘beat them’ to the circle), the starboard tacker will just call for room to tack from all the starboard tack boats on their hip,” notes AC Chief Umpire Richard Slater. “We cannot imagine any problems with the new rule.”

While questions remain on how this rule change will work when there are numerous boats on both tacks are arriving at the same time, Malcolm Page, Head of Marketing and Media at World Sailing, has confidence in the plan. “We are going to let the Olympians settle it on the water, and if there is chaos, we have confidence that it will make for good TV.”

On an unrelated note, Gowrie Group announced they are no longer providing insurance coverage for sailboat racing.