Improving ORC for the future

As the ORC rating system continues to gain traction in North America, particularly with the 2024 ORC World Championship to be hosted by New York Yacht Club, attention turns to improving the system’s use for the future.

Managed by the Offshore Racing Congress, much of the work gets done at its Annual General Meeting (AGM) which in 2023 will be held November 10-14 in Malaga, Spain. This event is where the feedback from thousands of ORC users around the world – along with the expertise of the ORC technical teams – is utilized.

“Our Annual Meeting is very important for our organization,” said Bruno Finzi, Chairman of ORC. “It brings together all members of the ORC community to look over what went right and what could use improvement in our past year of events and policies.

“Most importantly, it gives us a roadmap to be better in the future in our service to the sport. This is more important now than ever since we offer so many diverse classes of boats and types of racing, both inshore and offshore racing, and in boats racing with full crews or Double Handed.”

Among the committees to meet is the ORC International Technical Committee (ITC), who develop and improve the ORC Velocity Prediction Program (VPP) among other tasks, will meet to make final adjustments to the new year’s VPP and decisions on Submissions made to their committee.

Submissions for improvement to the ORC system are articulated by national authorities, submitted to ORC and then assigned to relevant committees for discussion at the AGM. Submissions provide vitally important feedback that keeps ORC rules and policies relevant to the racing community, from Sportboats to Superyachts and now Multihulls as well.

Users of ORC should contact their national authorities if they have specific ideas for changes to the ORC rules. The list and contact information for these authorities can be found here: https://orc.org/organization/about/nominating-bodies.

Submissions must be received by ORC no later than September 4, 2023.