lost classes and handicap numbers - Zenith

an area to discuss dinghy developments
DavidC
Posts: 216
Joined: Thu Jan 20, 2005 5:04 pm
Location: United Kingdom

Re: lost classes and handicap numbers - Zenith

Post by DavidC »

Hi Nigel,

The club can really use it how they wish. If they wanted to make a personal handicap system they could, equally there are various stages whereby results can be tweaked by inclusion or exclusion to provide a more averaged result. The small clubs should be able to get just as much benefit as the larger clubs and help to provide a fuller data picture.

There are choices and the RYA will be happy to talk to clubs and go through the process. The sailing water will often require a PY to be adjusted but clubs so often choose not to because they can then blame the RYA figure which will be wrong for their club. Equally we see clubs returning the published figures with no input and of course this again stops figures moving towards what we know they probably should be.

David is right, the Zenith needs to get sailing, but by using this system the accurate figure will be arrived at much more quickly. Also as the data base builds up there will be far morne numbers available for clubs to use than just the current published list.

D
Nigel
Posts: 1238
Joined: Wed Jul 12, 2006 9:51 am
Location: Thornbury SC, Bristol

Re: lost classes and handicap numbers - Zenith

Post by Nigel »

Hi David,

I think the problem will be for the club to decide how to use it. The easy way out will be not to.

As an example, at my club, there is only one Wanderer that races. A few Lightning 3682, RS200s, a Vago and the odd stuff that I choose to sail. A Wanderer is a pretty mainstream boat but with only one at this club, what do we do with the PYs? How can we distinguish between the impact of local conditions, sailing ground etc and the ability of the helm and crew? It is the normal statistical confusion between correlation and causality.

The arguments may go back and forth but the eventual easy answer will be to do nothing.

Sorry to be negative but I think also realistic.

Nigel
User avatar
azimuth
Posts: 153
Joined: Thu Sep 11, 2008 10:13 pm

Re: lost classes and handicap numbers - Zenith

Post by azimuth »

I do seem to have opened up a can of worms here! Thanks everyone.

Its great to have a much better idea of how the handicap translation should work, although i expect to be at the back of the fleet for a while so I suppose its not actually that important - lack of recent experience will be my main handicap for a while! I suppose really my main concern was if I was likely to have a problem being allowed to partake in racing when the Zenith's doesn't have an offical handicap - it doesn't sound like anyone thinks this is likely to be a problem which is great news!

Hope to be on the water again in April if everything goes to plan. Maybe see some of you at a cvrda event once I've remembered enough not to embarass myself too much, sounds like its about time the Zenith was represented at one of these...

cheers,

Keith
Keith.

Finn K60 'Sfinnx' Fairey
Zenith 74 'Azimuth' (rescued from the undergrowth 20yrs ago)
Zenith 61 'Bali Hai'... A family heirloom...
Rupert
Posts: 6255
Joined: Thu Sep 16, 2004 8:40 pm
Location: Cotswold Water Park

Re: lost classes and handicap numbers - Zenith

Post by Rupert »

The RYA state somewhere pretty catagorically that not having a yardstick is not a reason to bar a boat from racing. The Bloody Mary this year was treading on thin ice with its policy.
Rupert
User avatar
Brookesy
Posts: 498
Joined: Tue Nov 01, 2005 12:14 am
Location: Grantham. Lincs.

Re: lost classes and handicap numbers - Zenith

Post by Brookesy »

As Neil has already said, come and join us at Roadford where we a have a pretty varied handicap fleet and you will be made more than welcome. I'm also sure you won't necessarily be at the back of the fleet.
Incidently, as Race Secretary, Neil also will be monitoring and doing the PY returns.
GBR74 ex custodian of
GBR384 Mickey Finnale (Taylor,wood)
GBR455 Rubber Duck (Taylor, grp)
FD GBR350 Supercalifragalisticexpialidocious
Michael Brigg
Posts: 1663
Joined: Fri Jul 06, 2007 7:11 pm
Location: Gosport, UK

Re: lost classes and handicap numbers - Zenith

Post by Michael Brigg »

Hi Azimuth,

welcome to the greenroom of old sailing lags, where you can say what you like about French Tennis players, :shock: but like Carol "Queen of the Jungle" Thatcher,(I take it you are familiar with "I'm a Celeb..." ) if you open a Can of Worms, you will certainly end up having to watch someone eat them! :cry:
I do seem to have opened up a can of worms here!
:oops:

On your head be it! If you look back through the various threads nothing gets the guys going better on this forum than a good old discussion about handicaps. :roll:

You'll see...

Come May/June before the National Rally there will be a thread on this same subject.

So chuck in the slop and enjoy the feeding frenzy that follows! :P :P
Michael Brigg
DavidC
Posts: 216
Joined: Thu Jan 20, 2005 5:04 pm
Location: United Kingdom

Re: lost classes and handicap numbers - Zenith

Post by DavidC »

HI Nigel,

Rather than do nothing it sounds as if the club is in the very situation to do something. The club calculations work on a benchmark system so if you are happy that the Wanderer is a sound number and would work well as your club benchmark then use that and start from there.

There are 3 or 4 options on how much is to be included or not in the calculations and the RYA will happily discuss and advise. If the club is using a program that can link into the system then we reckon that it will take no more than 4-5 minutes a week to upload the results.

From this point you start to have calculations and numbers which relate to your racing. I cannot see the club has anything to lose and everything to gain.

Roadford's fleet will be a very interesting fleet and I hope that Neil will look at this and sign up to the system. The more the merrier and the more using it the better it will get.
Nigel
Posts: 1238
Joined: Wed Jul 12, 2006 9:51 am
Location: Thornbury SC, Bristol

Re: lost classes and handicap numbers - Zenith

Post by Nigel »

Hi David,

I think that my club would benefit considerably as we sail in very tidal waters. This favours faster boats or those that can hug the banks more effectively. It is how to take out the element of individual helm's skill and avoid personal handicapping that is the issue for me. We have nowhere near the sample sizes required. Perhaps another answer is for a system of categorising club sailing waters. That would give much greater sample sizes and allow small clubs to benefit with the confidence that the maths derives from a much wider set of input data.

As an example, we look at the (to be defined) criteria for sailing grounds and decide we are in category A. Adjustments to PYs could then be based upon all the category A data, not just the results at my club.

Nigel
User avatar
Ancient Geek
Posts: 1133
Joined: Wed Sep 10, 2008 9:50 am
Location: Sletten,3250, Denmark and Hampshire GU33 7LR UK

Re: lost classes and handicap numbers - Zenith

Post by Ancient Geek »

I do not handicap race these days at all, ever, but yonks ago when one did I recall the best races and results were in places like Oulton Broad (Broads generally.) or Whitstable where they had their own local handicaps nearly always time on time sometime amended as to conditions (Wayfarers being rather less well treated in a blow for instance.)
I do realise that handicap racing is the only way some of us are going to get a race, but some years ago clubs were also rather more Draconian about what boats they would accept.
Simples.
DavidC
Posts: 216
Joined: Thu Jan 20, 2005 5:04 pm
Location: United Kingdom

Re: lost classes and handicap numbers - Zenith

Post by DavidC »

I think clubs have to take responsibility for the racing at their clubs. A national figure is a good starting point and if there were the published adjustments so much the better. However, that is exactly what clubs were supposed to have been doing for over 50 years. However many adjustments you put in it will still be general, where with the new system it is yours.

I always wonder why people get so hung up on personal handicaps. I m the only Unicorn racing at my club at present. What ever figures are used or calculated it is only for me and is therefore personal. If you had Ben Ainslie turning up up every other week then you could rightly say that those results should be excluded. However, surely it is better to have a set of figures for your cub that give good racing. If you have a few boats that there are only one of each then you could argue that they are personal handicaps, but that won't change if you take the number out of a book!

Give it a try, You might get great racing and it would be perfect for your area and not an average. You could decide to change the numbers once a year or after each series.
Pat
Posts: 2555
Joined: Mon Sep 27, 2004 1:42 pm
Location: West Wiltshire (Wessex)

Re: lost classes and handicap numbers - Zenith

Post by Pat »

For cvrda racing the Zenith is listed at 92 - about the same as a classic Merlin, which we sail at Shearwater off much the same handicap as the Lark and the Laser and it seems to work.

As for the RYA initative - it needs the club sailing secetary to use technology first or want to delegate the job so Shearwater's results and returns will still be paper based!
JimC
Posts: 1721
Joined: Sun Oct 03, 2004 10:24 pm
Location: Surrey
Contact:

Re: lost classes and handicap numbers - Zenith

Post by JimC »

azimuth wrote:Also how do you translate from the old 3 figure PYs to the 'new' 4 figure ones -
For 1977 multiply old numbers by 1.20
For 1996 multiply old numbers by 9.46

So 92 = 1044...

Jim C
Rupert
Posts: 6255
Joined: Thu Sep 16, 2004 8:40 pm
Location: Cotswold Water Park

Re: lost classes and handicap numbers - Zenith

Post by Rupert »

Doesn't really work like that in real life, though, Jim, as boats have all been improving as mast sail and hull technology has improved, so a boat stuck in a 1960's timewarp will be slower than a modern one, even if everything is brand new, so giving a boat a direct "translation" doesn't work.
Also, not all the numbers that changed worked to that.
An example...The Firefly was 100. It changed, if I remember correctly, to 122, and then that was adjusted to 124 because of the returns. Now, 124 to 1173 is indeed a 9.46 multiplier, but by doing the 2 calculations one after the other you get 1135, which would be somewhat harsh. I fear the same harshness would creep in for the Zenith.
Rupert
JimC
Posts: 1721
Joined: Sun Oct 03, 2004 10:24 pm
Location: Surrey
Contact:

Re: lost classes and handicap numbers - Zenith

Post by JimC »

Rupert wrote:Doesn't really work like that in real life,
It worked pretty much exactly like that: I have the numbers. When you look at them its clear that they didn't use a multiplier overall but reworked the base data to the nearest integer, plus there were classes that had an adjustment at the same time but that's how it averages out. So I suggest that 1044 would be as fair as possible for a first class condition Zenith with new sails, spars, gear etc etc.

Surely allowances for this being a 50 plus year old boat are another matter entirely: if a club wants to make allowances for 1965 vintage/tech hulls, sails, spars, gear etc then of course they should, but the allowance needs to be made for the folks with 1965 Enterprises and GP14s too...

The Firefly is not a good comparison for PY purposes: its PY over the years has been rather variable - more so, for instance than the National 12 and the Merlin! It was as low as 1128 in the early 70s. Mind you the "jump" from 100 to 101 in 1975 works out at 1128 to 1140 in todays money, and the highest value it ever reached works out to 102 in 60s numbers, so just two points in CVRDA terms slower than its 1965 figure... its easy to get seduced by these 3 and 4 figure numbers into thinking that 10 point of PY is a big change. In fact its astonishing how little difference 10 points here or there makes to results...

The "Gold Star" classes for reference are Enterpise, Solo, Mirror and Wayfarer, which have been perfectly stable since the 1960s.

Here just for fun are the current CVDRA figures and 2008 RYA numbers converted back to the original system (plus one extra!)

Code: Select all

Class                    CVDRA  PY08
Albacore                 95/94   94
Bosun                      101  106
British Moth           110/107  103
Enterprise               98/97   98
Finn                     90/91   94
Firefly                    100  102
505                         81   79
49er                             66
Gp 14                   100/99   99
Graduate               103/102  103
Hornet                   88/86   86
International Canoe      80/79   80
International Fourteen   85/91   75
Kestrel                  93/92   91
Merlin-Rocket         95/91/88   90
Mirror                     124  122
National12                  98   96
Ok                       98/97   98
Osprey                   86/84   83
Scorpion                 94/93   93
Solo                   102/100  102
Wayfarer                 97/95   97
Last edited by JimC on Sun Feb 08, 2009 8:38 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Nigel
Posts: 1238
Joined: Wed Jul 12, 2006 9:51 am
Location: Thornbury SC, Bristol

Re: lost classes and handicap numbers - Zenith

Post by Nigel »

JimC wrote:Surely allowances for this being a 50 plus year old boat are another matter entirely: if a club wants to make allowances for 1965 vintage/tech hulls, sails, spars, gear etc then of course they should, but the allowance needs to be made for the folks with 1965 Enterprises and GP14s too
This does raise some interesting questions on whether/how to adjust a boat's handicap due to age. If a modern PY is based on returns from all boats sailing in that particular class, it could be argued that a new example benefits perhaps unfairly from its PY being based upon boats in a poorer condition. Perhaps there should be an age scale of plus or minus n PY points depending on the age of the boat. I have not heard of any clubs doing this but it would seem logical. Perhaps it is just all too difficult (this seems to be the major problem with any PY adjustments).

Nigel
Post Reply