Dear F16 sailors,

The mainsail area change is proposed because of the following. If we say the Mast area = mainsail luff length multiplied by the circumference of the mast and we start pulling on the luff the area will be increasing and will pass the 15 sqm if we pull hard enough. When you are using a dacron sail the area will be bigger than 15 sqm in compare to a pentex sail because you can not stretch this sail more than a dacron sail.. The other reason is that it is not possible to measure the exact area when starting to pull on the luff because during sailing this is a variable, so the area will change constantly and also a change of bigger than 15 sqm.
When we are saying the total mast length is taken than we can calculate a distance where you are can pull the luff to to reach the 15 sqm and this will be the point where the blackband is put. So with a maximum luff length of 8100 mm the sailmakers know exact what to do and they are able to make a sail that will comply with the rules always, and the sailors are not at risk of sailing with a bigger sail than 15 sqm.

This change will also bring us more in line with the ISAF classes so that our measurement is more typical of other International classes, and according the ISAF measurement rules.

With regard to the sails built earlier, we as F16GC have said that there will be no ban of these sails and people don't have to buy new or re cut the sails, we want to say that there is a transition time for these sails. Normally when you are racing in competiton every 2 to 3 years you need a new sail to keep at the front of the fleet and keep up to date. So the transition period is 2008 and 2009, and if after this time there are still older sails in use this will be accepted during events (global challenge, nationals etc) if the event organisation ( measurer) and F16GC are advised of it. We don't want that people should have extra costs because of these rule changes.