Difficult one re the ollies.....
Would the other manufacturers "let" the Tiger be the olympic class? Maybe not.
Would the other F18 classes be happy with the Tiger? Nope
Would making the Tiger the Olympic class be good for the F18, probably not.
Would the "fat men in Mono's" be happy with a development class like the F18, Nope
Were the "fat men in Mono's" happy with the Tornado as it is a development class(I know the T assoc say it's one design, but it's not, more than one manufacturer, nothing to stop others entering the market and as we have seen, sails are open within certain paramaters) - Nope
However, all the manufacturers can make massive trouble if one class of F18 is chosen, so if the Multihull gets back in, I'd bet it would be the T, or some other "designed for the ollies class".
I wouldn't make all of these assumptions when you're talking about the IOC. They're perfectly happy to use old equipment from one manufacturer (I'm thinking Laser here).
I do agree that IF (and these are big IFs) they choose the Tiger and IF they want to not allow development, that could cause issues for the class. They would essentially have to pick the boat and freeze the design to the current design at the time, or pick an end date for development, or something to that effect. Again, this assumes that they want SMOD, not sure if that's going to be a priority for them.
And, once they make any decision, they don't seem to be the type that care what anyone else thinks, sailors, or otherwise; so I'm not putting much weight on the idea that the non-chosen manufacturers can cause much heartache for them. The manufacturers can try, but it wouldn't look good PR-wise for them to cause more trouble regarding multihulls after the current mess we're in.
Mike
