Evidence provided to the DPN committee by regatta organizers.

Open class racing
Wind factors must be used
Only buoy racing, traditional upwind downwind with possibly a reach. The USSailing course card is your guide.

Again, if the evidence supports your claim that F18 has become faster over time then the number will be adjusted.

The only role I see the NAF18 Championship results and any championship for that matter is to show who is your top guns are in each class.

If I were on the DPN committee, I would look at the championship results to determine the top guns. Look at the results at the Alter Cup Championships and see how the skippers measured up, this is about the only place where the top guns in range of classes race each other straight up. Finally I would review all the open class results with maybe a little extra attention paid to the area qualifier which I would then use to calculate an adjustment if the evidence supported it.