Jake and Scoobie,

Now my one appearence in "The Room" it was approximently 1988 (maybe) ... those were the days of the "Instant Tack/Gybe" , all you had to do was slam the boat around and grab the boom and WHOMP it over and scream STARBOARD ... you DID NOT have to leave time or room to "Keep Clear"....so I didn't feel that it was right that w/ three boats overlaping me on my port side, that a boat just in front of me to my starboard could slam his boat around scream Starboard and sheet in ... expecting four boats to instantaniously to tack also. It made for some really VICIOUS racing .... and to be told you have to hit someone else, possible damaging your boat just to provide proof for a protest was just stupid. (Let's just say I did tack over and hit the other boat and put a hole in my boat as that's what usually happens when a TheMightyHobie18 T-Bones another boat ... I'm then having to put my boat on the trailer and going home to fix it ....

What this will do is cause the decision to drive in to be made earlier, "Go" or "No Go" ..... Starboard gets to make the call, NOT Port .... so yes there could be more protests intitially. And are protests a bad thing? ... if it prevents just one injury or boats from being damaged it will be a GOOD thing. But it will take EDUCATION!!!

The first time a "Starboard Tack" boat protests a Port tack boat under this rule ... and the Protest Committee asks a simple Yes or No question of the "Starboard Tack" boat ... "did you feel that the Port Tack boats left you enough room to sail your proper course to round the mark?"

If the "starboard tack boat replies "No", then the protest committee should find/rule that the Port Tack boat(s) violated Rule 18.2b and Rule 18.4

And because of the change to Rule 18.2c there is a "measurable" space ... so let's say there is a Mark Boat there w/ observers that say "No" the two boat length circle was full w/ port tack boats ... then the ruling most definately should go to the starboard tack boat.

But let's say the observers on the Mark Boat say the two boat length circle was clear and the Port tack boats were staying outside that circle then the ruling should be for the Port Tack boats and against the Starboard Tack boat

Let say there are multiple starboard tack boats also ... at some point the outside starboard boat will pass outside the "zone". This means that this boat has NO "Inside Overlap Rights" and must pass clear through the path of the oncoming Port Tack boats to the outside because if they tack they will not leave the Port Tack boats ample time and opportunity to "Keep Clear"

Remember Port Tack has options too ... the first is to hail the boats to leeward overlaped on them ... "I have a Starboard Tack boat w/ an inside overlap, I WILL need room and I intend to round just at the outside of the "zone" according to Rule 18.2c ...secondly, the inside boat can (and should) foot down to the point that they "rub/tap the boat to their leeward {I know "No Contact" but as a Judge I would rule that contact as incidental and find that the outside boat actually caused the contact by not leaving enough room for the "Inside Overlap"}... and thirdly, if they are Hailed by Starboard "Protest" then Port just goes and does their pentalty turns .... so it doesn't have to end up "In the Room"

The real issue is that everyone wants to "push" the envelope just a little too far w/ each unwilling "to give alittle bit". At our amatuer level is racing sailboats a issue of life and death ... is there large amounts of prize money on the line ....

So once it becomes clear that Starboard Tack gets to set the terms and will (most likely) win the protest, Port tack boats WILL then leave enough room so it is CLEAR/OBVIOUS that there is enough room no matter how competative they are or how big their egos' are.

And if you think that this means that everyone will now come in on starboard all we have to remember is your point Jake it's almost impossible to come in on starboard tack then gybe, dowse, round the mark w/o doing a ugly wide rounding ...resulting in being "rolled" by a Port Tack boat that rounds inside of Starboard and then slowly grinds past

Harry Murphey