I'm not going to bother with rule numbers as it just gets messy to read. This is going to be messy enough......

OK, if I was on the PC for this, my comment would be

"Why the <long list of rude words> did the reace officer not kill this race".

Here is why.......Remember PC's have to use FACTS.

How did the SIs define the course, did it state what the gate would look like? most say "between two bouys of the type <>".

Now, in this case there was no gate as one mark was missing.
So how can racers identify the place they should take the kite down and go back up wind to find the windward mark?
THEY CANNOT.
THE SI's say sail thru the gate, there is no gate, you cannot sail this course, keep going until you find the next race track WITH A GATE ON IT WITH THE MARKS as described in YOUR SI's....

IF the SI's stated there might be just one mark, then there would be a flag flown to indicate <gate> or <single mark to port/stbd>.

This tells you what to excpect and thus turn round. If they are not there(or you get a gate when you expect a mark), you do not have a race track. You were expecting a gate, there was not one, you cannot turn round by following the defined race track.




OK, so IMO, you cannot race this "course"; however.... YOu did and it gets worse....

So we could now say it's just port/stbd, but why were eaither of you rounding a mark that COULD NOT BE PART OF A DEFINED COURSE, so we might think we can say it's simple port / stbd, nope, not yet.....


Both boats (P + S) are attempting to round a mark that IS NOT A MARK WITHIN the racetrack (remember the SI's tell you you should be looking for a gate), so they are just both "rounding up in a bit of water".

Again we may still think port / stbd applies and P is wrong....

Not yet..............

Because S is changing heading and speed, P only has to react to what S does, and S HAS to give room to avoid, thus S cannot just come in, wildly drop and headup without giving room to P to avoid. P is also trying to go back upwind around a mark that IS NOT A MARK OF THE COURSE (refer SI's) as it has not been defined and so also has to keep clear of S.

Essentially it's a P / S, but with added chaos as both boats are dropping / heading up (remove the mark from this, it's not really there), so there is burden on both boats to either give room or avoid, and manover in a certain way.


Race officer should have killed the race PDQ or get a mark boat in pronto!