Now you are doing it yourself Dermot, I didn't refer to the "a beam" in this specific situation. I refered to the "keep clear and allow room to the other" rule in this situation.

Now I know why I dislike rule discussions. The bloody things are just to much open to intepretation.

I can't remember whether the "mast a beam" rules was cancelled or not. I have a year 2000 rule book I use so I guess I can be reading from an outdated book here. That would be my mistaken.

However I still claim that if you force another to make a crash by actively luffing up or have him risk collision that you are (probably) at fault as well. Because if he had room to go below then he would have done so; the fact that he was FORCED to flip sort of implies he didn't get enough time/room to stay clear. From this point onward it is up to the personal intepretation of the judges of what "enough" means.

With respect to barging (I agree with you Dermot here) I think the thigns I wrote got misunderstood. I wrote that both baots were close hauled side by side. This is not the same as coming of a beam reach trying to get in. It is my experience that alot of sailors don't know what barging actually is. Often they think it means that nobody can be to their luff side, which is just non-sense.

Anyway, I neither had any need of both rules. I don't do "mast a beam" and I don't start near the committee boat. Too much risk of running into trouble in both situations. I stear clear or threaten to pass above while actually passing the baot through their lee-side. Mostly they think that their windshadow will block me but most of the time it doesn't.

So I think I agree with several others in this thread that you are best by finding ways around problem situations. Once you get into rule conflicts then the damage has already been done.

I think I will leave it at this. Got some video editing to do.

Good thread by the way, guys. Never hurts to cover the rules one more time ahead of the season.

Wouter