Race Starting Times

I was the raceofficer on Sun.13th Oct assisted by Keith Wheatley. I had not been
looking forward to running the race the weather had been wet and
gloomy all week and a 5 30 pm start in mid Oct did not leave any time
for possible delays I also thought there probably would not be many
entriesWhen I got to theclub at about 4 00pm I was pleasantly surprised the sky was bright
there was a light breeze veering to the South West and there was 30
entries!!!. We set a fairly short course trying to avoid the force of
the incoming tide. The rescue boat crews had arrived at the club in
good time and were able to quickly lay the marks. All the helms
responded to our request to get on the water asap we were therefore
able to get the racing started 5 minutes earlier that the scheduled
time.By 6 15 pm thebreeze had almost died away it was getting very gloomy and most of
the fleet were near the Salmon Pool mark trying to make way against
the tide towards the finishing line. I kept saying to Keith we are
going to have to make a decision to abandon the race and get the
rescue boats ready to tow boats back to the club before we loose
sight of them. Surprisingly by 6 30 pm 27 boats had crossed the line
and finished the race, the problem we had at the end was trying to
read the sail numbers as it was almost dark.Why have Isubmitted this report? I have been a member of the club for 20 years,
race start times have always been set as near to high tide as
possible this on many occasions has not resulted in enjoyable safe
and excited racing. If it had been windy on Sun. evening and boats
were capsizing it would have been difficult to see them from the race
box.The racing onSunday could easily have been started at 4. 45 pm there was enough
water a better breeze and enough light to have had a safer race.
There Have been many times during the years when race times could be
adjusted in the hope of getting a better breeze i.e. morning starts
late in June and any morning starts in July and Aug. when a sea
breeze often sets in after 11 00am, evening starts should be no
later that 6 30 pm at any time of the year as what often happens is
that any prevailing breeze usually dies away after 7 30pm

I feel that everything should be done to make the racing as exciting and as safe as
possible adjusting start times should help to achieve this . I am
sure that most of our sailors would prefer battling with the tide in less water in
a decent breeze to drifting around at high tide with no breeze.
Adjusting start times in the in an attempt to sail in a breeze may
also help to stem the declining turnouts we have had recently. I am
not bothered if my centre board or rudder occasionally touches the
bottom there are no jagged rocks to hit just soft mud, it just adds
to the challenge.
I hope that whenthe racing programme for 2020 is compiled some thought is given to my
comments.Ralph Wogan RS400

In general, I have to agree with Ralph - 9.30 starts don't tend to produce much breeze (particularly in the Summer) and 7.40pm is 'switch-off' time on Summer evenings. 

I seem to remember that at the Sailing Committee, several years ago, there was an agreement that 9.30 starts would be avoided where possible and that on days when two shorter races could be held, we would. 

Personally, I'd rather we had more sailing on better tidal days and accepted that on a few more days 'No sailing - tidal state' appeared on the programme.

As far as Wednesday evenings are concerned, a 6.30 start would usually result in a meaningful race being completed before the switch-off. However, I do appreciate that many people may find it difficult to get to the Club for the earlier start time after work.

Hi Ralph,
Thanks for your comments. The 2020 draft programme will be discussed at the next sailing committee meeting. We will  look at the race times carefully and hopefully get it as right as possible! 
Cheers Simon.

Hi Ralph, it is always difficult to get it right, specially when planning 1 year ahead of time.

What is the right balance: more sailing or more perfect start times? I remember you battling to get more sailing in, and inspired with this we reintroduced 9:30 races when 10:00 would not have been feasible, we introduced Thursdays when several Wednesdays in a row were non-sailable, etc.

Now the fine-tuning has to come from the race officer who can postpone the race if needed, set a shorter or longer course, decide on the number of lapses.

Unfortunately a race cannot be made to start earlier though, hence you have a point that it may be a good idea, for races near the end of the day, to have an earlier start time by 30', with possibility for the OOD to fine-tune by postponing.

Another issue is length of races, and this is all within the race officer's control. Sometimes OODs seem to aim for races longer than 1 hour, which is not always a good idea. Note also that in the situation that you described (little wind and getting dark) I would have suggested to lay a much shorter course: that would have been the most pragmatic way to avoid the situation that you described: and this brings me back to the first sentence of this post: it is not always easy to get it right!

We need to accept that it will not always be perfect. The important is to try!