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chris
Poke It With A Stick
1847 Posts |
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Andrew Blee
Wetter than a very wet thing
519 Posts |
 Posted - 05 Mar 2010 : 12:29:28 PM
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but nothing we can't argue about  |
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chris
Poke It With A Stick
1847 Posts |
Posted - 05 Mar 2010 : 12:32:14 PM
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you're just going to have to sail the 49er a bit quicker Andrew....
Chris
 425  720  "ERICSSON"
sailing pictures My pictures |
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Ally Jones
Quite dry
62 Posts |
Posted - 05 Mar 2010 : 12:56:09 PM
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Miracle +7 should give us an extra minute. Which us much needed.
Phantom looks to be biggest loser.
Ally Jones
Miracle3847
Contender 586 |
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Elizabeth
Quite dry
94 Posts |
Posted - 05 Mar 2010 : 1:14:51 PM
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| Good news for Toppers too (+5) - also much needed. More changes this year and some greater in size than previously, no doubt a reflection of the new monitoring system, thanks to Chris and all the other volunteers around the country. |
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MikeHall
Damp
109 Posts |
Posted - 10 Mar 2010 : 4:43:55 PM
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Hello Chris,
I understand that you may have had something to do with these changes and I was wondering if you knew exactly how the changes were arrived at.
For example, the Supernova’s handicap has gone up by one point and the Phantom’s down by seven.
Does this represent the average of last year’s racing, an average over a longer period or is there any human judgment involved?
For example, could the average for the Phantom be lower than indicated, as some here suspect, and could the Supernova be higher?
Mike
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Edited by - MikeHall on 10 Mar 2010 4:44:20 PM |
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chris
Poke It With A Stick
1847 Posts |
Posted - 10 Mar 2010 : 11:01:36 PM
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Mike,
Apologies to anyone reading this but it is likely to be a colinesque reply so if you arent interested dont bother reading on - here goes:
Yes, I have had something to do with all new handicaps published by the PYAG (Portsmouth Yardstick Advisory Group) of which I am a member. We are a small bunch of volunteers, we dont get paid for doing it but purely do it for the "enjoyment"... The PYAG are a group of people with varying different backgrounds to try and be as even handed about issuing new numbers as possible. So how does it work?
Clubs are asked by the RYA to make a PN return from their race results. Historically this has taken the form of a long document that has been tricky to fill in. It is also wildly subjective and unless your club had a scorng officer who went above and beyond his duty to try and calculate handicaps from results it was a stab in the dark when they came to fill in the "what number would you suggest" using column for each class. The easiest thing to do would be to enter the published number which would indicate to the RYA that at your club you believed everything was sailing to its current handicap. This is what the majority of returns seemed to consist of hence not much movement in PY's historically.
We have now seen the introduction of a web based returns system linked to sailwave or HAL. Draycote was one of the first, if not the first clubs to start using the system in anger (mainly due to me badgering Bas Edmonds, the technical manager of the RYA, as the button seemed to be there in sailwave but nothing happened when i pressed it). This new system now analyses data on a race by race basis. When you upload the race, the web site chooses a benchmark class from the classes sailing in that race. These benchmarks are ranked by the RYA depending on whether the class is deemed to sail to its PN more often than not, so something like an enterprise is a good benchmark and a 49er isnt. The other variable is the number of each class in a race. If there are several of one class in a race then more likely than not it will use the most numerous as the benchmark.
One of the benefits of a club using this system is that it very quickly builds up a database of returns for that club which can be used as "local handicaps". These should be implemented where possible as the whole ethos behind the handicap system is that it is a guide for clubs and where necessary clubs should feel happy to make modifications as they see fit.
At the beginning of the year I was sent 5 huge pdf documents, the biggest being about 200 pages long. One contained the returns for dinghies, one for multihulls, one for cruisers, one for keelboats and one for all of the web based returns. In these documents were not only the returns made for every class for the previous 5 years but other information including the club name, type of water, number of races, PN used, PN recommended and more. Current handicaps are calculated on the last 3 years returns weighted so that the last year is more important.
Bear in mind that returns for some classes run into the tens of thousands (laser) and others could be 1 or 2 and you start to see that the quantity and quality of data received needs some human intervention to decide what is and what isnt accurate/useable. This is kept to a minimum though and only used where deemed as absolutely necessary by the PYAG.
One of the biggest movers this year was the miracle class and Bas was recently asked to justify the movement on the Y&Y forum and whether it could/should have moved more. This was his response:
"I indicated that the Miracle showed that its number "could" have gone higher. When faced with a large quantity of data, you can look at it all in a number of different ways and the PYAG sometimes have very simply decisions to take and at other times some more difficult decisions to take. Sometimes the data we get is also not of the highest quality and this also has to be taken into account.
With the returns within the Miracle S2C, of the ten club returns received in 2009, 2 clubs showed a return 200 points higher at 1380 whilst the remaining 8 clubs showed an average of 1185. When looking over a three year weighted average, 1185 was also the most consistent number across the range.
At the end of the day, neither the RYA or the PYAG have the luxury of putting in a personal view on this. We, at the end of the day, have to stand up and justify to all of you why we have taken some of the decisions that we have done based on the data that we have. I did just this over the weekend at the Dinghy Show and in each case I hope I answered each of the comments put forward.
At the same time, I unfortunately do not have time to monitor this forum all the time so would ask that if anyone has any further questions on either individual boats or process, then please contact me directly at the RYA.
Cheers,
Bas"
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In previous years the numbers havent moved very much, mainly because of the paper based system. In the future i think we can expect the PN system to be more reactive and the new PYAG won't be too scared to move handicaps if needed. The old group erred on the side of caution and never moved any PY numbers by more than 1, SY's more than 2 or RN's more than 3 to allow for some smoothing. This also had the negative effect of not allowing the PN's to keep up with modifications to classes such as the Phantom with epoxy hulls and carbon masts, and was wildly short of the mark for development classes like the 14. It just couldnt keep up.
Boats like the phantom moved as much as we could justify this year, i.e. no more than the data was showing, but bear in mind this was still based on a lot of club paper returns saying 1043, which the PYAG have to take as being accurate as they have nothing to say it isnt. As more and more clubs (hopefully) shift to using the web based system we should see more real results based data filtering through giving the PYAG more data to use. We, as indivduals and the PYAG as a whole still need to be able to justify all changes made to anyone that asks. If you were interested in seeing any of the return documents, I can show you, but let me know in advance as i would need to bring the laptop with me.
One of the biggest problems we faced this year was the plethora of new "plastic" classes. They all seem to have about a hundred different variants including number of crew and sailplans. Clubs may have been returning for the same boat but by stating a different number of crew or sailplan the results become separated. Hence why this year the RYA has only issued one number for boats like the tera and pico etc. This is something we need to look at, how to standardise returns and make sure everyone knows the knockons from the action of misdefining a class.
For the future, we need to increase the number of clubs using the web based system. This year data from 36 of 87 registered clubs was used. Not sure of the total number of clubs returning via paper though. The RYA is being proactive in this and is offering workshops for clubs wanting to start to use the system. I also think that the future will see the new web based system allowing for the PN system as a whole to be refined further. We could, fairly soon, reach a point where you may see different numbers depending on type of water sailed. We also removed the TN category this year and made a new one called experimental numbers. The idea behind these is that they will be updated more regularly than yearly on the PY website. Any club registering returns through the new system will be able to see the latest numbers for these "E" classes. I would suggest that new classes such as the RS100 will feature on the experimental list until enough returns are made for it to be considered for inclusion in the PN list. This will hopefully eradicate the issue of new classes struggling to make the list for many years as happened with the Solution recently.
Blimey, if you're still awake and have any more questions then please do not hesitate to ask me either on here, via the PM, or at the club. Hope that kind of helps explain the process and the thinking behind some of the changes made this year.
Chris
425 720 "ERICSSON"
sailing pictures My pictures |
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Ashley
Quite dry
60 Posts |
Posted - 10 Mar 2010 : 11:58:59 PM
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Good job Steve Irish hasn't been sailing much in the RS200 otherwise we would be been cut more than 2. I'm going to start sailing bad for a bit !
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Edited by - Ashley on 10 Mar 2010 11:59:45 PM |
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chris
Poke It With A Stick
1847 Posts |
Posted - 11 Mar 2010 : 08:03:35 AM
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huh? There were over 9000 races returned for the 200....
Chris
425 720 "ERICSSON"
sailing pictures My pictures |
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robbersdog
Drenched
1427 Posts |
Posted - 11 Mar 2010 : 09:07:30 AM
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And Steve, good as he is, wasn't as fast in the 200 as he was in the 800. The 200 is sailed by a lot of irritatingly good sailors. With returns that high one sailor isn't going to make much impact, which is a good thing.
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Chris Smith
Flying Fifteen 797
Sailing Photos
http://www.sushidesign.net/
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Colin Newman
Wet
277 Posts |
Posted - 11 Mar 2010 : 4:14:53 PM
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Well done Chris, a great and clear account of how it all worked this year. As for brevity, a big welcome to the Colin Club!
Andy Rice in the current issue of 'Yachts and Yachting' lists several examples of how Merlin Rockets and Phantoms have dominated three recent handicap events on their current numbers. As more clubs come on board with actual race result returns I would expect their PYs to drop even lower and, may be, the Solution to rise a bit more, especially if I sail badly often enough!
As for the Experimental Number for the foiling Moth; 690 proves that life is too short to sail slowly. On sheltered inland water this PY will challenge any Moth sailor! May be to keep the start of pursuit races at Draycote to within a reasonable time frame, foiling Moths should go off with the 49ers, even if we use the new number in handicap races? All the Moth sailors at Draycote are currently novices or 'has beens'!
I was especially pleased to see the PY for the International Canoe acknowledges it is for the 83.5Kg 'One Design' and implicitly when returns are made for the New Rules, 50Kg narrower ICs they will lead to a lower and different number. Thanks tons if this recognition of the One Design was partly the result of your influence. The Class itself could not initially get the RYA to agree to publish an IC 'One Design' Number different from the New Rules number. So far there are only about three purpose built New Rules ICs in the UK and most of those are not being raced seriously. They did however finish in the first three of the Nationals, ahead of the ex-World Champion still sailing a 'One Design'. Fifth was an ex-one design with 10kg of correctors removed, then me sailing my 83.5Kg boat (containing 8 Kg of lead correctors). The New Rules ICs are intrinsically faster but less stable, my excuse for not wanting one. The 'One Design' IC is challenge enough for the elderly and for handicap racing there is little point in going faster but to a lower PY. The problem of the One Design PY getting reduced by inclusion with the New Rules results seems to have been recognised.
Cheers and thanks, you are an asset to us all!
Colin
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MikeHall
Damp
109 Posts |
Posted - 11 Mar 2010 : 5:37:05 PM
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Hello Chris,
Many thanks for taking the time to put together that explanation. Getting a handicap that works in all circumstances is impossible, and I know that the Phantom sailors at my other club, who sail single bottomed wooden boats, won’t be happy with the news on their handicap! I think that some 300 sailors here will be though...
Not only is there the problem of different boats, there is a problem of helm skill and attitude to contend with. An RS300 is a tricky beast that will throw out the inexperienced and the lazy, but other boats such as the Solo and Laser can be bought cheaply second hand and thus are sailed by everyone from beginners on old boats with tired sails, to Paul Goodison in an immaculate boat, but all on the same handicap. I am sure that more returns will improve the system, but unless you start assessing the helms in some way, some boats will still have an advantage over others in a handicap race.
Kind regards
Mike
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chris
Poke It With A Stick
1847 Posts |
Posted - 11 Mar 2010 : 6:43:34 PM
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Thanks Colin and Mike, the handicap system can never be perfect but we are trying to make it as fair as possible.
Mike, please remember that your other club can always alter handicaps if they are proving not to be working for your water/boats. The RYA cannot publish a list of handicaps for each class dependant on age of boat as we just dont receive the data in that format, as far as Im concerned that should be a job for the class associations. The whole point of the PN system which most people seem to miss is that it is a guide and club should be altering the numbers wherever they deem it necessary, obviouly backed up with evidence to justify it. If they do this though it is imperative that these adjusted numbers are returned to the RYA at the end of the year, or even better still on a race by race basis using the PY website so that they know people are not sailing to the suggested numbers.
It should also be noted as a couple of the above posts have mentioned it, the PN system is not designed to solely handicap the good guys, it should be a fair reflection of the boats performance, not the sailors, the good guys will, and should, still win.
Chris
425 720 "ERICSSON"
sailing pictures My pictures |
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Barney24
Quite dry
69 Posts |
Posted - 11 Mar 2010 : 8:43:10 PM
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Justice finally prevails!! The bandits maybe no more :)
Well done for all the hard work chris, it makes more sense now and should hopefully make racing closer and more interesting.
Tom
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MikeHall
Damp
109 Posts |
Posted - 12 Mar 2010 : 10:07:29 AM
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Hi Chris,
I am aware that the hadicaps can be adjusted - it's just that they tend not to be. Otherwise I think that the Phantom would be around 950 here!
Mike |
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Paulr
Soaked
559 Posts |
Posted - 12 Mar 2010 : 11:52:06 AM
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There is always the other angle: the person(s) complaining may not be good enough to sail their chosen boat to its handicap and the people that win do so because they are good?
ouch |
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Topic |
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2010 PY's published on RYA site....
