DN Western Challenge 2004 Planning Blog

Several areas to discuss w the members...

1: Corporate status... right now we're probably an unrecorded general partnership, from a legal entity perspective... given the size of the fleet attending our western challenge event, perhaps we should consider incorporating the organization.

2: It's a royal pain to try to score boats, and my understanding is, this is thought as a good thing to do... even if we insist there are no "bragging rights" that come from this event. One thing that would simplify the process is simply registering boats that wish to sail. Capturing name, home town, sail number, etc.

3: Independent of registration, there's some suggestion we charge a nominal fee to defray some of the costs associated with the event.

4: As an alternative, because the event operates under the sanction of the MISA, event sponsorship could be a possibility.

5: Thought we did an excellent job getting the marks and starting blocks up & down during the event, thanks to JD, Dr. and all the guys associated with this effort. Seemed like the pace of racing was just about right....

6: On the ice administration. We maybe need to think a bit about how to make this work slicker, starting positions, scoring, etc. without overburdening the event with formality.

7: Off ice admin, scoring, etc. perhaps we should have an actual regatta chairperson centralizing those tasks. I donno...

If you have $0.02 to toss into the dialog, or saw something that should have been done differently...this is the place to weigh in and add a comment.

mk

Comments

clipboard is in hand

If you want to handle the off ice scoring, posting, etc. that's great.

The on the ice process is pretty straightforward, once all the scoring material gets to the starting area.

I have a couple aluminum "professional auctioneer" grade outdoor use clipboards, with fold open drawers to hold pencils, sheet inventory, and completed forms, which I'd be happy to donate to the cause.

The "waterproof paper" must come from another source.

We should seek some "non-sailor" volunteers to score, or in the alternative use the "Maine System" as outlined in the Millenium Edition on "Think Ice",
- sail a scratch race to determine starting positions
- winner of scratch race starts & scores race 1
- Winner of race one serves as scorer for race 2
- Scorer of Race 1 Starts in Block 1 for Race 2
- Winner of Race 2 Scores Race 3
- Nobody scores more than one race, second, then third place sailors (etc) fill the rold.
- The race you score is your throw out.
- ergo, the good guys don't get a toss, choppers like me get one. :)
- The sailor who does the recap gets his boat taken down and hauled off the ice by the other sailors

$0.02 ... We've always used the event as a "tuning for the worlds" kind of event, allowing the guys to tweak and experiment, with good speed benchmarks, getting to top speed prior to the big events later in the season. I have some concern if we take our scorekeeping too seriously, the event will change and become "worth winning", changing the flavor of the entire event, but maybe that's ok too.