What if you used “present” instead of “in position”?

I would suggest "If one of the gate marks is missing, the remaining mark shall be rounded to port.".  If it is close enough for there to be confusion as to whether it is position or not, then it is not unreasonable for them to go between the marks as a gate, picking the one that is closer and rounding that on the "normal" side for the orientation of the gate.  After that they can ask for redress.

The suggested wording implies that either there might only be one mark laid where there ought to be a gate OR both marks are laid but one is ‘not in (the correct) position’. The latter option is difficult to manage as it is very rare indeed for both gate marks to be perfectly positioned. A gate mark not perfectly positioned may lead, in an extreme situation, to requests for redress but mostly the sailors choose the most advantageous mark and go around that one. So this wording allows for confusion. 

I suggest the following: “If only one gate mark is laid, that mark shall be rounded to port.” 

This simply means that if there is only one mark in the vicinity, leave it to Port. And by implication, if there are two, choose your favourite! 

"If only one gate mark is in position missing, that then the remaining mark shall be rounded to port"

This isn't rocket surgery.

I often lay the leeward gate, and at times there is either not enough time to get it laid, or the second mark doesn't end up where you intended. Having the option for the gate layer to remove it (quickly) makes for fairer racing. If you are worried about the word "position" in the SIs, then simply change this to "laid": “If only one gate mark is laid, that mark shall be rounded to port.” (Nick Hutton has the same experience & solution I see....)

'Missing' is a better word than 'laid' as 'missing' is a word used in the rule book, see rule 34, and its meaning is consistent.  Laid can mean a lot of things ;-).

I have seen this used
 If one of two gate marks is missing and has not been replaced as described in RRS 34, then the remaining mark shall be rounded to port. This changes RRS 34. 
Mike

What about specifying a distance defining what "out of position" means? E.g., "If one gate mark is over five boatlengths to leeward of the other, the windward-most gate shall be rounded to port."

I've never experienced a missing gate mark, but from this asymmetric dinghy racers POV it seems to me the lack of one could cause all sorts of problems with competitors not realising that a single mark is in fact half the missing gate and so on. I'm inclined to think it better to abandon or postpone if the course is incomplete because the fairness of the racing could be severely compromised. But things may be different in your circumstances. 

I agree with Peter’s initial comment “This instruction has the potential to create more issues.”  The mark is more often out of position, rather than missing.

I do write is the offset mark is missing or not laid round the windward mark only.

While it isn't desirable to have a gate mark missing, it does happen.  Would the best solution be to abandon the race if one of the gate marks is missing?  Or is it better to have a contingency plan that the sailors can easily follow?  What if the mark set boat can't take the location of the missing mark with an M flag because they are busy (at the windward mark, chasing down the missing mark, etc.)?

The difference between the windward and offset mark situation and the gate situation is that the gate is formed by two marks, whereas the windward and offset marks are rounded independently of each other and in a specified order.  The offset mark is no different than any other mark of the course.  To have a gate both marks must be there and the rounding direction for each requires knowing where the other mark is.

Properly written, such a sailing instruction can save a race for the sailors, the PRO from a bad situation, and a PC from a long night of redress hearings.  Seems like a reasonable trade-off to me.

I like Nick's wording. Competitors will generally seek to round the mark that is most advantageous given their downwind course, upwind strategy and the wind angle within the oscillation pattern. With the wind oscillating around the median (course axis), a gate set may be "perfect" at on period of the race but one or another mark will be favoured for most of the time. 
That said, my understanding of the wording is to allow for those instances where a gate mark may have sunk, or dragged so far as to be out of consideration. The alturnative is to abandon the race and that results in way more requests for redress, than rounding the remaining gate mark to port.

The leeward gate may be replaced by a single mark which shall be rounded to port.

strange this isn't in Appendix LG.

I like either: 'If only one gate mark is present ...'  or 'If one gate mark is missing ...'.

I also think MIke B's caveat about rule 34 might be useful.

Edit:  Thinking about it, if the 'only one gate mark is present' language is used, there is no need for the rule 34 reference:  if the race committee has replaced the mark in accordance with rule 34, then both gate marks will be present and the clause will not trigger.

'If only one gate mark is laid ...' has a problem:  it will be very rare for a race committee to deliberately lay only one gate mark:  the poblem ususlly is that one of the marks that was laid has drifted, or observed out of position and lifted by the race committee:  nevertheless two marks were laid.

Likewise with 'replaced':  this implies an action by the race committee, to 'replace' the mark, that is unlikely to have happened.

This has worked fine for me:

Mark 2 may be a gate.  If the gate is not in place, the existing mark shall be left to port.

Sue … My first thoughts regarding that language is … a mark can be part of a gate (18.4’s “gate mark”, where “gate” is descriptive of the individual “mark” a boat is at) … but a “gate” can’t be a mark (it’s not an object that can be left on a specified side). 

Do you have other accompanying SI’s / words / diagram that go along to define the course with/without a gate when you use that language?

Ang

Sue Reilly

Said Created: Yesterday 15:28

First, I think this suffers from the same problem as the OP.

It just opens the door to dispute about the meaning of 'in position' or 'in place'.

Second, I agree with Angelo.  A gate consists of two marks, each of which is a gate mark.  The gate as a whole is not a mark

I'm troubled by 'may be a gate'.  If it 'may be a gate' it alternatively 'may not be a gate'.  Which is it to be?  Competitors are entitled to know unambiguously what course they are required to sail.

No other wording is used. The diagram does not show a gate but a single leeward mark.  Been using this for years and there has never been a problem, not even a peep.  If I remember years ago we included the gate in the diagram and listed it as 2a/2b in the wording of the course.  But probably 4 year or so ago stopped that as everyone knows what a gate is these days.  

John C re: “The difference between the windward and offset mark situation and the gate situation is that the gate is formed by two marks, whereas the windward and offset marks are rounded independently of each other and in a specified order. ”

Rereading what you wrote above, John C, had me think “we are not talking about rule 18.4!” (another difference between the missing offset and gate-mark situations). 

When talking about an “out of position” gate mark, 18.4 is either on or off depending on whether they are “at a gate mark”.   So, is 18.4 on or off?

We could have 2 boats thinking they are racing under 2 different rule conditions. 

PS: Also, if boats do not notice this until very late in the leg, the boats setting up for a starboard rounding at the right-gate could be seriously out of position and disadvantaged, trapped on the outside of a wheel when they would have been setup as inside boat!  IMO, this seriously effects the fairness of the competition. 

How about this?  How about we not leave it up to the competitors and put it back on the RC?

If the RC can’t do that, then they abandon.

PS: I changed the suggested companion flag to flag F since flag A is used in other communication (and the single diamond visually sort’a conveys the meaning a bit, “The next mark is changed to a single mark”).

I think you are making a mountain out of a mole hill.  Has anyone had a redress filed pertaining to this?  I haven't and have been using gates for many years all over the country. As a wise race officer told me - keep it simple, cute kills. 

Absolutely agree with Sue Reilly. Can anyone really imagine a time when one boat notices a gate mark is missing and another one doesn’t? Or that the RC has time to signal a missing gate mark? If there’s time to do that there’s time to put the mark in! 

Seriously over-thinking this very simple issue. We have a couple of clear and simple sets of words. Choose one and stop worrying about it! 
And BTW we certainly don’t need any more flag signals made out on the course. The one proposed would come out maybe once every five years and no one would have the vaguest idea what it meant.

I don’t know Sue, a boat knowing if they are sailing to a gate or a single mark seems to me on par in importance as knowing if the next mark has been moved.  JMO. Ang

Just found that the World Sailing Standard Match Racing SI use the following wording for the standard course of a single windward mark and a leeward gate.

Mark W shall be rounded to starboard. In the event one gate mark is missing, the remaining mark shall be rounded to starboard.

A very wise IRO, whose initials are TD said, "Sailors are smart people that do not read."
An even wiser IRO, whose initials are PR said, "Don't be tricky.  Unless you like redress hearings."

"If one of the gate marks is missing, the remaining mark shall be left to port."  Simple and to the point.  If the competitors have radios, announce the situation on VHF. "Competitors, competitors, competitors. This is the Race Committee.  A gate mark is missing. The remaining mark shall be left to port." [Repeat]

In 20+ years of being a race officer and 50 years of racing, I've only seen a gate mark missing once. That's about 600 regattas and something like 5400 races.  That's a 99.98% probability of it not happening.  I'll take those odds on anything.

Angelo - most sailors can see a mark a mile away.  I know that is more than enough space for me to see if there is a gate or not when I am racing.  

That being said not all races are run by professional RC,  I have had times when we get on the water and the person/people on the leeward mark boat whom have claimed they know how to set gates get on the water and it is pretty obvious that they don't know how to set a gate.  It's sometimes wiser, especially if the first class is getting close to the 1/2 point on the run to just call it and live with a single mark at the bottom.  I have had marks deflate only to find that the mark boat does not have a working blower blower.  (For the record for any traveling PROs, there are adequate battery operated small blowers at Home Depot or Lowes that work like a charm, I now have 2 of them.)

Here in San Francisco it can be very difficult to set a gate mark properly to account for wind and current to try to equalize which mark is better to round.  After all, the purpose of a gate is to (try to) make it so there is no definite strategic advantage to one or the other and have the boats divide up accordingly.  I have seen more than once where they could not set the gate properly and simply removed one of the gate marks rather than have a really bad gate.