Corrections to previous post shown in RED

Werner Esswein
said

Version 1:

At the windward mark (without offset) A enters the zone clear ahead of B. Both starboard tack. By rounding the mark A opens a gap to the mark and b sails inside between the mark and A. A sails a gybe set and B take a crash gybe to avoid contact and protests.

As long as A's gybe was part of her action to round the mark as necessary to sail the course (which it appears it was), A is sailing within the mark-room to which she is entitled under rule 18.2b and, if she breaks rule 10, she shall be exonerated in accordance with rule 21a.

Case 63
Definitions, Mark-Room
Rule 18.2(b), Mark-Room: Giving Mark-Room
Rule 18.2(c)(2), Mark-Room: Giving Mark-Room
Rule 21(a), Exoneration
At a mark, when space is made available to a boat that is not entitled to it, she may, at her own risk, take advantage of the space.

Version 2: A sails one hull length downwind starboard and gybes then inside the zone.

As long as A's gybe was her proper course (which it appears it was), A is sailing within the room to which she is entitled under rule 18.2c and, if she breaks rule 10, she shall be exonerated in accordance with rule 21a.

A, gybing one boat length downwind of the mark, has been given the mark-room she is entitled to and rules 18.2b and 18.2c cease to apply (rule 18.2d): A is not entitled to mark-room or room to sail her proper course.

A on port tack does not keep clear of B. A breaks rule 10. On valid protest penalise A

Version 3: B is at the beginning on port and tacks in the zone. Is there a difference?

A's entitlement to mark-room now arises under rule 18.3.

In the Version 1 scenario, A's gybe was part of her action to round the mark as necessary to sail the course, A is sailing within the mark-room to which she is entitled, now under rule 18.3 and, if she breaks rule 10, she shall be exonerated in accordance with rule 21a.

In the Version 2 scenario, A, gybing one boat length downwind of the mark, has been given the mark-room she is entitled to,and is no longer sailing within the mark-room to which she is entitled, and, being entitled to mark-room under rule 18.3 is not entitled to room to sail her proper course under rule 18.2c. On valid protest, penalise A.

Version 4: While gybing, B has contact with A.

Gybing is instantaneous: it is not possible for any event to occur 'while gybing'.

Assuming that the contact caused injury or damage and exoneration is not available under rule 14.

If contact occurs before A has gybed, A has broken rule 16.1. If contact occurs after A has gybed, A has broken rules 10. In both cases A has broken rule 14 (Case 99) A, sailing within the mark-room to which she is entitled, shall be exonerated for breaking rules 16.1 or 10 in accordance with rule 21a, but rule 21a does not provide exoneration for breaches of rule 14. On valid protest penalise A.

Case 99
Rule 10, On Opposite Tacks
Rule 14, Avoiding Contact
Rule 44.1, Penalties at the Time of an Incident: Taking a Penalty
Rule 64.1(b), Decisions: Penalties and Exoneration
The fact that a boat required to keep clear is out of control does not entitle her to exoneration for breaking a rule of Part 2. When a right-of-way boat becomes obliged by rule 14 to “avoid contact . . . if reasonably possible” and the only way to do so is to crash-gybe, she does not break the rule if she does not crash-gybe. When a boat's penalty under rule 44.1(b) is to retire, and she does so (whether because of choice or necessity), she cannot then be disqualified

What is it in the given scenario that indicates that a gybe was integral to rounding the mark?Version 2:

Does she sail one boatlength downwind OF THE MARK before gybing?
Or was she initially high and, after sailing one boatlength downwind, gybe while still at the mark?

BTW, I am seeing a lot of claims of "room freely given" that are barely more than squeak-through beam width - not the required keep clear room.

Phil,

In my understanding, a boat that is changing course around a mark is rounding the mark.

In what way would a gybe-set at the mark NOT be rounding the mark as necessary to sail the course?

Werner,

What point(s) were you trying to draw out by posing these questions?

I assume that it wasn't because you didn't know the answers .

John, when a bear-away were just as fast or faster to the finish, then a gybe set onto port gybe meant to foul or control the other boat would not be rounding as necessary to sail the course.

And how on earth could a protest committee be satisfied that 'a bear-away were just as fast or faster to the finish'?

If you were going to argue about it, wouldn't you be focussing on whether it was necessary to gybe to sail the course?

Then, what about rule 18.2c(2)?

Sorry, port's only concern should be if she would have had time to cross clearly across starboards bow if she doesn't tack, since she ended her completed tack ahead in front she must have. The act of tacking would have slowed her down but by evidence given she ended in front. Case 50 does require the protest committee to agree with starboard's claim, they didn't. Unless some judgement by some independent review is allowed, every time a starboard tacker wants to claim they might have been affected, they can claim a foul. I been in that actual situation a few times when the starboard boat had taken action many boat length away and the protest had been disallowed. Case. 50 does not give an automatic defense against Lee bow action.

re 18.2c2
Her proper course is defined in the absence of the other boat. So if a bear away is clearly faster to a skewed next mark, then that is the proper course. A gybe would be tactically aggressive and improper.
How to determine? Presumably via processing of starboard tacker's protest.
Also consider my linked question of where ("after sailing 1 BL downwind") the gybe occurred. Had she cleared the windward mark and ended her mark room?

Ernest,

I assume that your post is in response to the discussion we were having in the Port Starboard Lee Bow tack thread, and I've responded to it there.

Philip Hubbell
said Created: Yesterday 17:21

re 18.2c2
Her proper course is defined in the absence of the other boat. So if a bear away is clearly faster to a skewed next mark, then that is the proper course. A gybe would be tactically aggressive and improper.
How to determine? Presumably via processing of starboard tacker's protest.
Also consider my linked question of where ("after sailing 1 BL downwind") the gybe occurred. Had she cleared the windward mark and ended her mark room?

Can't dispute that if the leeward mark is skewed so that the starboard gybe is obviously favoured, then proper course will not (usually) be to gybe.

Do you agree that if the leeward mark was skewed so that the PORT gybe was obviously favoured, then a gybe set at the mark would be rounding as necessary to sail the course, or a gybe one boatlength after the mark would be sailing a proper course?

I think the OP scenario took the mark to be square downwind, so that neither gybe was obviously favoured.

Tactical aggression is not a factor that a protest committee should be considering: either boats break the rules or they don't: their state of mind, or tactical intention is irrelevant.

Isn't it a fair assumption from the OP that A rounds the mark within say, less than half a boat length of it, so that when 'A sails one hull length downwind starboard and gybes', she is at least half a boat length downwind of the mark?

Where, in your opinion, would A need to be relative to the mark (N, S, E, W, and distance) for the analysis to be any different?

18.2.c.2 ends when A has cleared the mark.
.
A sailed wide of the mark, allowing B to gain an overlap between A and the mark.
A sails a full BL downwind, and (by your analysis) 1/2 BL beyond the mark.
A has been given her mark-room.
18.2.c.2 has ended.
Both boats are sailing downwind on starboard.
B is leeward and may hold her course. A must keep clear.
If A gybes onto port and into B, A violates 10 and 14, possibly 16.1.
.
If A disputes this, her remedy is to protest, not to collide.

Are we speaking the same language?
When you say "sailed 1/2 BL past the mark, I see the mark abaft her transom, not her bow.
Just checking. Calibrating.

Can I suggest to have a look at Match Race Call ?
Kim

MR Call B12.

I don't think a call about rule 19, when both boats are clearly at the obstruction, and will have to travel about 1 BL until they are no longer at the obstruction and rule 19 ceases to apply assists analysis of a mark-room scenario.

Philip Hubbell
said Created: Fri 16:04

Are we speaking the same language?
When you say "sailed 1/2 BL past the mark, I see the mark abaft her transom, not her bow.
Just checking. Calibrating.

In Version 2

Mark is left about half a boat length clear astern of A.

A has completely 'left the mark on the required side', is no longer at the mark or 'rounding the mark as necessary to sail the course'.

Philip Hubbell
said Created: Fri 15:38

18.2.c.2 ends when A has cleared the mark.

Because rule 18.2d says OK, got that.
.
So my answer to Version 2 was wrong.

A sailed wide of the mark, allowing B to gain an overlap between A and the mark.
A sails a full BL downwind, and (by your analysis) 1/2 BL beyond the mark.
A has been given her mark-room.
18.2.c.2 has ended.
Both boats are sailing downwind on starboard.
B is leeward and may hold her course. A must keep clear.
If A gybes onto port and into B, A violates 10 and 14, possibly 16.1.

.Agreed, except that the OP Scenario was that B gybed away and there was no contact, so rule 14 is not broken.

If A disputes this, her remedy is to protest, not to collide.

Well, violence is never a solution .

The diagram and comments I have prepaed above epresent my thoughts on the first 2 questions that Werner posed regarding gybe sets at the windward mark.
As to question 3, the last sentence of rule 18.3 states that when 18.3 applies rule 18.2 doesnot apply between them. I understand this to mean that neither boat had Mark-Room thereafter. However, exoneration under rule 21 was still available in regards to finfringements of the provision of room in other rules such as rules 15 & 16.
And I think the answer to Werner's last question, of what would happen in the event of contact occurring during the gybe set, would depend on the facts surrounding the contact, but in the first two scenarios, gybing at the mark and gybing 1 boat length after the mark, as long as A (Yellow) was sailing th the room to which she was entitled to sail in, Blue would be DSQ.

regards, Phil.

18.3 mark-room only applies when the boat that did not tack becomes overlapped inside the one that tacked.
That is not the case here.

Phil M

If Y, starboard windward, give way boat, sails 1 boat length after the mark, then gybes onto port, give way boat, how is she entitled to room?

Hi Philip,

It's true that Rule 18.3 says in part: ".......and she shall give Mark-Room if that boat becomes overlapped inside her". However, I think it's clear that rule 18.3 begins to apply from the very moment a port tack boat passes head to wind inside the zone if the other boat has been on starboard tack since entering the zone.

The important bit of rule 18.3 to me, is that rule 18.2 no longer applied and neither boat had mark-room as they manoeuvred around the mark.

Phil.

Phil.

Hi John,

Thanks for drawing my attention to question 2. I regret that I have misrepresented the situation. I'm sure you'd agree that a boat's entitlement to mark-room finishes when she has passed the mark and is on the next leg of the course. I've further developed the diagram to clearly show Yellow past the mark and no longer entitled to mark-room.

I got my knickers in a knot over Yellow's right to additional "room to sail her proper course while they remain overlapped", in 18.2(c)(2). But if no part of 18.2(c) applies after Yellow has been given mark-room as per 18.2(d), Yellow has no protection from rule 21 after position 5.

Phil M,

As you might have seen from my embarrassed corrections to my earlier post, I suffered from the same knicker knottedness. Phil Hubbel draw my attention to my mistake.

The benefits of collegial discussion demonstrated yet again.