Rule of Law?

A couple of anarchists sent us updates on some rules situations
we’ve been following:

Mallory Malfeasance
Scott Young’s Austin YC team clearly earned their victory at the US
Sailing Men’s Championship (Mallory Cup), the notable story came from
some truly bizarre judge action. Young’s jib halyard parted during the
start of the 8th race after he got shot out the back of the fleet and
tacked. His jib came down, and a judge started timing how long it took
them to put on the spin halyard. Then they timed how long it took for
them to switch halyards during roundings. During the redress hearing,
the jury subtracted all the time from Young’s finish time, and awarded
him first place for the race. Completely contrary to the rules (A.10)
– when you change a score for a redress you either do average points
one of a few different races or you give the position at the time of
the incident. Chairman Bill Ross gave them their first place – Young
was embarrassed – he’d only asked for average points and deserved to
win the event with a classy performance from him and his entire crew.
It just pointed out how inconsistent and contrary to the rules some
committee’s decisions can be.

Melges Mix-up
We reported another out-of-whack RC action in the weekend’s Melges 24
US National Championship from Charleston, SC. There were very few protests
during the 44-boat event, none of which impacted the top boats, but
Simon Strauss’s third-place winning boat, Simplicity, had a beef with
management. It seems that ISAF and the US Class President received the
same anonymous complaint on day 1 of the event. The whining was about
anarchist bgulari, Simplicity’s tactician – the complaint was that he
was not properly classified as a Cat 1 sailor, and therefore, Simplicity
shouldn’t be eligible for the Corinthian trophy – a hotly contested
subdivision in the Melges 24 fleet. ISAF changed the sailor’s status
to "under review," and the organizers removed the team from
Corinthian standings after the first day of racing. A redress against
the RC was deemed untimely, but today, ISAF concluded their investigation
into Gulari’s status and confirmed his Cat 1 status. According to Class
officials and common sense, the new Corinthian National Champion is
Simon Strauss’s Simplicity – this also gives Gulari the award for the
second straight year. It’s a bummer for event chairman Reggie Fairchild
on Wireless to lose his championship after the event, but it’s the right
result for Strauss’s all-amateur team – a team that owned the overall
lead for the entire event until the final beat of the final race. Congratulations
to the all-anarchist team aboard Simplicity.