Overview of the Rule

Overview of the Rule

The Rating Rule

Management of the rule is provided by a Chief Measurer and Chief Technical Officer currently a role held by Bastien Pouthier along with a team of measurers located throughout the Caribbean region.

The intent of this Association is to handicap fairly the broad variety of monohull, multihull and classic yachts which race within the Caribbean region.

Four Rules are currently being managed.

  • The main monohull rule deals with racing yachts, both cruisers or purely racers, with a competitive edge.
  • The multihull rule deals with multihulls, cruisers or racers, foils (straight, C, L or T) or not.
  • The Classic Rule deals with traditionally built and rigged monohulls.
  • The Simplified Rule deals with yachts who want to take part in an event without the hassle of a full measurement and without the competitive edge. A variable rating system has been developed to use with the Simplified Rule.

Each Rule will compute a Rating (time correction factor) for each yacht which is intended to be representative of its true speed potential.

In order to establish a rating for each boat, a rating system and review process is in place. Each year at the end of the regatta season the measurers meet to discuss performance of the rule throughout the season and talk about issues, anomalies and proposals for improvements to the rule. Each year those improvements and changes are then agreed upon and the work done by a programmer who is employed as needed to do the necessary work on the database calculation.

The Measurers Role

The measurers input into this process is on a voluntary basis.

Any regatta, who must be a member of the CSA, using the CSA Rule may, in consultation with the CSA Chief Measurer, appoint and bear the cost of a CSA Measurer as Regatta Measurer (RM) whose duties shall include:

  1. a) Advise the Organising Authority and Race Committee on class assignment.
  2. b) Review ratings of all entered boats and notify the owner, organisers and the Protest Committee of any errors found.
  3. c) Be the “authority responsible” referred to in RRS 64.3 and perform any services required under that RRS from such an authority, provided that the CM has issued the necessary permission for the Regatta Measurer to perform this role.
  4. d) Correct errors found as permitted under the CSA Rule and as agreed by the Race, Protest or Technical Committees.
  5. e) Prepare and submit a detailed Measurer’s Report on the regatta.
  6. f) Any other duties requested by the Organisers that are appropriate to be done by a Regatta Measurer.

The cost of the measurer to the Organizing Authority is to provide for accommodation, travel costs and daily subsistence costs.

Find a list of Official Measurers here.

Boat Measurement & Producing a Rating

The Classic and Simplified Rules are self-declared rules and therefore the boat owner or his representative must provide the required details to the measurer.

The main and multihull rules are an in the water measurement rule which must be completed by an approved measurer. This measurer can be one of the many measurers around the region or the regatta measurer. The boat details and measurements are then input into the database and a program runs a thorough a long list of logic and formulaes to issue a Time Correction Factor or tcf. The measurer, Chief Technical Officer and Chief Measurer then review the measurements and issue a certificate once payments to both measurer and the CSA have been confirmed. It takes experience as a measurer and racer to understand the details of the measurement system.

The fees received by the measurer are to cover his/her time in completing the necessary tasks.  The fees paid to the CSA directly are used to pay for programming and server fees to ensure the database is functional along with costs necessary to support measurers meetings and also promotion of the rule and the CSA.

Membership fees create a small amount of revenue for the CSA overall which along with boat measurement fees allow the organization to sustain the rule as well as support sailing development around the region.

Click here to review the 2023 Measurement Fees.

© Caribbean Sailing Association 2018