Barging ... by our tune up mate

So OK he got me on a bad day ... protest committee disqualified him for this race, but not based on this clip ... Barging is no longer an accepted term ... had to do leeward boat rule. Fortunately had witness on different boat. No videos used in protests here.
Still not sure why he didn't have a bowman on.

And racers wonder why it is hard to find powerboaters willing to offer up a committee boat.

But why were you so slow? You weren't early to the line. A little bit of speed on and you could have closed the door way earlier and made him follow the leader.

Great positioning for the start though!

slow ... roger,roger ... this is the two minute version sans prior action. but with his speed I was concerned he could have dipped below me.

[[ subsequent note: After our incident on Sat, and the Spin A J95 running OVER the offset mark at the committee boat the following race -- on the second day, Sun., they added 10 feet to the offset mark line to get it even further away from the stern of the committee boat, .... their next step would have been to replace the small red offset ball with a full tetrahedron. ]]

Note from the Protest Committee chair re photo evidence.

Excellent video.

Photographic evidence is allowed in a protest hearing. Anything that could be evidence is allowed unless the Organizing Authority (GCSC) expressly prohibits it in the Sailing Instructions.

[As an aside, at higher profile events it is generally excluded. Reason being is due to expediency, meaning that it simply requires more time than is available to view and review every last .jpg, .mpg and like files that suddenly appear. Put another way, it takes too long to look at all of it and then deliberate it's value. What people say is relied upon instead, which was the procedure in this protest.]

The Protest Committee ultimately determines it's relevance and assigns the evidentiary weight of it within the context of the sequence of events.

In this case, I believe that it certainly would have reinforced Vee Jay's version of the incident. Luckily, other evidence was available, and sufficed.

If not, the hearing could have been reopened based on new evidence becoming available. The video could have come into play at that time as well.

Each protest hearing also affirms whether the system of dispute resolution works. My experience has been that it does, and did so again in this case. The video confirms that as well. Thanks very much for sharing.

Good Sailing!

Jeff Butzer
Protest Committee Chair
2011 GCSC Naples Porsche Cup

I thought you had a great start going and had the windward boat nicely in control (had he remembered or followed the rules).

As well, it's always enjoyable to sit in 19 degree weather watching and enjoying a sailboat race as we count down the days until we're back on the water.

As always, thanks for sharing your fun with us!!