Under rule 60.4(a)(2) A protest is invalid if ... she was not involved in it or did not see the incident.
A competitor watching a replay of the start sees two boats make contact. Neither boat takes a penalty although it is clear from the video that there was contact. The competitor notifies both parties and files a hearing request within the time limit alleging that both boats broke rule 14 and neither took a penalty.
1) Does seeing a video of an incident meet the requirement to "see the incident"?
2) Is the protest valid?
3) If valid what penalties, if any, should be imposed by the protest committee?
It is an absurd change but seems to be a reallity.
Rule 60.4(a)(2) is changed as follows: “if it alleges a breach of a rule of Part 2 or rule 31 and is
from a boat that was not involved in and did not see, the incident, or”.
If a protest concerns an incident observed by the protestor in the racing area:
I understand this to mean that the observing must take place in the racing area.
It doesnt address the nature of the observation.
How about if a boat, whil racing in the racing area observes an incident in the racing area:
Recently i had two protests,, days after an event finished, when the boat, watched the event vidios, saw what it considered breaches of the class rules.
How do you apply protest time limits to this?
Was it a dimension/measurement issue (that could be observed after racing by the technical committee?
Was it a prohibited action or configuration while racing?
Was it an instantaneous or an ongoing breach?
IMHO they saw a video depicting the incident. They didn't see the incident.
So no. Invalid.
...but she was not involved in it OR did not see the incident...
Using an OR rather than AND means that a competitor CANNOT protest any incident that they were not involved in. It doesn't matter whether they saw it or not.
To explain, if a boat was not involved in an incident, but saw it (either live or on video), the propositional logic parses out as:
Protest is NOT valid if:
Whoever wrote the new version of 60 didn't check the logic of the new wording carefully enough.
Side note: Why doesn't World Sailing make draft versions of rules available for public comment? That's what we do in the software industry -- it's called open source software -- and it leads to much better quality. Good feedback can come from anywhere, and more eyes on a draft of code or rules catch more issues. Everyone reading this post is using open-source software and benefiting from this open feedback process.
For reference, the 2021-2024 equivalent rule, 60.1.a, reads as:
A boat may (a) protest another boat, but not for an alleged breach of a rule of Part 2 or rule 31 unless she was involved in or saw the incident;
For a boat that saw an incident but wasn't involved in it, the prepositional logic of these parses out as:
Protest is valid if:
The 2025-2028 has a tricky combination of double negatives and OR clauses that would be right at home on a university-level logic or software engineering course (which I took, hence the pedantic analysis above).
Again -- World Sailing needs to do better by having more of the sailing community review draft rules.
They do .. they are called "Yellow Pages". Forum member Ric Crabbe found that error and shot a red-flare through the proper channels ... but the word must not have made it in time.
The "public comment" aspect is that you send your comments through your MNA's rules committee.
As far as this particular error ... I believe an edit is on its way for 2026.
What if instead of alleging a breach of a rule of Part 2 or rule 31, the protest alleges a breach of rule 2. As the boat is alleging a breach of a rule of Part 1, rule 60.4(a)(2) does not apply, so we avoid that problem.
A competitor watching a replay of the start sees two boats make contact. Neither boat takes a penalty although it is clear from the video that there was contact. The competitor notifies both parties and files a hearing request within the time limit alleging that both boats knowingly broke a rule and neither took an appropriate penalty or action.
I got a quick response back from them stating that US Sailing identified the issue in Spring 2025 and notified World Sailing. World Sailing has approved a change for the 2028-2032 RRS. In the meantime, US Sailing recommends adding the following text in sailing instructions:
1.x - Rule 60.4(a)(2) is changed as follows: (2) if it alleges a breach of a rule of Part 2 or rule 31 and is from a boat that was not involved in, and did not see, the incident, or
It's disappointing that, based on that reply, WS may not publish a fix for 2026. If that's true, I just don't understand that.