The Bosun
Sailing as an Olympic sport is disappearing up its own fundamental orifice. A once-revered ‘discipline’ of the Games is unfathomable to the general public and unattractive to the media.
The most depressing aspect of this failure is that every recent attempt by the governing authorities to improve sailing’s appeal has actually made it worse.
Fidgeting around with illogical decisions as to which classes should be granted Olympic status was bad enough. Remember the fiasco of dumping the Finn? Remember that failed proposal to introduce a mixed-gender, two-handed offshore event?
But the real rot had already set in with the introduction of ‘Medal Race’ finals. This entirely synthetic format is an affront to the fundamental principle of competitive sailing: that the contest is conducted over a set series of races and the boat with the lowest total score wins. Simple, fair, but not good enough for World Sailing and the IOC. They insisted on some kind of climactic, winner-take-all shoot-out they imagined would generate ‘spectator drama’ and make for gripping TV.
What they got instead was one of the most unfair results in sporting history. At the 2024 Olympics the British sailor Emma Watson finished the qualifying series with a 31-point lead in the Women’s Windsurfing. She was clearly the best at her event and deserved the Gold Medal. But much lower-placed entrants then battled out a quarter-final and semi-final on the race course while Watson waited. In the medal race she came third, a patent injustice.
So, what did World Sailing and the IOC do? A sensible response would have been a return to the traditional regatta format. Oh, no. They have now complicated Olympic sailing even further. Here is a precis of just part of the official outline of the new system. Please pay strict attention:
- Instead of one medal race, the top 10 boats compete in a new format. This is being tested as two or more final races, rather than one.
- To ensure top performers are not instantly penalized, points from the opening series are carried over but compressed to ensure no competitor is more than 9 points ahead, and 4th–10th place are no more than 18 points behind 3rd, keeping the field tight.
- The final race(s) are designed to make it possible for anyone in the top 10 to win a medal, aiming for a “knockout” scenario rather than relying entirely on cumulative scoring.
- Races are shorter (around 20-30 minutes), focusing on providing a “spectacle” and high-drama TV audience engagement.
Got all that? Complexity in scoring is death to any sport. This new format guarantees that media attention – if any – will be confined to the final race. And there is still nothing to prevent an injustice equal to that appalling windsurfing result in 2024. Nice work, fellas.
The Bosun
