From time to time, in the past, we have adjusted a boats handicap value, or several boats handicap values, but no more than what was adjusted this past Monday (see Bandit Regatta – Jan 6th 2020). With the publication of this post, we have reviewed the the entire North Sea Handicap Table. Instead of tacking this current post on to the end of a results post, were it might get lost and also make the results post entirely too long, we are posting this here, to shine more light on what was done in this adjustment. This type of adjustment will be now done yearly, during the first week of January.
During the course of the 2019 sailing season in The North Sea, there were 25 races held on North Sea Olympic Course (Long), the course used as the basis for the North Sea Standard1. The winners of those races were added to the table used to generate the standard. Since it’s inception in 2014, the North Sea Standard stood at 00:10:42. With the addition of the times from the 2019 race season, the time has now gone down, for the first time, to 00:10:40. The entirety of the handicap table was adjusted to reflect this change. We also added all the times for each boat that participated in those races to further adjust and update their handicaps. Some boats handicaps saw a single point drop from their previous handicap value, others saw no drop due to its value still falling within the bounds of the updated standard, and some boats saw an increase due to faster sailing times from racers increasing the value.
Several highlights:
The handicaps for the The Mesh Shop (TMS) Flying Shadow, solo and crewed, were entirely refactored using only times from 2019. All previous times were considered tainted or stale due to previous versions of the boat having a flaw that allowed a percentage speed gain across all polars when exploited. V2.0 of the boat does not contain this flaw. The Flying Shadow X V2.0 is the version currently allowed in North Sea races.
| Boat | Old Value | New Value |
| TMS Flying Shadow | 0.96 | 0.99 |
| Flying Shadow Crew | 1.13 | 1.16 |
In Monday’s Bandit Regatta results post, we noted the updates to some of the Bandit boats. Specifically, the Bandit IF saw a new separate handicap created for crewed IFs. 74 race times were added to the Bandit IFs handicap tab, which helped in creating the new handicap.
| Boat | Old Value | New Value |
| Bandit IF | 0.58 | 0.57 |
| Bandit IF Crewed | N/A | 0.59 |
The TMS Star Class had its handicap refactored off of the Backwater Bay Standard and onto the North Sea Standard, with its new value sitting at 0.64. Plus, its sibling boat, the recently released TMS Star Class – Vintage, was introduced to the table with a handicap time of 0.50.
Some more highlights, in no particular order:
| Boat | Old Value | New Value |
| Nacra 17 | 1.01 | 1.04 |
| Quest M-24 | 0.94 | 0.92 |
| One Design 65 | 1.03 | 1.01 |
| Volvo Open 70 | 1.00 | 1.01 |
| Wildwind OP-60 | 1.05 | 1.05 (no change) |
| Wildwind AC-45 | 1.22 | 1.21 |
| Widlwind AC-62 | 1.64 | 1.61 |
As always, we will continue to look at and evaluate the values on the table over the course of the year as new data is generated from races. Please see North Sea Handicap Table for more (click on the tabs along the bottom of the sheet to see individual boat data).
1 The North Sea Standard is the average sailing time of all race winners on North Sea Olympic Course (Long) racing with a 225° (SW) 18 knot wind. This is the time that all handicaps on the North Sea Handicap Table are weighted against.
North Sea Racing 