Tokyo 2020 - Nacra 17 vote to become the Olympic foiler

by Sail-World.com on 24 Oct 2016 The Nacra 17 class have voted to become fully foiling - answering the supposed call of the International Olympic Committee for Sailing to have one foiling event in the 2020 Olympic Regatta.

On the 19th of October the Nacra 17 class members assembled for an electronic Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM), to consider three topics the key one being whether to stay with the partial foiling boat or go to a full foiling boat for the 2020 Olympics (assuming the Nacra 17 is selected).

A presentation covering the proposed changes to equipment, pricing, and procedure was shown to 50 members in attendance over the course of 2 hours. Details of how the boats would be made stronger and more consistent were included.

Also shown was three pricing options for a Mk 2 Nacra 17 was presented which can be downloaded by clicking here or can be viewed below

The three options for equipment going forward are:
a) retrofit a mk1 boat to go full foiling at a cost of 7,900 euros
b) Buying a new platform for at a cost of 14,500 euros, retaining the ability to sell the mk1 platform for a next cost of about 7500 euros
c) Buying a new boat for cost of 24,250 euros, an increase of about 2000 euros from the mk1 price

It is not clear how the Mark 1 and 2 versions of the Nacra will co-exist for racing above club and maybe national level.

Following the presentation was a discussion with questions and answers from class members and leadership. At the close the meeting, voting was opened to class members. 89 members voted from the total membership of 132, above the 40% threshold required to form a quorum. All of the motions passed, with the advertising and constitution motions receiving 87% support or higher. the major question of whether to recommend to World Sailing whether Nacra 17 should go fully foiling for the 2020 Olympic or not was a closer vote, but ultimately passed 48 votes to 33, for a 59% support level.

Following the vote, the Nacra 17 class sent a letter to the head of the Equipment Committee of World Sailing with the class recommendation. Class president, Marcus Spillane, will convey this position at the World Sailing Conference next month in Barcelona. Equipment of the updated configuration will become available following confirmation from World Sailing Conference of their position on the matter.

Team wishing to get onto the waiting list for Mk2 equipment should be in contact with the Nacra Sailing head office.