Gladwell's Line- Olympic Decision - will ISAF get caught by a Yorker?

by Richard Gladwell on 19 Oct 2010
In just over a couple of weeks the International Sailing Federation's Council will have to make a decision as to whether they have the courage to make the biggest changes ever proposed in the Olympic side of the sport; or, will they compromise and try to almost please almost everybody?

To recap, in 2008, on the back of one of the more misguided and certainly most contentious decisions the ISAF Council have made - to drop the Multihull event from the 2012 Olympic Sailing Regatta - the ISAF formed an Olympic Commission which looked at the structure of the whole Olympic sailing event.

Maybe it is an overdramatisation to say that the Multihull decision was the genesis of the Olympic Commission. But the astounding move in November 2008 certainly turned up the heat on a pot that had been close to boiling over for several years. The outrage from the Multihull exclusion forced the ISAF Executive Committee's hand, and the Olympic Commission was established.

Under the chairmanship, of Yachting Australia's CEO, ex Brit, Phil Jones, the Olympic Commission was expected to go the way of so many that have gone before and deliver an obese document that was long on platitudes and short on action.

Instead the Olympic Commission probably exceeded its brief, and cut long and deep into the sport to establish the causes of the malaise, and identify the solutions.

These have been covered previously in Sail-World, however in brief, the Olympic Commission painted a disturbing picture showing that of the 26 Olympic Sports, Yachting was one that had the lowest TV viewership, one of the highest TV production costs, the lowest paying gate, and had a competitor qualification/representation that was Euro-centric.

Costs of the regatta were substantial - and well out of kilter with its ratings.

The report from the Olympic Commission, presented to the Mid Year Meeting of the world body, ran to some 48 pages, it was tightly written, full of bullet points and lacking repetition - and managed to shoot, but not mortally wound, most of the sacred cows of the Olympic sport.

The sacred cows of yachting are a remarkably resilient breed - able to take the occasional bullet; politically very adept; they usually operate as a herd formed to meet any necessity vital to their continued survival, and if all else fails they will eat their young.

However in the second round of submission by the Olympic Commission, making the bullets for the Executive Committee to fire, the sacred cows have been pretty well machine gunned.

Buried in the mosh pit of Submissions to the November Annual Conference are two submissions to the ISAF, all from its own Executive Committee. The first Submission 96-10 modifies ISAF Regulation 16.1 and trades under the innocuous name of 'Defining the Process'.

Splitting the Herd

The effect of Submission 96-10 is to define six 'Core' Olympic events which can only be changed on 10 years notice.

With one bullet the Executive Committee have split the Olympic events into two - those who are in the Core Events group and the Rest.

At this point is is worth recalling the usual tactics of the Olympic herd when faced with a threat to one of their number. The simple political ploy of the established Olympic classes is to neatly switch from talking about Events to talking about Classes.

Under this switched political process the ISAF, instead of determining which Events will be sailed in the next Olympics, votes on which classes will be included in the ten or eleven events allowed by the International Olympic Committee. Having allowed the classes to lobby their way into being part of the the Final Few, the dear old ISAF would obligingly write down a list of Event names alongside the Class list and the job was done - albeit in a round about sort of way.

'Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose', to quote the French.

Sailing World's Stuart Streuli summed up the process pretty well writing in November 2007 saying:

Ostensibly, the process of deciding the events and then, a year later, the classes, allows the ISAF Council, which votes on the final decisions in both cases, to choose a slate of sailing events that best represents the sport. However, in practice it doesn't work this way at all. Each event is closely tied to a specific class. The Men's Heavyweight Dinghy is the Finn. The Men's Two-Person High Performance Dinghy is the 49er, and so forth. Separating an standing Olympic class from its event is about as difficult as taking down a South American dictator.

If the IOC applied similar logic, Kickball and Hide-and-Seek would be Olympic sports.

You can see Stuart's full story by http://www.sailingworld.com/article/No-Surprise-as-ISAF-Council-Bungles-Olympic-Event-Selection-for-2012!clicking_here.

The point being that there has never really been a conscious decision as to whether there should really be a Men's Heavyweight Dinghy, for instance - rather it is a designed event to cater for the inclusion of the Finn class.

This is a fundamental point to understanding the rationale behind the ammunition generated by the Olympic Commission. Bullets which are now being fired by the all-powerful Executive Committee at the Olympic Sailing Regatta.

Effectively what is being proposed by the Executive Committee is that instead of minor changes being made to the class slate, the whole lot have been dispatched.

That has set the scene for a zero-based for a Zero based selection process, for both classes (also known in IOC-speak as Equipment) and the Olympic Events.

The Objectives of the End Game

The ISAF has a few informal benchmarks that it must attain. First it must have a wide spread of countries - typically about 65 represented, but the previously stated target is about 75 if possible. Currently there are 128 nations in the International Sailing Federation, it is one of the smallest of the 28 Olympic sports.

Although it does not say as such, in so many words, the means by which the ISAF can grow its Olympic reach is to select Events and classes which are popular in as wide a range of its membership as possible.

This one objective of the submission covering the selection of Core Events.

In other words the Core Events are those which are both the most popular, and cover the very basic disciplines of sailing.

In Submission 97-10, six of the ten possible events Olympic calendar are prescribed.

They are fairly obvious, if you think about them:

• Mens and Womens Board or Kite-board
• Mens and Womens One Person Dinghy
• Mens and Womens Two person Dinghy

Consistent with its unstated Zero Base objective the Executive Committee only prescribes two/three classes to be sailed in these six Events - the standard rig Laser, the Laser Radial in the Mens and Womens single hander respectively, and the 49er in the Mens two hander.

The first four Core Events, should satisfy the objectives of attaining regional spread - they can be sailed by most competent sailors, in all regions of the world.

As an aside, the Kite-board does offer the made for TV option of running a speed trial (down say a 500 metre straight track), with points being awarded according to fastest time each day (with say three or runs per day per competitor), culminating in a final for the Medal race (using an event formula similar to that for the Olympic High Jump - where the highest is decided by an elimination process).

The other three Core Events will have their Equipment (classes) picked as a result of an Evaluation Trials process - to be conducted AFTER an Event has been agreed. The objective being to provide a way of keeping the Olympic equipment/classes up to date.

What's on the 2016 Olympic Menu

To fill the remaining four Olympic Events a menu of 11/12 options have been offered.

These include a second One Person Dinghy for Men and Women, but maybe there is a good Mixed option; a Multihull (Mens, Womens and Mixed); a second Two person dinghy, Mens, Womens and Mixed; a Mens and Womens and Mixed Keelboat. (A Mixed event is not currently sailed in the Olympic regatta but means having a male and female crew.)

To make the choice somewhat simpler the Executive Committee have made suggestions in six of the 12 options (remembering that four Events will be chosen) - offering the Finn as the second Mens singlehander, with the Womens option being subject to Evaluation trials; the Two person Multihull is suggested as a Mixed Event with the class being chosen after Evaluation trials; the two person Dinghy is differentiated as a spinnaker boat sailed with a Mixed crew; and in the Keelboat the mens option is to be chosen on Evaluation and the Elliott 6 metre is proposed for the Womens boat.

One issue that does not seem to be addressed is that under the International Olympic Committee requirements, two events cannot be similar. In other words, in Athletics you cannot have a 100 metre sprint and a 110 metre sprint.

So given the Core events, how can there be a second Singlehander, or a second Two hander? Oh yes, they can try the proven work around of creating a Heavyweight Mens Singlehander - but under that logic, why not have a Heavyweight Mens Two hander, a Lightweight Three Person Keelboat, and so on?

Stick to your Guns, Chaps!

At this point the ISAF Council need to draw a deep breath and recall the verse about the Duke of York.

The grand old Duke of York,
He had ten thousand men;
He marched them up to the top of the hill,
And he marched them down again.

And when they were up, they were up,
And when they were down, they were down,
And when they were only half-way up,
They were neither up nor down

Having got halfway up the Olympic hill, thanks to the Olympic Commission, the trap for the ISAF Council, is to repeat what has gone so many times before and promptly march back down again, instead of finishing the job.

The easy way out for the Council is to bring in a second Singlehander for Men (ie save the Finn); leave out the Multihull again; turn the 470 into a two handed Mixed event; and keep the Star and Elliott 6 metre as the two Keelboats.

Having Evaluation Trials, as proposed by the Executive Committee for the Mens keelboat is a very academic exercise. The Star is the only real option as a two handed keelboat, and outside the Flying Fifteen and previously spurned Tempest, there are no other international two person keelboats. As a genre the two person keelboat is not widely popular.

Going to a Three Man Keelboat (ie and Etchells) would put too much pressure on the 400 competitor limit imposed on the Olympic regatta by the IOC.

History and tradition are the principal reasons for the Star’s retention. Same song second verse for the Finn. It should be hard to justify having two double handed dinghy events in the Olympic sailing program, same as they don't have a 100 Metres and 110 Metre sprint events in the Athletics program.

The other issue facing the ISAF, is that re-inventing the current classes into new events isn’t going to fix the TV viewership statistic. Sailing is bottom of the table according to the Olympic Commission report, and showing a reluctance to change is, to put it mildly, a very courageous move for any sport in this invidious position.

The conflicting agendas are those of universality and telegenicity.

In other words to achieve the required spread amongst nations (sailing in Olympic qualifiers, rather than the actual Olympic regatta) the boats must be simple, available off the shelf, moderately easy to sail, and relatively low cost. They used to be called a SMOD (Single Manufacturer One Design) of which the Laser is a good example.

Generally speaking, such universally appealing boats do not a TV spectacle make.

Having picked six Core Events (and the Council can nominate up to eight Core Events) , the Olympic Events card must be written in such a way that the classes used do not look like a fleet of generic white boats.

Neither should they effectively exclude male sailors more than 80kg in weight.

There are also gender targets to be achieved (equal number of events for men as well as for women) which is why at least one of the events chosen will be for Mixed crews.

The opportunity with the selection of the final four events is put the fizz back into the Olympics.

Two near certainties - Womens Keelboat and Multihull

The Multihull almost certainly has to be put back in, given developments in other areas of the sport, such as the America's Cup, Extreme 40's and trans-oceanic racing. The first decsion choice for the Events Committee and ISAF Council will be as to whether the Multihull will be a Mixed event, or a Mens and Womens Multihull. If the former then there are three Events left to be selected. If the latter then just two Events remain.

Next tough choice will be the Womens Keelboat, and more particularly whether matchracing should remain as an Olympic Event.

One of the action items identified by the Olympic Commission is to reduce the numbers of officials required for the Olympic Regatta.

Using the recent Skandia Sail for Gold regatta as an example there were 18 Judges required for the International Jury (noting that there were over 900 sailors in 712 boats – much bigger than the 400 sailor limit for the Olympics). However the matchracing required a further 10 Umpires.

As the Executive Committee notes in its choice of the six Core Events - only two (Mens and Womens singlehander) require 'significant on-the-water judging'.

Yes, you’ve got the drift - less is better as far as Officials are concerned in the Brave New Olympic Sailing World.

The umpiring overhead is probably unsustainable, given that at a duration of 13 days, sailing is one of the longer Olympic sports. Flying and accommodating 10 officials for at least two weeks is a big cost overhead for just a single event on the 10 event sailing program.

The options for the Womens keelboat question are to drop it completely, or run it as a fleet racing event.

Then there were Two

So now we are up to Eight events – being Mens and Womens Board (Kite or Windsurfer); Mens and Womens Singlehander; Mens and Womens Doublehander; Mixed Multihull; Womens Keelboat. We have five events for Women, and four for Men.

Depending on which way the Multihull goes (could be Mixed, could be a Mens and a Womens boat), there are one or two events left.

At this point, the classes usually have a final bite at ensuring their survival by morphing themselves into an event – like the Heavyweight Singlehander (aka Finn), the Two Person with Spinnaker (aka 470) etc.

Again the ISAF Council must stay resolute and stick with the game plan.

Our choice would be to bring in an 18ft skiff – a Three Man Dinghy.

While this may sound like a wild choice for the Olympics, on closer examination it has a lot going for it:

(a) Yachting needs a signature event – like Rowing has the Eights, Athletics the 100 metres and 1500metres. Sailing doesn’t have it in the current Event mix.
(b) 18’s are well established as a class in Oceania, Europe, and North America
(c) The phrase 'Sydney harbour 18’s' is in the public lexicon – and everyone knows what the class is about – big rigs and spectacular sailing – and the class is the epitome of the Olympic ideal – 'Swifter, Higher, Stronger.'
(d) If television were to be enticed to cover just one event of the Sailing Olympics it would be the 18fter Medal Race
(e) With two or three rigs the 18’s can sail, and look very spectacular, in winds from 5kts to 30kts
(f) The 18’s will easily fit in a 20ft shipping container

The Safe Thinkers in the ISAF Council will be quick to pull this Event down, citing the usual fear words – cost, starting an arms race, not universally popular etc.

But don’t forget the sage words from this same Safe Thinking group has got the sport and the ISAF into the mess that has now been addressed by the Olympic Commission.

Their conservative approach is like a heavy smoker, on being told they have lung cancer, opting for prayer as the best means to address their medical condition.

Safe Thinking is very easy at an ISAF Council level, but it has had its day. What is required is some bold, and astute thinking of the type that has come from the Olympic Commission.

The Three Man Dinghy is not a boat for everyone, just the best. There are ways of controlling cost – as is done in many classes. The boat doesn’t need to be one design – since it must suit the needs and weight of the crew. It doesn’t need to be supplied gear either.

The Tenth Event?
If the Mixed Multihull is the chosen option, then there is one more Event left in the ten Event Olympic sailing program.

Probably the best option is to bring in the Foiling Singlehander – being another high profile class, also with many similar attributes of the 18fter – good geographic distribution; fast and athletic; telegenic; appleals to the so-called Facebook generation, and is a television and media magnet.

The Event itself is genuinely unique, and allows many options with being a Mens class or an Open class.

Our list of Events for the 2016 looks like this:

Core Events:
Mens and Womens Wind/Kite Surfer (to be chosen by Evaluation Trials)
Mens and Womens Singlehander (Laser and Laser Radial)
Mens and Womens Doublehander (49er and Womens to be chosen by Evaluation Trials)

Regular Events
Mixed Multihull (to be chosen by Evaluation)
Womens Keelboat (Elliott 6m) (Fleet or Matchracing format to be determined)
Three Man Dinghy (18ft skiff – Open to both genders)
Foiling Singlehander (Open to both genders)

The changes are expected to be opposed by the existing classes - who refused en bloc to make submissions on the Olympic Commission Report tabled in May 2010, and on which many individuals and National Authorities did provide comment.

Having chosen not to take up that opportunity to make constructive input, it is difficult to see why they should be listened to in November, and the ISAF Executive Committee submissions should be passed by the ISAF Council.

The other point that should not be lost on the ISAF Council is that sailing, as a sport is now in a process of tectonic change - Multihulls in the America's Cup; an expanding World Match Racing Tour; a sea change in the Sailing Olympic events and structure.

Each are scrabbling for the new high ground in sailing.

The former two lack one huge factor in favour of the Olympic sport and its associated World Cup circuit - Nationalism - which is the driving force behind attracting the interest of fans. That coupled with some spectacular events and you have the Perfect Storm for the development of a Sailing TV product.

With say 60 national teams represented, good events representing both regional diversity and sporting spectacle, the ISAF Council have the ability in November to perform a masterstroke.

Stuff that up, and the situation is probably terminal, for the Sailing Olympics - just a matter of 'When', rather than 'If'.

Sorry, there can be no half measures, or appeasement, in the Olympic sailing solution.