New US SAILING Rules and Policies:

The OSC of US SAILING will apply to ISAF for Automatic, Additional and Commission Places in the names of athletes based on the following process:

1.      US Athletes not receiving one of the allocated places to US SAILING must request a Commission Place through US SAILING by e-mail to olympics@ussailing.org by a deadline to be established in accordance with ISAF requirements.

2.      Applicants must submit a sailing resume justifying their request for a Commission Place.

3.      Applications for Commission Places will be reviewed by an OSC subcommittee and ranked in priority order based on a subjective evaluation of sailing resume and regatta results.

4.      US SAILING will submit those names to ISAF in the priority order for consideration by the Commission.

5.      If required by ISAF, the applicant must submit entry fees or deposits in advance.

6.      If the athlete receives a Commission Place they will be responsible for entry fee, shipping, and any other costs related to participation in the 2007 World Championships.

7.      The one Automatic Entry and the Additional Entries as allocated by ISAF will be awarded according to the previously announced procedure.

8.      The OSC intends to provide shipping for the US Sailing Team boats (top 3 only).  More details and requirements to follow. 

9.      Non US Sailing Team athletes receiving Additional Entries (#4 - #7 on the ranking list), or Commission Places may be required to pay non refundable entry fees or deposits to secure Additional or Commission Places as early as January 2007.  Shipping on a space available basis, or at Athlete expense. 

10.  Athletes qualifying for both the 2007 Combined Worlds and the 2007 Test Event must have two boats or charter.  There will not be shipping from Portugal to China.   

Background

You may have read that ISAF changed the procedure for qualification to the 2007 Combined Worlds in Cascais at the recent November 2006 conference in Helsinki.  The new procedure may be found at http://sailing.org/default.asp?PID=19731, and follow the link to the full details.  Also, follow the link to the table with the current status of additional places per nation at; http://www.sailing.org/ISAFworlds/places_mna.pdf

The OSC of US SAILING had previously announced our selection system based on the ISAF system that was approved in 2005.  Our system may be found at http://www.ussailing.org/olympics/2007/rankingsystems.asp and scroll all the way to the bottom of the page for details. 

The recent ISAF changes place a limit of six on the number of Additional Places that may be awarded per nation.  Be careful interpreting the current status table, just because the USA may be listed as having six additional places, there is no guarantee that we will get those six places.  That table should be viewed as a MAXIMUM of Additional Places that we *may* be awarded. The other major change by ISAF was to create a new category of Commission Places to be awarded individually on merit.

Our delegation recognized a year ago that the proposed system was flawed, and objected in November 2005 to no avail.  By the time of the November 2006 Conference, many more nations had recognized that ISAF had made an error, and therefore proposed changes.  Our delegation supported some reasonable compromises, but opposed the last minute rewrite at the Council table.  We believe they have created new and additional problems.  But at any rate, this is the system at hand.  Ultimately it will turn out to be good for the USA in some classes and negative in others.

An example may help.  Laser has an overall quota of 150 entries.  Assume that 40 nations meet the deadline for requesting their automatic one entry.  That leaves 110, of which 20% or 22 places are next given to the Commission.  The remaining 88 places are awarded as additional places.  (150-(40+22)).   But there are a total of 109 potential additional places so only 88 of those 109 will be granted.  Remember, this whole example was based on 40 nations applying for their one automatic entry.  If 30 or 60 nations apply, it changes the rest of the math. 

Gary’s Class by Class Best Guess 

(This is only as good as my guess of how many nations meet deadlines and take up automatic spots).

49er

Ninety total entries.  Guesstimate 30 nations take up automatic spots.  Twelve spots to be awarded by Commission.  Forty-eight Additional Spots of 65 potential.  We had three teams do very well in 2005 and 2006.  We will get four total spots; one automatic and three Additional.

Finn

Eighty total entries.  Guesstimate 30 nations take automatic entry.  Ten spots awarded by Commission.  Forty Additional Spots of 80 potential.  We have five Additional Places on the chart, but I do not believe we will get more than two of those.  Three total; one automatic and two Additional.  One spot each above and below the bubble.  Could get two or Four Total.    

Yngling

Eighty total entries, there have never been more than 40 boats at a Women’s Worlds.  Everybody gets to go if they want to.

Laser Radial

One hundred twenty total entries.  Guesstimate 35 nations automatic.  Seventeen Commission Places.  Sixty-eight Additional Places of 73 potential.  We have six Additional Places on the chart, and I expect we will get five or six.  Six total entries; 1 automatic and 5 Additional Places. One more on the bubble. 

470 Men

One hundred twenty total entries.  Guesstimate 35 nations automatic.  Seventeen Commission Places.    Sixty-eight Additional Places of 71.  We have six Additional Places on the chart, and I expect we will get all six.  Seven total entries; 1 automatic and 6 Additional Places.  One of those is on the bubble.  Paul and Kevin can get a Commission Place for the asking, I’d think.

470 Women

Eighty total entries.  Guesstimate 27 nations automatic.  Ten Commission Places.  Forty three Additional Places of forty potential.  Every Additional Places on the chart gets to go.  Seven total entries; 1 automatic and 6 Additional Places.  One of those on the bubble. Not too likely to get Commission Places after that.

Laser

One hundred fifty total entries.  Guesstimate 40 nations automatic.  Twenty-two Commission Places.  Eighty-eight Additional Places of 109 potential.  We have six Additional Places on the chart, but I expect we get three. Four total entries, one automatic and three Additional.  One more on the bubble.  Unlikely to get Commission Places. 

RS: X Men

One hundred, twenty total entries.  Guesstimate 40 nations automatic.  Sixteen Commission Places.  Sixty-four Additional Places of 96 potential.  We have one Additional Place on the chart.  One total entries; one automatic and zero Additional.  One Additional on the Bubble. Unlikely to get Commission Places.

RS: X Women

Eighty total entries.  Guesstimate 30 nations automatic.  Ten Commission Places.  Forty Additional Places of 63 potential.  We have one Additional Place on the chart, but we probably will not get it.  One automatic entry total.  Unlikely to get Commission Places.

Star

Eighty total entries.  Guesstimate 25 nations automatic.  Eleven Commission Places.  Forty-four Additional places of 44 potential.  We have six Additional Places on the chart and could get all six.  Seven total entries; one automatic and six Additional.  Pretty good chance of getting a couple more Commission Places.  The downside is if the Commission favors nations getting their second spot over potentially more deserving “names.”

Tornado

Eighty total entries.  2006 Worlds not complete at this writing.  We have four entries in Argentina in 2006, and I would expect we get at least four in 2007.