Ocean racing and ICF regulations

What are people's thoughts on Ocean Racing being adopted by the ICF?


If it were to be included, there would have to be regulations placed on the specifications of craft to be used, as is the case for all other forms of paddle sport. Currently we are seeing huge advances in the reduction of weights in ocean racing skis, but does this benefit the sport, or the more well off or better supported athletes? Marathon canoeing faced a similar issue years ago with guys turning up to races in extremely light boats, some stories that probably have not lost much, tell of kayaks being made as low as 4kgs. Obviously there boats set the paddlers back huge sums of money. The ICF got around the issue by insisting that all boats be manufactured to a minimum of 8kgs. This leveled the paddling field so to speak. What should we consider as a minimum weight for the sport of ocean racing?

With K1s, we have a full set of rules to abide by, length, weights etc. What kind of specs should be applied to skis to make the game fairer on everyone?


Interested to hear people's comments.

Does the game has to be fair ?
It's a race, and the faster, the winner.
Sometimes, when the sea is rough, I go to races with my old XT instead of my brand new Mako6... should i aks for a handicap since I have a slower boat ?

Maybe there should be 2 rankings.
- An class with no rules, for top paddlers wishing to use new designs, very light, very expensive technology, etc.
- Another one opened only to skis widely sold on the market (let's say for example at least 200 sales).
Sounds complicated tough.

Weight isuue is a difficult pb to deal with. Ocean canoe manufacturers can buil 6 man canoes around 60kg, but regulations are that they have to weight 150 kg in Tahiti and 180 kg in Hawaii... The reason is that not every club can buy a 60 kg canoe because it's too expensive, and then allowing them would be unfair... So why set a weight regulation ? Why not set a price regulation ? i.e. allowing only skis that cost less than 3500 $.

Any other ideas ?

Read the draft rules for ocean racing.

www.canoeicf.com/site/canoeint/if/downlo...aft%20%2010Nov06.pdf

The bulk of the rule is made up of competition details. The only craft limitation is that the ski must be more than 4m long and currently must be over 13kg. I foresee the weight limit being scrapped before the rule is ratified.

BTW, the only rules for K1 are max length 5.2m, min weight 8kg for marathon, 12kg for sprints.

The ICF is fully committed to Ocean Racing and so are a number of Federations - namely CSA who ran the 2007 World Cup under the ICF umbrella.

Does the game has to be fair ?
It's a race, and the faster, the winner.
Sometimes, when the sea is rough, I go to races with my old XT instead of my brand new Mako6... should i aks for a handicap since I have a slower boat ?

Well do you want an official racing class, or a free for all? Rules apply to all sorts of sports, cars, bikes etc, so why not this branch of paddling?

Maybe there should be 2 rankings.
- An class with no rules, for top paddlers wishing to use new designs, very light, very expensive technology, etc.
- Another one opened only to skis widely sold on the market (let's say for example at least 200 sales).
Sounds complicated tough.

Sounds like a bad idea I reckon.... just my personal opinion of course, others may think it a great one.

Weight isuue is a difficult pb to deal with. Ocean canoe manufacturers can buil 6 man canoes around 60kg, but regulations are that they have to weight 150 kg in Tahiti and 180 kg in Hawaii... The reason is that not every club can buy a 60 kg canoe because it's too expensive, and then allowing them would be unfair... So why set a weight regulation ? Why not set a price regulation ? i.e. allowing only skis that cost less than 3500 $.

Any other ideas ?

Price restriction wouldn't be the way to go, someone might be able to get a ski cheaper than another guy, so we're into the same issue of what can be afforded.