Over Early and General Recall

If one or more boats are over early, the PRO asks the signal officer and timer to raise the over-early flag with ONE very clear -- one to two second long -- manual blast.  If after some time, the PRO can’t figure out who the over early boats were, then he might ask the signal officer to raise the general recall flag with TWO clear blasts.   In my opinion, these sound signals are very important because competitors are not likely to look back at the committee boat to see which flags were raised, but to listen for the sound signals.  Nothing is worse for a competitor than not hearing that signal. 

Drop the over-early (X-ray) flag after everybody who was over early comes back or 4 minutes, whichever comes first.  NO SOUND.   (Do NOT dip flag for returning boats as they clear the line as some RCs have done.)

Or if you had issued a general recall, follow the same procedure as with the postponement flag, that is, when you are ready to begin the start sequence again, drop the general recall flag with ONE SOUND, look at watch, wait 40 seconds, turn on Ollie.

ALTERNATIVELY, the sailing instructions might call for the recalled class to be sent to the “back of the line”.  In this case, let the start sequence for the next class continue and drop the general recall flag with ONE SOUND when you think everybody in the recalled class got the message.  

If you want to follow this procedure, you could announce it at the skipper’s meeting and pin a note to that effect on the bulletin board that, in effect, changes the sailing instructions.

MY PHILOSOPHY:

Don't call numbers of over early boats.  The rules don't require it and It is hard enough to do what the rules do require:  1) clearly sound the horn and get the X-ray flag up promptly, 2) identify the sail numbers of all the offending boats, 3) keep track of whether the offending boats properly return to the pre-start side of the line.   Furthermore, if boats at the pin end are masked by other sails you might be talking to the RC person on the whaler to find out how many and who.

I also feel that calling numbers doesn't help the racers that much because it is very very hard to hear your number, it is easy for the RC to scramble the numbers (especially those 5 and 6 digit ones) which then causes confusion (and, later, anger).

If you do decide to call numbers, you have got to do so in a FAIR way.  To me this means being willing to chase a boat in the whaler who hasn't heard their number being called.

TIP:  When the PRO is calling sail numbers to the Recorder, he might just use the last 2 or 3 digits.  For example,  "OCS boats are 019, 187, 717 " or simply "OCS 19, 87, 17."  Then "19 clear, 17 clear."   If the PRO calls out long numbers, the last and most crucial ones are always the ones that get messed up, e.g.  14019, 14187, 14096.

AFTER A GENERAL RECALL

Think of lowering the general recall flag as the 6-minute to the start signal.

Lower general recall with one horn blast -- 6 minutes to go

By looking at your watch, wait exactly 40 seconds and flip switch on Ollie -- Ollie waits 10 seconds, gives 5 1-second blasts, and then counts down 5 seconds, which takes a total of 20 seconds.

On the Ollie's long blast, raise class flag exactly 1 minute after you dropped the general recall -- 5 minutes to go.