What If...

by Rick White

You are approaching the leeward mark

Under the new rules there have been some significant changes. The inside boat has always had rights to round the mark and still does. However, in the past the outside boat had only to give the inside boat enough room to make a seamanship-like rounding.

Now, if the inside boat is also the right-of-way boat, the outside boat must allow enough room for the inside, right-of-way boat to make a tactical rounding. (See Diagram 1).

On the other hand, if the inside boat does not have right-of-way, then the outside boat only has to leave enough room for the inside boat to make a seamanship-like mark rounding. (See Diagram 2). In this case boat “B” is the leeward boat and has right-of-way, but must allow inside overlapped boat “A” room to round the mark in a seamanship-like fashion.