I think just to keep costs in check, the Supplied Boats is the way to go, at the Olympic event only. Now, how do you select who will represent? I think the boat type selection should be announced at the prior Olympic, giving any interested teams a full 4 years to go out and buy one, and practice on it.

BUT for the actual Olympic regatta itself, use brand new, supplied boats, to level the feild a bit and keep the Arms Race type spendig in check. This is the one thing that I think hurt the Tornado class the most, the out of control spending to "keep up". If it is known 4 years in advance that a "stock boat" will be used for the next games, all the spending in the world won't give you any edge for the games.

The Selections, while each country is free to choose it's own method, might be best handled much like how we do the Alter Cup here in the USA. Take all the top sailors from all the active classes, put them all on the same boats, new (use the same boat as will be used in the Olympics) and have a week long regatta to sort it out. The top teams go to the Olympics.

Now, obviously if it is announced that the Tiger (or what ever) is going to be the -next- Olympic boat, the smart teams will go out and buy one to practice for 4 years, but when it comes time for Selections and the actual Olympic regatta itself, they will be on Stock Boats, not their own "modified" boats.

Maybe they could bring their own sails, maybe not, of course either way they would all have to be measured, and the boats would have to be inspected and weighed, just to be sure everyone has equal equipment.

This would keep the Olypic Campaign type expenses in check, but of course each country would have to pony up some "entry fee" just to pay for the use of the Olympic boat. They pay entry fees already, right?

For the sailors, it would be a whole lot cheaper than spending $50,000 on a Tornado, and the expense of trying to campaign it all over the world just to get selected. When the event is over, the boats and sails can be autographed and sold to the rest of us who want a nearly new Olympic quality boat at a discount.

It' supposed to be about who are the best sailors, not who can spend the most money, right?

I don't know what it would cost a big cat company like Hobie to supply say, 40-50 new boats for such an event (are there that many countries that put up sailing teams?), but they would generate some additional sales up front as soon as the "next boat" was announced, and of course they would then sell the boats afterwards, and each country would be paying some amount of money for the use of the boats as well.