I know that NO ONE is happy about this (except maybe NZL). TV or otherwise, I think it's inexcusable not to be able to correct such an error. Yes, this was close, but suppose the umpires mess up something even more obvious? May not seem possible, but we're all human.
This reminds me of the MLB umpire that screwed a pitcher out of a no-hitter a few years ago. He knew he blew the call, but no one could fix Humpty Dumpty at the time. I believe that the replay rules have fixed that, and rightly so.
No one (including umpires) wants their career to end over a mistake (which should be fixable).
Mike
PS/EDIT: I do fully agree that they should be using a zone of at least four lengths. Wouldn't work for us mere mortals, but they're doing everything with GPS, so it wouldn't be a problem for the boats or umps.
Brucat, it's different because the penalties are being assessed live on the water during racing. I know you know this following bit but to refresh, there's a difference in how match racers treat penalties. The match racing boats do not exonerate themselves in the case of an infraction. They only do so after a penalty is assessed by the judges/computers so the judges carry a lot more responsibility. While this was a clear case of a penalty right before an obvious outcome at the finish, imagine if the debatable penalty had occurred on the first downwind gate rounding? How would you correct a judging error at the end of that race? You would have no way to know how exactly that penalty affected the outcome. I don't think it's possible to universally be able to revisit a judging error when the calls are being made live unless you can stop the action while it's revisited.
