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On the Olympic Medal Race format

The medal race format, where the top 10 boats get to sail the final race, counting for double points, was introduced for this Games amid much controversy. Last week we looked at how it affected the results.

James Davies writes:

Not sure I entirely agree with the suggestion that the public struggle to comprehend the various scenarios about who needs to come where in the medal race in order to winner or still get a medal.

Plenty of football fans are capable of explaining to you before the last weekend of the season who needs to beat who in order for a certain team to avoid relegation or for a certain team to take the title if it is a close race (in fact the Premiership is often like the Qingdao medal races in that by the last game of the season one team just needs to turn up to guarantee winning the title).

I think it is possibly more of a lack of coverage or interest prior to the medal race which means that spectators are not aware of the overall position going into the medal race or are not totally familiar with the racing format. This can surely be remedied by better explanation before the race starts by the commentators and as James Boyd has suggested by the use of cunning electronics which could provide a constantly update display of what the overall outcome will be based on the current position in the medal race.

As to the idea that the medal race is unfair,although it may seem unfair that once person can guarantee a medal by keeping another person at the back of the fleet, similar tactics have been used in Formula 1 at the end of the season for years and that has plenty of media interest and hasn't felt the need to change the format of racing to make it fairer! Can't see any difference between what Paul Goodison did in the laser medal race and Michael Schumacher driving rivals off the track.


Steve Mellors writes:

Hi there,

i don't normally write in, but I feel compelled to add a few points about the medal race and sailing on the TV;

Firstly, as the GBR team has proven, if you are good enough and well prepared it doesn't matter what the race format is.

Secondly, Qingdao has proven, (if it really needed to be proved), that the best way to make sailing exciting to watch is to add wind. Dilute the politics go where the wind is. Here you have to remember the " it's not normally like this here" effect which will always add a little uncertainty and keep the sailors honest by ensuring that they are still on the pace when the weather hasn't read the script.

However, the various medal race scenarios did raise a few eyebrows and it is easy the see why people would see it as unfair, or more precisely putting certain competitors at a potential disadvantage. But when has the Olympics ever been fair? To quote George Orwell: "Serious sport has nothing to do with fair play. It is bound with hatred, jealousy, boastfulness, disregard for all rules and sadistic pleasure in witnessing violence: In other words it is war minus the shooting".

Fair enough, we all know this really and to be an Olympic champion it's best to put aside you notion of "fair play". That is just not relevant to the rules of global competition in the 21st century.

Respect the competition, play by the rules and winner takes all.

So does it need changing? Well probably, because it is much better TV when there are only 10 boats in the race, so just make it a knock-out. 12 race series, every three races the bottom of the pile get knocked out, minimum wind speed and no match racing before the start. I would like to add that match racing is way too complicated and very boring, if it is not your thing but two boat racing can sometimes be a spectacle if
there is enough wind.

ISAF has not shown itself to be much of an open democracy and I do hope that sailors will be consulted about all this after the Olympics, but don't hold your breath.

John Greenland offers a similar suggestion:

What about the idea of having eight odd normal races. Then go to the top ten. Then run a further three or so races, taking the bottom two out until just four or five are left. Then it’s a first across the line wins last race?

James Boyd writes:

The problem is trying to make the final race in each 'event' TV-friendly while at the same time for it continuing to be 'meaningful' and fair for the competitors.

The reason the Olympic sailing events (indeed pretty much all regattas) are sailed in a series of races rather than just one, is partly that those involved don't want the culmination of their monumental efforts over the previous four years to be decided in just one 45 minute race, but also because sailing involves the vagaries of the wind and water and an accumulation of points over 10 or 15 races leads to a more accurate result in terms of who the best sailors are.

This being the pinnacle of the sport one could argue the case for there being no discard (as they have for example in the Farr 40s). If these guys and gals are truly the best then all their results from the series should count and this would remove another complication from the scoring for the non-sailing general public.

As to whether the medal race stays as it is or changes or is removed... Certainly from a TV perspective, the presenters having to scrabble around to determine who the winner is, as happened this time, makes our sport look like something of a joke.

Sadly there is no easy fix for this.

One option would be a major overhaul of the results reporting/TV graphics that automatically number crunches the results to give an immediate display of who's won and by how much. Conversely the most friendly option for a non-sailing public would be turning the medal race into a first across the line wins affair. From a TV viewer perspective this would make it a lot simpler to understand who is winning and the present double points scoring aspect could be removed. It would also place immense pressure on competitors (this is good, it is sport after all) to perform in this final race, as the double points scoring aspect of the present medal race format attempts to.

But while we are very drawn to this latter option, the fact is that the Olympics is about sport first and media coverage second. The whole sport of competitive sailing is based on accumulated results over a series and to change this format for the benefit of the media and general public would be of too great a detriment of the competition, effectively making the results in the series leading up to the medal race almost meaningless. By its nature sailing is not winner takes all one race sport. While the Race Organisers need to address the issue of releasing race results in real time, it should be the media who have to work around the sport, not vica versa.

Send us your views on the medal race format here