Amateur or professional?

At Rolex Commodores' Cup Nick Haigh explains why he is not sailing on board the DK 46 he normally skippers

It came as some surprise on Monday, the first day of the Rolex Commodores' Cup, to learn that former Farr 40 owner Nick Haigh, the supposed new owner of the DK46 Dark and Steamy, chartered to the Irish and sailing as marinerscove.ie 1in the Ireland White team, should not be on board despite appearing initially on the crew list.

We understand that some time on Sunday the RORC received a tip-off querying Haigh's ISAF Classification on the basis of Dark and Steamy having been chartered to the Irish ostensibly by Haigh and him then sailing on board as crew. Under ISAF's Sailor Classification Code this combination of acts elevates Haigh from being a Group 1 Amateur as defined by the code to being a Group 3 Professional.

"It came as a surprise," Haigh told thedailysail of the call he received giving him this news on Sunday night. "The Notice of Race 14.c said a protest shall be submitted on classification issues and there was no protest, but that was overruled by ISAF."

If Haigh is the owner of the boat then clearly ISAF are in the right to make him Group 3 according their code. This exact scenario is laid out on page 14 of the Frequently Asked Questions associated with the code where it states:

"Q. An owner charters out his boat but never races on board her during the charters. Is he Group 1?
A. Yes, provided there are no other reasons to be Group 2 or 3.
Q. An owner charters out his boat and races on board her during the charter. Is he Group 1?
A. No, he is Group 3.
Q. An employee or director of a company whose business is paid to charter out boats, races on any of the boats whilst on charter. Is he Group 1?
A. No, he is Group 3 if any boat on charter with him on board takes part in a race held in accordance with RRS 87. The type of charter, the duration of the charter, the nature of the other people on board are immaterial."

However Haigh maintains that no money has changed hands and the boat is owned by the same company which sponsors the IRC Nationals, Fortis Yacht Group. "The boat is actually owned by an organisation and it is not myself. I am not the legal owner of the boat, I am not a director of that company and I am absolutely not involved with that company. So it calls into question the definition of ‘owner’ under ISAF rules."

In fact it does far more than this. Under the letter of the code sailors, including owners, are not allows to receive 'compensation of any kind' else they risk becoming Group 3 professionals. How many owners have received gear for free, a few litres of diesel or even been bought a thank you drink or lunch that could potentially fall foul of the code?

Regardless of whether Haigh is or isn't the owner of the boat this scenario does highlight the limitations of the code particularly when he was replaced on board marinercove.ie 1 on Monday morning by former America's Cup helm and Whitbread Round the World Race veteran skipper Lawrie Smith who because he has not sailed as a Group 3 professional for more than 24 months, is now technically a Group 1 amateur! Clearly few would debate Haigh is an amateur sailor, albeit a keen one, and therefore should be Group 1, while the knarley old sea dog Smith should be Group 3, regardless of whether he has been busy lining his coffers as a property developer over the last two years at the expense of partaking in our noble sport. Haigh is threatened to put another high profile sailor, now technically an 'amateur' behind the wheel of marinerscove.it 1 later this week if he is not allowed to sail.

"Still open to debate are a number of grey areas and those areas for the sport in general need to be sorted out," says Haigh. "Personally I am very disappointed. I don’t particularly like to see a boat that I have helped put together go off sailing into the distance and an active amateur sailor like myself sitting on the shore and watching that happen. From my own personal point of view I am disappointed but I think the wider implications for the sport in general are very significant and they need to be sorted out with ISAF.

"I think most people know me and know my wife who sails on the boat too, realise that we are genuine amateur sailors. We work very hard for the sport. I personally sit on five committees to assist to run the sport within the RORC on the RM committee and the dinghy committee. I put a lot of my personal time into the sport to make sure people enjoy the sport I love. So naturally I feel a little bit aggreived by what has happened. I understand the reasons they put the rule in place but I don’t think it is for the reasons they found to stop me going sailing on a boat I have been working on since it was launched."

Haigh makes the valid point that if owners wish to remain Group 1 under the letter of the Code then they cannot receive renumeration of any kind and this is utter madness. "In the States how many Mumm 30 and Farr 40 owners are able to run their boats by chartering them out. If I wanted to be in a position like this where I am sitting on the sidelines I would have bought myself a race horse. But I want to be a jockey."

Anthony Matusch, Chairman of the ISAF Classification Commission is expected to pass on his views on this later this afternoon.

In the meantime - what do you think about this? Let us know here