One of the interesting things about rules changes is that many people, including rules experts, discover “problems” or “features” in the new rules, implying that these problems or features are new.  In some cases, these problems or features were actually in the old rules, and the experts apparently never noticed.  A good example of that is the issue, lately raised, of anticipation in rule 18.2.

To understand the issue, we need to take a look at the new rule 18, Mark-Room.  The part of this rule that has raised the question of anticipation is in section 18.2(b), which says:  

(b)    If boats are overlapped when the first of them reaches the zone, the outside boat at that moment shall thereafter give the inside boat mark-room. If a boat is clear ahead when she reaches the zone, the boat clear astern at that moment shall thereafter give her mark-room.

As I pointed out in an earlier blog, this rule has the same overall effect as rules 18.2(b) and (c) of the 2005-2008 RRS.  The only major differences in application are that the new zone is bigger (3 hull lengths from the mark instead of 2), and now rule 18 only applies at and inside the zone, whereas the old rule applied “when boats are about to round or pass” the mark.  This second change is not as big as it might seem; a now-defunct ISAF Case attempted to define “about to round” without actually doing so, but that Case implied that, in moderate conditions with most boats, a boat was first “about to round” when she was at the two-length zone.  

There’s one exception to rule 18.2(b), and it’s contained in rule 18.2(e), which says:

(e) If a boat obtained an inside overlap from clear astern and, from the time the overlap began, the outside boat has been unable to give mark-room, she is not required to give it.

My understanding of this rule is that if boats are already overlapped inside you, or if you are sailing into an outside overlap from clear astern, you will have to give the inside boat mark-room when you reach the zone.  On the other hand, if, at the last moment, a boat comes from behind and establishes an inside overlap and you simply cannot give her mark-room, then you don’t break rule 18.2(b) when you fail to do so.

So, where does anticipation come in?  Well, if you’re headed for a leeward mark with four boats overlapped inside you, you can’t simply head for the mark and then, at the zone, say “sorry, boys and girls, but I can’t give you room.”  Rule 18.2(b) requires you to give those boats mark-room when you (or they) reach the zone, and if you fail to do so, you have to do your turns or face disqualification.  The rules do not require you to give mark-room outside the zone, but if you have boats inside you, you have to anticipate before you get to the zone that rule 18.2(b) will eventually apply to you, and start moving over so you will be able to give room at the zone, in order to comply with rule 18.2(b).  This is a lot like having to give mark-room outside the zone, though technically it’s not the same.

The interesting thing, to me at least, is that this situation was equally true (actually, more often true because of the smaller zone) under the 2005-2008 RRS:  Boats were required to give room to boats inside them when they became “about to round”, which according to the ISAF Case generally meant when they reached the zone, and the only exemption was almost the same in the old rules as in the new ones – old rule 18.2(e) said, in part, “If the outside boat is unable to give room when an overlap begins, rules 18.2(a) and 18.2(b) do not apply.”  This exemption was broader than current rule 18.2(e) in that it applied no matter how the overlap was established; but it clearly did not exempt boats from anticipating the need to give room to boats inside them when they were well outside the zone, if that’s what it took to enable them to give room when they were “about to round”, i.e., later on.

So, just as a port-tack boat has to anticipate the need to tack or duck a starboard-tack boat well before they meet, an outside boat has to anticipate the need to give mark-room to boats inside her well before she gets to the zone.  And I think that was true under the old rules, too.