Race officials play an important role in the promotion, organization and administration of competitive sailing. Volunteers involved in race administration, judging and umpiring are encouraged to take part in the certification program that has been set up to develop their experience and knowledge.
There are four certification levels. The first two, Assistant Race Officer (ARO) and Club Race Officer (CRO), are offered by the Quebec Sailing Federation, while the third and fourth levels are managed by the Canadian Yachting Association (CYA).
The Sail Canada Judges Program requirements are that a judge has to have attended a seminar (or seminars) which cover Parts 1 -7 of the rule book. The Rules seminar covers basically Parts 1, 2 and 3. The other seminar, on Protests, covers whatever else is needed.
For people who wish to be judges, they have to attend both days OR they have to have completed one of the days somewhere else – and attend for the parts they have missed.
The Rules seminar is an interactive seminar i.e. with 25 scenarios in pictures (TSS) which the instructor displays and then get the class to tell him which rules apply and why. Incidentally, every person in the class will have a rule book in front of them.
The Protest seminar consists of a morning with the instructor talking and then he splits the class into groups of four or five, and then they practice a number of hearing scenarios that he has prepared. He critiques each group in turn. The groups change and everyone has a chance to practice being chairman, panel member, protestor, protestee etc.
A list of certified race officials is available on the Sail Canada website
If you are a certified race official but your name is not listed, please contact us.