Rule C7: PENALTY SYSTEM

PENALTY SYSTEM

Rule 44 is deleted.

(a) A penalized boat may delay taking a penalty within the limitations of rule C7.3 and shall take it as follows:
- (1) When on a leg of the course to a windward mark, she shall gybe and, as soon as reasonably possible, luff to a close-hauled course.
- (2) When on a leg of the course to a leeward mark or the finishing line, she shall tack and, as soon as reasonably possible, bear away to a course that is more than ninety degrees from the true wind.
(b) Add to rule 2: ‘When racing, a boat need not take a penalty unless signalled to do so by an umpire.’
(c) A boat completes a leg of the course when any part of her hull crosses the extension of the line from the previous mark through the mark she is rounding, or on the last leg when she finishes.
(d) A penalized boat shall not be recorded as having finished until she takes her penalty and her hull is completely on the course side of the line and she then finishes, unless the penalty is cancelled before or after she crosses the finishing line.
(e) If a boat has one or two outstanding penalties and the other boat in her match is penalized, one penalty for each boat shall be cancelled except that a red-flag penalty shall not cancel or be cancelled by another penalty.
(f) If one boat has finished and is no longer racing, and the other boat has an outstanding penalty, the umpires may cancel the outstanding penalty.

(a) A boat taking a penalty that includes a tack shall have the spinnaker head below the main-boom gooseneck from the time she passes head to wind until she is on a close-hauled course.
(b) No part of a penalty may be taken inside the zone of a rounding mark that begins, bounds or ends the leg the boat is on.
(c) If a boat has one outstanding penalty, she may take the penalty any time after starting and before finishing. If a boat has two outstanding penalties, she shall take one of them as soon as reasonably possible, but not before starting.
(d) When the umpires display a red flag with or soon after a penalty flag, the penalized boat shall take a penalty as soon as reasonably possible, but not before starting.

(a) When a boat with an outstanding penalty is on a leg to a windward mark and gybes, or is on a leg to a leeward mark or the finishing line and passes head to wind, she is taking a penalty.
(b) When a boat taking a penalty either does not take the penalty correctly or does not complete the penalty as soon as reasonably possible, she is no longer taking a penalty. The umpires shall signal this as required by rule C5.6.
(c) The umpire boat for each match shall display blue or yellow flags or shapes, each flag or shape indicating one outstanding penalty. When a boat has taken a penalty, or a penalty has been cancelled, one flag or shape shall be removed, with the appropriate sound signal. Failure of the umpires to signal correctly shall not change the number of penalties outstanding.