ORC Club Update
August 2025
MHYC is encouraging boat owners who don’t have an ORC Rating to apply for an ORC Club Certificate.
ORC is now the primary handicapping type for Saturday pointscore racing and an ORC pointscore based on elapsed times will be run in conjunction with the Pacific Rigging Wednesday Non-Spinnaker Series from the beginning of the new season.
The Sailing Committee is promoting ORC Club (ORCc) as the best option for all boat owners to obtain a Measurement Rating as it provides the right balance of science and simplicity to generate a handicap at a low cost.
Benefits:
- Easy Application Process - ORC Club requires a small number of measurement points and the ORC database already holds these measurements for over 128,000 production boats
- Fixed Handicap - ORC Club provides a constant reference point of a boat’s performance from week to week and allows identical boats to compete on the same handicap
- Boat Polars - the ORC Club Velocity Prediction Programme (VPP) calculates target boat speeds of each boat across a variety of wind strengths and wind directions
- Low Cost - It is inexpensive to generate an ORC Club certificate (in 2025 a new application for ORCc is $115 whereas ORCi is $650)
- Visibility - ORC Club is an open rule, so anyone can look at any other boats certificate and measurements that have been used. ORC Club also enables skippers to do a test to see what impact any changes to their boat or sails has on their handicap
- Popularity - ORC Club is widely used internationally and has seen rapid growth in Australia. The NSW ORC Championships are held each year
To assist owners with new applications, Australian Sailing’s Ratings Manager, Chris Zonca, will be at the club on Sunday 24 August (the final Get Checked Day this year for free safety audits) to provide information and answer questions about ORC Club and help with measurement.
Further details on ORC Club and other ratings can be found on the Australian Sailing website https://www.sailingresources.org.au/ratings-hub/.
Go to https://orc.org/sailors/active-certificates-database to search the ORC database for an existing ORC International or ORC Club certificate.
See the MHYC Handicapping Information Page at https://mhyc.com.au/sailing/keelboat-division/handicapping-at-mhyc.
Or contact the MHYC Sailing Office via email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call 8969 3103.