Most club sailing instructions are too long, and they are too long because they repeat things the racing rules already say. The rules require seven items. Everything beyond those seven is a choice, and each choice you make is another sentence a protest committee can be asked to interpret.
The seven items the rules require
Under Appendix J, unless the information is already in the notice of race, the sailing instructions must include:
- Any changes to the racing rules, including national prescriptions, and the scoring system if it differs from Appendix A.
- The schedule of races and the time of the warning signal for each class.
- A complete description of the course or courses, or a list of marks from which the course will be selected.
- Descriptions of the marks, including the starting and finishing marks, and the order in which they are to be passed.
- Descriptions of the starting and finishing lines, the class flags, and any special signals.
- The race time limit, if there is one, for the first boat to sail the course.
- The location of the official notice board, or the address of the online notice board, and the location of the race office.
That is the whole mandatory list. If a paragraph in your draft does not serve one of those seven, ask what it is doing there.
What to leave out
Do not restate the racing rules. Writing that boats shall keep clear adds nothing and creates a second, slightly different version of a rule that already exists, which is exactly the kind of thing that goes wrong in a hearing.
Do not change a rule casually. Every change has to be flagged explicitly under item 1, and each one is a decision you will have to defend. Change rules when the venue genuinely demands it, not out of habit inherited from last year's document.
Do not bury the safety information. If there is a check in and check out procedure, or a signal that sends the fleet ashore, it belongs where a competitor reading in a hurry will find it, not in an appendix.
A section order that works
For a one weekend club regatta, this order keeps the document short and puts things where people look for them:
- Rules, and any changes to them
- Notices to competitors and the notice board location
- Changes to sailing instructions
- Signals made ashore
- Schedule of races
- Class flags
- The racing area
- The courses, with a diagram
- Marks
- The start, including the line and any rule 30 flags you intend to use
- Change of the next leg
- The finish and the time limit
- Protests and the protest time limit
- Scoring
- Safety, check in and check out
- Prizes
World Sailing publishes both a sailing instructions guide and a set of standard sailing instructions. Starting from those and deleting what you do not need produces a better document than starting from a blank page, and a far better one than starting from last year's file without reading it.
The diagram is doing more work than the words
A course diagram removes more ambiguity per square centimetre than any paragraph you can write. Draw the marks, mark the rounding direction with an arrow, and label the start and finish. If the course can be shortened, show where.
The most common failure in club sailing instructions is not a wrong rule, it is a course description that two experienced sailors read differently. A diagram fixes that in a way that prose does not.
Write for the boat that has to act on them
Sailing instructions are read twice: once at leisure the night before, and once on the water at speed by a crew who are wet and behind. The second reading is the one that matters. Short numbered paragraphs, one instruction per paragraph, and no cross references that require flipping pages.
The same logic applies to the committee boat side of the document. If your sailing instructions describe a start sequence, the boat has to be set up to run it exactly as written, every time, which is a kit and drill question rather than a writing one. Our note on the committee boat setup covers how the station is arranged around the sequence.
Keep them current with the rulebook
The racing rules are on a four year cycle and rule numbers move between editions. A document that cites a rule number from the previous edition is worse than one that cites none, because it looks authoritative and is wrong. If you are reusing an older template, check every rule number against the current edition. We summarised what changed in the 2025 to 2028 racing rules if you have not gone through it yet.
Frequently asked questions
What must sailing instructions include?
Seven items under Appendix J, unless they are already in the notice of race: rule changes and scoring, the schedule and warning signal times, the course description, the marks and their order, the starting and finishing lines with class flags and special signals, the race time limit, and the notice board and race office locations.
Do sailing instructions have to repeat the racing rules?
No, and they should not. The rules apply on their own. The sailing instructions exist to say what the rules leave open and to record any changes to them.
Where do I find a template?
World Sailing publishes a sailing instructions guide and a set of standard sailing instructions alongside the racing rules. Both are available from World Sailing in editable formats.
How long should club sailing instructions be?
Long enough to cover the seven mandatory items and the local decisions, and no longer. For a one weekend club regatta that is usually two to three pages plus a course diagram.
Next step
Write the seven mandatory items first, then add only what your venue actually requires, then hand the draft to someone who was not in the room to read cold. If they can sail the course from the document alone, it is finished. Once the document is right, the remaining variable is whether the race officer kit on the boat can execute what it describes.