The difference in the fleet are very much larger after time
corrections in LYS than in IMS.


Comments, based on experience with both. I'ts of course true that a single
number handicap can't be as accurate for a particular race, as the handicap
tables of IMS. However,

- The standard of the boats and crew skills in IMS is both generally higher
and has less variance than in LYS. In LYS, everybody participates, from
Grand Prix sailors and boats to beginners with cruising boats with their
bottoms covered by barnacles. As IMS is the top level class, the
participants have a higher standard (and those not up to it often quit after
a while).

- In IMS, at least in Finland, the corrected times are for some reason
normalized against a virtual "scratch boat" with GPH somewhere around 550
sec/mi. The result is that published corrected time differences are only
about 1/2 to 2/3 of the actual times that one needs to sail faster in order
to beat the winner. Why the scratch boat GPH is not chosen from the actual
fleet's speed range, I don't know

BR,
Nils