New man at the top

John Mendez appointed Executive Director of US-IRC

Richard du Moulin, Chairman of the newly formed US-IRC Owners committee and member of the US-IRC Association, has announced the appointment of John Mendez as the Executive Director of US-IRC. Mendez, a past chairman of the New York Yacht Club Race Committee, replaces Barry Carroll who leaves the post to pursue other business interests. Carroll will remain affiliated with the US-IRC as a technical advisor. Mendez raced dinghies and raced offshore in England from where he emigrated to the USA in 1968. He is also a member of Larchmont Y.C. where he served as Commodore.

"US-IRC will continue to pursue its primary goal of promoting the IRC rule and IRC events," Mendez said. "We successfully introduced IRC racing into the United States three years ago and Barry Carroll has done an excellent job of building the fleet and growing events in the US.  Now with his resignation, we will take this opportunity to review our next challenges."
 
US sailing will continue to manage the rule in the US. Their Offshore Office will continue to issue IRC certificates and will support the rule fully, as other Member National Authority’s do in their commitment to managing IRC.

US Sailing will be there to address questions from owners on all topics including among other matters, the status of their rating in the system, validity of their measurements, perceived differences between PHRF and IRC ratings, differences between "sister ships", how to get measured, where to get measured, and how to contact a local measurers.
 
"US Sailing Offshore is the management entity for IRC in the U.S.A.," Mendez concluded. "And the US-IRC organization will focus on communications and marketing to build the IRC fleet, to promote existing IRC events and to spread IRC participation from coast to coast. Our goal is to get sailors sailing."
 
The US-IRC Association and US Sailing Offshore will work closely with the newly formed US-IRC Owners committee. This committee was formed in February and has been holding regular conference call meetings to organize and address some initial owner issues.
 
Rating spinoas was one of the first issues the committee tackled and with its input the RORC is addressing the problem. Other rating systems simply ban the sails altogether, but the IRC is working on ways to rate the sail’s performance in the system. Other topics such as endorsed vs. unendorsed certificates, weighing, certified sail measurement are now under discussion with owners who are actually racing under the rule giving their experienced input.
 
One of the priorities of the new executive will be to update and maintain the US-IRC Web page.  Mendez will be working with web developer Luiz Kahl on new design and content. IRC Event organizers are encouraged to send race information and links to info@us-irc.org .
 
Anyone interested in receiving US-IRC newsletters and other informative emails may subscribe at  http://www.us-irc.org/ under the NEWS tab at the top of the page.