But each race director should be entitled to determine what criteria are necessary for the safety of their particular event. USMS took that option away from the race director by attempting to dictate rules that work for some open water events but, frankly, not for the most dangerous.
Did USMS take it away? Or did USMS's insurance carrier take it away, as a condition of providing the insurance coverage that surely everyone agrees is absolutely necessary? From reading the USMS announcements, I understood that the new rules regarding boat equipment and insurance were dictated by USMS's insurance carrier. Am I wrong? Is USMS's imposition of these new rules not a condition of coverage, or of coverage at the price USMS ended up negotiating?
Now, one might say that if those rules are conditions of our coverage that we should ditch this insurance carrier and get a better one. And I am also reading here, and have read elsewhere, that insurers are out there who would provide coverage without requiring the boat equipment and insurance that USMS (or, if my understanding is correct, our insurer) now requires to issue a sanction. But I am not reading anything about the price at which they offer it, and yet I am reading in this very thread that for some race directors price is a bigger issue than the boat equipment and insurance requirements. Moreover, I have not read that such insurance actually was offered to USMS at any price, let alone at a price that would have made USMS's overall cost to insure swim practices, pool meets, and OW swims competitive with what USMS ended up agreeing to pay for 2013.
So I feel as if I am reading a heated debate without having enough facts to understand precisely why either side is so worked up.
But each race director should be entitled to determine what criteria are necessary for the safety of their particular event. USMS took that option away from the race director by attempting to dictate rules that work for some open water events but, frankly, not for the most dangerous.
Did USMS take it away? Or did USMS's insurance carrier take it away, as a condition of providing the insurance coverage that surely everyone agrees is absolutely necessary? From reading the USMS announcements, I understood that the new rules regarding boat equipment and insurance were dictated by USMS's insurance carrier. Am I wrong? Is USMS's imposition of these new rules not a condition of coverage, or of coverage at the price USMS ended up negotiating?
Now, one might say that if those rules are conditions of our coverage that we should ditch this insurance carrier and get a better one. And I am also reading here, and have read elsewhere, that insurers are out there who would provide coverage without requiring the boat equipment and insurance that USMS (or, if my understanding is correct, our insurer) now requires to issue a sanction. But I am not reading anything about the price at which they offer it, and yet I am reading in this very thread that for some race directors price is a bigger issue than the boat equipment and insurance requirements. Moreover, I have not read that such insurance actually was offered to USMS at any price, let alone at a price that would have made USMS's overall cost to insure swim practices, pool meets, and OW swims competitive with what USMS ended up agreeing to pay for 2013.
So I feel as if I am reading a heated debate without having enough facts to understand precisely why either side is so worked up.
