Requests to Withdraw a Protest or Request for Redress

This page is under construction.

On occasion, after following the procedures to submit a protest or request for redress, the submitter may decide to request the withdrawal of their protest or RFR. RRS 63.2(a) states “The protest committee shall hear each protest or request delivered unless it allows it to be withdrawn.” Thus, it is not a given that a request to withdraw a protest or RFR will be allowed.

There are no World Sailing Cases, Sail Canada Appeals, nor US Sailing Appeals, that give guidance on when it is or is not appropriate to allow for the withdrawal of a protest. However, there is some guidance in both the World Sailing Judges Manual and the World Sailing Q&A Booklet.

The 2026 WS Judges Manual, in section F.1.5, states, “Once a hearing request has been received, the party’s request to withdraw the protest or the request for redress must be approved as a decision of the protest committee. The protest committee should determine why the party is asking for it to be withdrawn. Permission to withdraw a protest would not be given if the protestor is being coerced or may themselves be in breach of rule 2 Fair Sailing.”

The 2022 WS Judges Manual provides slightly different wording: “The protest committee would allow the withdrawal of the protest if there is no reason to refuse the request. If damage or injury is suspected, or the protest committee thinks the protestor has realized he may have broken a rule and is attempting to avoid a penalty, permission should not be given.”

World Sailing Q&A 2023.006, dated 2023-05-17, titled “Protest withdrawal after the arbitration”, also provides insight. This Q&A 2023.006 makes it very clear that in an arbitration situation, a protestor should not be allowed to withdraw his or her protest to avoid a penalty. It follows directly that a protest committee should not allow the withdrawal of a protest if that would allow the protestor to avoid a penalty, or perhaps to avoid their position being made worse by any means.

If the original protest or RFR suggests that a rule may have been broken, then it may also not be appropriate to allow the withdrawal, in much the same way that a request to withdraw a PRP submission is generally not allowed.

There may be other reasons to not allow the withdrawal of the protest. A primary objective of the protest process is to clarify and resolve rule questions and concerns. If there remains widespread confusion and misunderstanding of how the rules apply to the scenario at issue, then it may be better to proceed with a hearing than to perpetuate a misunderstanding of the rules.

While nobody wants to unnecessarily go through a protest hearing, the wording in the 2022 Judges Manual seems to suggest that if there is any good reason to deny a withdrawal request, or any opposition to the withdrawal request, then the request should be denied.

It should be noted that the NSC/BYC SIs include a provision in SI 17.5 that allows the Protest Coordinator to approve the withdrawal of a protest. That provision was included because our SIs also provide for post-race penalties. SI 17.5 is intended for the situation when a boat accepts a post-race penalty, to allow the Protest Coordinator to then allow the withdrawal of the protest against the boat taking the PRP. This is consistent with provisions in Appendix T. However, if the protest coordinator is not comfortable in allowing a protest or RFR to be withdrawn, then a protest committee must be convened, per RRS 63.2(a).

Return to the Protest Procedures page.

Cameron Wood & Hugh Morrin, 2026 Protest Coordinators.

Page updated: 2026-07-25.
Page maintained by Hugh Morrin.