The Final Beat

I have a new favorite sailing blog.

Actually The Final Beat is a lot more than a blog. It has the ambitious goal of being...

"the website that helps dinghy sailors get better, quicker. All the best information about dinghy sailing on the web in books and on DVDs and CD-ROMs to help you find out what you want to know, when you want to know it."

And it's certainly true that the website is a great resource for finding all sorts of information about how to improve your sailing.



But the author, Damian, also writes blog posts. I would read it just for the blog posts. Actually I do read it just for the blog posts.

Damian hits a variety of topics related to dinghy sailing in his blog posts and is, at various times thoughtful, inspirational, provocative, humorous and touching.

For example…

He wrote a series of posts about the Great Retention Problem - how clubs can deal with the problem of once active junior sailors dropping out of the sport in their late teens or early twenties, discussing the pros and cons of such ideas as giving away free memberships and whether sailing clubs should have fleets of club-owned boats.

On a completely different topic, as someone who is completely incompetent at boat maintenance (or anything practical involving hand tools for that matter) I had a good chuckle over How to Fix Anything on your Boat in Just 23 Steps. It made me glad to learn that I am not the only sailor with two left hands and a klutz complex.

And this week Damian shared with us an hilarious story about when he and his wife took their two very young children sailing for the first time, and what his kids taught him about sailing, a post with the quirky title Toe Straps and Shark Attacks. And an Apology.



If you like Proper Course, I think you will like The Final Beat.

Check it out.