The Southern Cross and Country Roads

Something strange and unexpected seems to happen every time I go back to sailing the Laser after exclusively sailing the RS Aero for a while.

I was originally expecting that the Laser would feel clunky and boring after the RS Aero.

I was told that the Laser would feel like a truck after sailing the RS Aero.

To the contrary, when I jump back into a Laser I feel a surge of pleasure almost as intense as what I felt the first time I jumped into a Laser, here in Minorca 35 years ago.

How can that be?



After five days of RS Aero sailing last week, I decided to do some Laser sailing on Thursday. It was the starting practice class in the morning and the weekly regatta in the afternoon and I thought it would be more fun to race with a bunch of Lasers than cruise around the race course on my own in an RS Aero.

The starting practice was intense. It was clear that there was one very good Laser sailor in the class who would be the man to beat. The start line was biased to the boat end for most of the drills and the right side of the course had stronger wind so it was all about winning the boat end of the line. I didn't always do that very well, but on one memorable occasion I did "close the door" on the "man to beat" who was trying to barge at the starboard end of the line. Poor guy he didn't know what hit him. It felt very mean but I checked with the instructor afterwards and he did concur that what I did was entirely legal. I don't recall ever doing this in real racing before, so now I have a new weapon for racing back home. Watch out people!

The "man to beat" and I had some good close racing in the afternoon. We split the first two races, one of them in a photo finish that I took by inches. My concentration was wavering in the third race so he took his revenge for my start line aggressiveness in the morning, and he won the regatta by one point.

What a day! I came off the water with a big smile on the face and was babbling to anyone who would listen about what an awesome day I had had.



So how come I love the Laser so much, even though the RS Aero is a much better boat?

Is there an analogy that can explain it?

I did think of emulating Steve Cockerill and using a comparison to activities with the fairer sex, but I couldn't think of a way to do it (wife and mistress? sister wives?) that wouldn't get me into trouble with Tillerwoman.



So here's another analogy.

I love to travel, to see new places. Most people do. It's exciting, sometimes challenging, inspiring, mind broadening.

But I still love to come home to my beautiful home with its view of the bay and my own big comfy bed.









The RS Aero is my Southern Cross -
When you see the Southern Cross for the first time 
You understand now why you came this way

The Laser is my Country Roads -
Take me home to the place I belong.

Or something like that.



Does that make sense?

Do you still feel a special affection for the first boat you owned?

11 Lessons I Learned from Sailing with Fleet 413 on Sunday

On Sunday I went racing with the Newport Laser Frostbite Fleet also known as Fleet 413.

It was a beautiful day for sailing. Temperature about 50 degrees and a 15 knot SW breeze.

I would often describe those as perfect conditions for Laser sailing, but Sunday's races were a humbling experience for me.

A learning experience in all sorts of ways.


Lesson #1: Laser sailing is not like riding a bike. 

Riding a bike

You do forget how to do it (properly) if you don't do it for a while.

At least I do.

I hadn't been Laser sailing for six weeks and it felt like a strange and difficult thing to do.

At least at first.



Lesson #2: Get out to the course early.

I was at Sail Newport in plenty of time but somehow I frittered the time away and didn't take my boat down to the beach until about 15 minutes before the start. Then I spent some time helping some other people to launch. Then I launched my own boat only to discover that my evil sheet had wrapped itself around both the boom and the tiller extension in one of those triple buntline carrick bend double surgeon's clinch knots, which it has a tendency to do at times. Then I capsized my boat trying to untangle the triple buntline carrick bend double surgeon's clinch knot. Then I spent a few hours (or it felt like it) actually untying the triple buntline carrick bend double surgeon's clinch knot. O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!'

Triple buntline carrick bend double surgeon's clinch knot

As a result I only arrived at the start line just after the three minute signal for the first race and didn't have time to do all the things they tell you to do in the sailing books, like work out which was the favored side of the course and check out the start line bias and sail upwind for a while to check out the timing of the shifts and sail downwind for a while to check out how to play the waves.

Which is one reason I didn't do very well in the first race.

Or the second race.



Lesson #3: Buy a new sheet.

This sheet is old. This sheet is evil. Any sheet which will tie itself into a triple buntline carrick bend double surgeon's clinch knot deserves everything it has coming.

 I love the smell of burning sheets in the morning

Lesson #4. I am terrible at starts.

I really should concentrate on making 2016 the year I finally get around to working out how get better at starts.

After about 35 years of Laser sailing, it's about time. Seriously!

I could even blog about it.

Not me in not one of the starts on Sunday

Lesson #5. I did learn the lesson from Dave Perry about how it's better to overstand the starboard tack layline in a large fleet than to risk tacking below the layline.

Dave Perry

Well...... maybe I did overdo it a bit. Maybe I occasionally overstood too far. Maybe occasionally I hit the layline too far from the mark.

That's OK. I can gradually work on being more aggressive about when I hit the layline and when I tack. But at least I won't be having any more nightmares about not laying the mark.




Lesson #6.  Steve Cockerill is right.  Sailing a Laser downwind in 15 knots IS like dancing with Anne Widdecombe.

Dancing with The Right Honourable Anne Widdecombe

But that's OK. Dancing with Anne can be fun in a masochistic kind of way. Once you get the feel for how she's going to react to your moves (or not) it can even be sort of satisfying.

At least I didn't capsize on the downwind legs on Sunday like certain people did. You may have sailed in all kinds of fancy big boats but, in a Laser, The Right Honourable Anne Widdecombe can still trip you up.



Lesson #7. I am not bad at leeward mark roundings.

Seriously!

I did it like they tell you in the books.

In a crowd, I avoided getting trapped on the outside of the pinwheel and slowed down and rounded just behind the transom of the inside boat which sometimes gave me a good lane, and if not at least I had freedom to tack.

Pinwheel

And one time I saw a huge crowd in front of me going for the right hand gate mark (looking downwind) so I threw in a gybe and went for the left-hand gate mark and had clear air coming out of the mark and passed at least half a dozen boats on that leg.

But see Lesson #8.



Lesson #8. In a crowded fleet you need to approach the finish line on the starboard tack layline for the favored end of the finish line.

What was I thinking?

In what anyone could see would be a crowded finish I approached the finish line on starboard tack but shy of the layline for the port end of the line. As a result I had to tack on to port just a length or two short of the finish line. And it was a bad tack and I ended up in irons. And as I drifted backwards and desperately tried to get out irons, about ten boats passed me. Ugly!

Bad tack

Lesson #9. If I don't make any stupid mistakes I can easily finish in the middle of this fleet.

Apart from sucking at starts and a tendency to do stupid stuff, I have reasonable boat speed. I can hold my own downwind and (thanks to all that extra weight I put on over Christmas) I can sail faster upwind than the bottom half of the fleet in these conditions.

In the third race I did finish about mid-fleet.

I should have a goal to do at least as well as this in every race by the end of the season, and better if I can get good starts.

A goal

Lesson #10. When you don't sail for 6 weeks (and don't do much exercise of any kind in those weeks and eat too much over Christmas) you lose a lot of your fitness and stamina.

Too much Christmas dinner

After three races I had had enough. I was hiking hard on every beat and my back was feeling it.

Better to quit early than have another of those back problems which can put me out of sailing for many weeks.


Lesson #11. Sail against the best.

One of the lessons in Nick Craig's book, Helming To Win, is to "sail against the best." His advice is to "sail in fleets where the standard is high and above your own." Sailing against better sailors than yourself will sharpen you up. Observing and talking to top sailors is a great way to learn.

Sailing with Fleet 413 certainly qualifies.

I think I'll take a nap now.

Laser Frostbiting with Dave Perry

The last time I sailed with the Newport Laser frostbite fleet (aka Fleet 413) was on December 20. We enjoyed a special treat on that day because we had racing rules guru Dave Perry give us a seminar on the Racing Rules before sailing. Then we did our normal racing and Dave came out in a motorboat to shoot some video of us. After racing, Dave gave us a debrief using some of the video from our racing to illustrate various points about the Racing Rules and tactics and other good stuff.

A guru - not Dave Perry

So it's now 40 days since I last went sailing and I am getting a serious case of cabin fever.

A cabin

There have been a few weekends in the last few weeks when there was no sailing at all by the fleet on account of circumstances beyond our control like Christmas, gale force winds and heavy rain, winds in the 20s and temps in the 20s, or other such nonsense.

Fleet captain checking whether it is OK to sail this week

And then on the weekends when there was some sailing I wimped out on account of the dreaded man cold or the dreaded twisted ankle from falling over in the kitchen (how did that happen?) or other such nonsense.

I have been reduced to writing blog posts about such fascinating topics as squeezing a pimple, gasometers,  and Strictly Come Dancing. Blame the cabin fever.

Strictly Come Dancing

What Laser sailing is like according to Steve Cockerill

So let's get back to some real sailing again.

My performance when racing on that Sunday before Christmas was about the same as every other week I sailed this season.

• One fairly good race, when I managed to find a clear lane not too long after the start, play the shifts and the puffs more or less correctly, and arrive at the windward mark with the Laser sailing rock stars.


• A couple of bad races when I got totally blown away on the start line and spent most of the first beat gasping for air on account of the 40 or 50 Lasers in front of me.


• A couple of races where I arrived at the starboard tack layline simultaneously with the majority of the other 40 or 50 Lasers, tacked on what I thought was the layline, only to discover because of the tide or a big lefty shift or not being able to judge the layline properly or other such nonsense that I wasn't going to be able to lay the mark, and having to gybe around and go back down the line of 40 or 50 boats to try and find a gap to tack through which usually was between the boats who were 47th and 48th in the race. Ugly!

Here for your amusement are a couple of Dave Perry's videos.

The first is from my only good race that day. Dave used this video of a leeward mark rounding to teach us about communication at the mark.  That's me in 157812 rounding in the company of sailors who usually finish way ahead of me. I think I scored a 5th in this race

And here is a windward mark rounding. Dave used this video to explain why it is better to overstand than to tack short of the layline in a crowded fleet. If you look carefully you can see me in the middle distance bailing out when I realize I won't lay the mark and going the wrong way to try and find a gap between the 47th and 48th boats or something. 

Have a good laugh at my expense.

You're welcome!

Six Words of Sailboat Racing Advice - Learning Experiences

A few days ago I challenged readers to give me their best racing advice in six words.

There have been dozens of wise - and flippant - responses and they are still coming in.

But I wondered, what have I learned from my own racing experiences recently? How could I sum up those learnings in six words?



Racing with the Newport Laser frostbite fleet a couple of weeks ago, I discovered a counter-intuitive way to sail the first beat of a race in a highly competitive fleet and arrive at the windward mark up with the leaders. See Hubcap Diamond Star Halo 56th Sail.

Me

In one race I started at the "wrong" end of the line, I sailed the "wrong" side of the course, and I banged the corner.

But that meant I sailed the whole race in clear air and did the minimal number of tacks. In that race that strategy worked better (for me) than fighting for position on the crowded end of the line, fighting for a clear lane against all the top sailors in the fleet, and being bounced around doing multiple tacks in traffic on the busy side of the course.

Clean start and clear air wins.

Last month I sailed my RS Aero in a local fun pursuit race against an assorted menagerie of craft, the Archipelago Rally.  I came 2nd in the 43 boat fleet. See How I (Almost) Won the 2015 Archipelago Rally.

Some other sailors (behind me)

But I was very lucky. The tide situation favored the faster boats, but even more importantly the leading boats made not one, but two navigation errors! On a course that only had three rounding marks! And I happened to be placed to take advantage of their mistakes. It helps to be lucky but the real moral is...

Know the course. Write it down.

In July I sailed in the RS Aero North Americans in the Columbia River Gorge. I had a blast but on the first day of racing I capsized in three of the four races. I was pretty slow at capsize recoveries and my results were mediocre. See RS Aero Capsizes - Mission Accomplished and RS Aero North Americans.

Some other sailors (way in front of me)

In retrospect it was apparent that I had not practiced enough in the kind of conditions I should have expected in the Gorge - strong winds and short waves. Almost all of my RS Aero sailing in the summer had been done on a lake, on flat water, and usually in quite light winds. There are places in Rhode Island where I could have found conditions more similar to the Gorge and I should have done some RS Aero training there before going to the NAs. (I should have practiced capsize recoveries more too.)

Train for the conditions you expect.

Next year it will be different.

How about you?

Do you have any "learning experiences" from races or regattas that you can sum up in 6 words of advice?

The Best Racing Advice in Six Words

If you only had six words to pass on some advice about sailboat racing to a new racer, what would they be?

For example, the first answer that springs to my mind when faced with this question would be the somewhat cynical...

"Win the start. Extend your lead."

But I am sure you can do much better than that.

Please leave your answer in the comments to this post.

---

This post was inspired by the post The Best Cruising Advice in Six Words on Windtraveler the excellent cruising blog about that "estrogen-rich family" Brittany, Scott, Isla, Haven and Mira. (The estrogen quote is theirs, not mine.)

That post was inspired by a recent New York Times contest calling for parenting advice in "six words or less" which was, itself, inspired by the book The Best Advice in Six Words: Writers Famous and Obscure on Love, Sex, Money, Friendship, Family, Work, and Much More.

Is that what they call a "meme?" Whatever they call it, please participate, and leave your answer in the comments.

Racing advice in six words.

First thing that comes into your head.

Now.

---

This challenge is a little reminiscent of the group writing projects we used to run on this blog.

For example in 2008 I asked people to write blog posts or articles on the theme of Best Sailing Innovation Ever which received 25 entries.

A couple of years later we turned that one on its head and had a group writing project on Worst Sailing Innovation Ever which had 28 entries.

Wurst - Worst. Get it?

Some of our group writing projects have had even more entries than that.

But today's challenge is a lot easier than writing a whole article.

Just six words.

Six words of racing advice.

How hard is that?

Please leave your answer in the comments.

Your name - or nom de plume - would be nice too.

"Nom de plume" is French for "name of pen."  Some stupid name you make up if you don't people to know who you are and, really, who could blame you.

Where was I?

Where am I?

Oh yes. Six words of racing advice.

Submit more than one idea if you feel like it.

In the comments to this post.

Now.

---

I don't know what I will do with all the answers.

Probably put them all in a separate post.

Maybe organize them into categories.

Perhaps use some of the best ideas as jumping off points to write some of my own blog posts, full of insane rambling and half-remembered reminiscences about races in which I used - or failed to use - your advice.

I'm not in this video but it does cover a situation which is pretty typical of my own racing career.

I really do need your advice.

Experiment

Definition: An experiment is an orderly procedure carried out with the goal of verifying, refuting, or establishing the validity of a hypothesis.

Hmmm. What do experiments have to do with sailing?



I had a bit of a revelation about how important experimentation is to sailing during one long afternoon racing with the Duxbury Laser Fleet last year. I was not having a good day. I figured I was of a similar standard to the top 5 or 6 sailors in the fleet but somehow I never seemed to be at the front of the fleet that day. I was getting a bit frustrated to be perfectly honest. I thought I was sailing the boat well. I thought I had a good strategy and was getting good starts. But somehow it never paid off in my results.

After the racing was over and we were back on shore, I asked one of my friends, who had had some excellent races, what her strategy for the day had been. Her answer was something like, "Well, at first I thought the left looked good so I went that way in the first race but that didn't work out. So the next race I went right and that was worse. So after that I just played the shifts up the middle in every race and that seemed best, so I stuck with it."

Ahah! That explained a lot. In every race, I had checked the wind before the course and thought I could see more pressure on the left so I always went that way. And it never worked out. But I was stubborn and kept persisting in my failing strategy. In retrospect I think there was more pressure out to the left but often it was beyond the layline of our (short) courses and so it did me no good. What's the definition of insanity again?

Another of my friends had capsized while going downwind in one race. I asked him what had happened. "Oh, I rounded the windward mark in third place but I wasn't prepared to settle for that, so I tried sailing by an extreme angle by the lee and heeling to windward more than usual." It didn't work out for him but he was experimenting, trying something a bit different, getting out of his comfort zone, testing a hypothesis you might say… and in the process learning something.

It's OK to use some races as learning experiences. Eric Twiname said so in his classic book about self-coaching, Sail, Race and Win. In fact he recommended that you use some races to experiment with your technique, recognizing that this means your race results will probably get worse before they get better.

Now that I remember it, on that long afternoon last summer in Duxbury, I did notice that I was doing mediocre tacks. But I didn't do anything about it. I was trying too hard to do well in the races. In retrospect I should have said, "I am just going to use the next beat to work out why my tacks are all wrong and try some different things until I get it right. Bucket."



The reference to a bucket won't make any sense to you unless you listened to President Obama's speech at the White House Correspondent's Dinner last Saturday night.





So that's another resolution for racing this year.

Experiment more.

Bucket.

Don't Do Stupid Stuff

"Don't do stupid stuff" may not be a organizing principle for planning a campaign to be the best Laser sailor on the planet, but it sure is a mantra that can radically improve your results when racing in a small local fleet.

Two Sundays ago I raced with the Duxbury Laser fleet. I only did one really stupid thing (capsizing while tacking - don't ask - I have no idea why it happened) and I won a number of races and was first overall for the day.

Yesterday I raced again with the Duxbury Laser fleet and did lots of stupid stuff. As a result my results were abysmal. But I still had fun.



Somehow I won the first race. I did that last week too. Maybe I warm up and get in the groove faster than the other sailors. But it was all downhill from there.

In the second race I was OCS and had to go back to restart. In a close fleet on a short course it only takes one incident like that to dump you way down the fleet. Actually I don't really count one OCS in nine races as stupid stuff. I almost take pride in it because it shows I am being aggressive on the start line and I did have some very good starts in the other races so that was all good.

In the next race I tried to cross a starboard tacker on the beat and he just clipped my transom. That's really stupid stuff. I should know better.

I did my 720 for that incident. Later in the day I asked the fleet captain whether the local rule was a 360 or a 720 for boat to boat rule violations. Turned out it was a 360 (as it is in some other local fleets.) Not knowing the local rules (or reading the SIs) is more stupid stuff.

In another race I was behind two boats coming into the gybe mark. I figured the outside one would round wide and I would be able to follow the transom of the inside boat and sneak inside the outer boat. I was wrong. He closed the gap on me. I ended up going the wrong side of the gybe mark AND hitting it. Duh! More stupid stuff.

Then there was another race where I was leading and I was heading for the right hand gate mark on starboard tack, but another boat managed to get an overlap to windward of me on what would be the inside well before we entered the zone. So, as leeward boat, I sailed him way to the right of the mark, gybed and entered the zone clear ahead. I was pretty pleased with myself for about a millisecond, until I tried to gybe again and round the mark. I dropped my tiller AND rounded up head to wind AND hit the mark AND snagged the mark's line with my rudder  (don't ask - I have no idea why it happened) AND dragged the mark upwind a few boat lengths before I figured out what was happening. Quintuple duh! Lots of stupid stuff. The other guy was so disgusted at my antics that he wisely decided to keep well clear of me so he went round the other gate mark and beat me handily as did most of the rest of the fleet by the time I had disentangled myself.

So yes. I did lots of stupid stuff yesterday. If I hadn't done so much stupid stuff my finishes would have been so much better.



On the other hand, look on the bright side...

Tillerman's stupid mistakes were fodder for much hilarity and teasing over beers at the Milepost Tavern later. I suspect it will take me a few weeks to live it all down. I am pleased that I am able to afford my friends so much amusement.

We do learn from our mistakes, don't we? I figure the memories of yesterday's mistakes are so seared in my mind that I probably won't make the same mistakes again for a while.

And when I do lots of stupid stuff, at least it gives me something to blog about.



PS. Yesterday was my 42nd day of Laser sailing this year. My regular (male) readers know what's coming next…

Collision Avoidance and Offset Marks

Many of you have probably already seen this video of a port-starboard collision at the recent E-Scow Nationals, but I haven't sen much discussion about it online. So here's my take on the situation and what we can learn from it and how such situations might be avoided in future.

As always, all opinions are my own and may be ill-informed, confused, or even downright wrong. So feel to disagree and abuse me in the comments if you are so inclined.



So what do we have here?

A large fleet.

A crowded windward mark rounding.

Boats on starboard bearing away on to a run and raising their spinnakers, while port tackers further down the fleet are still racing upwind towards the windward mark and are crossing the path of the starboard tack boats.

And one of the port tackers collides with a starboard tacker.

It's one of the most dangerous parts of the race course. Everyone knows that port should give way to starboard in this situation, but it's complicated by the facts that the starboard tackers are changing course and the the crew of the starboard tackers are probably busier than they are at any other time on the race course. It's bad enough on the Laser... sheeting out, pulling up the board, releasing the outhaul, maybe resetting the vang if you released it too much at the windward mark, catching the first wave… and I suspect it's even worse on a boat with a spinnaker. So sometimes the starboard tacker doesn't have their eyes out of the boat enough, and the port tacker may see the starboard tacker but isn't sure exactly when she is going to turn and how sharply. I've seen a similar incident in a Laser fleet which put the starboard tack sailor in the hospital.



So what can be done to avoid these collisions?



Options for the sailors

Under Rule 10, the obligation is clearly on the port tackers to keep clear. What options do they have? Slow down, head up, bear away, or tack I suppose.

Bearing way is certainly an option but you had better do it soon enough to be able to pass cleanly ahead of the starboard tacker. The port tack boat in the video tried to bear away but was too late. Tacking wouldn't usually be necessary or even advisable so close to the lay line. Slowing down or heading up are the best possibilities I suppose for avoiding one starboard tacker. But what if there is a whole parade of starboard tackers, as there is in this incident? Do you luff up and wait for them all to pass? You might wait for the whole fleet. Or do you choose a likely looking gap and go for it? It can be a tough choice.

The real lesson is that port tackers should really anticipate this situation and not put themselves in the situation of having to cross a crowd of starboard tackers bearing away to the downwind leg so close to the mark. It's a bit like the old joke about a tourist in Ireland who asks one of the locals for directions to Dublin. The Irishman replies, "Well sir, if I were you, I wouldn’t start from here."



And the starboard tack boats are not entirely immune from the responsibility to avoid a collision. Rule 16.1 says, "When a right-of-way boat changes course, she shall give the other boat room to keep clear." So if a starboard tack boat wishing to bear away sees a port tacker approaching, sailing in a straight line course that would cross to leeward of the starboard tacker if she maintained her course, the latter can't just bear away in front of the port tacker and immediately claim right of way under Rule 10. She has to give the port tacker room to keep clear.

Not that I'm saying that the starboard tacker in this incident changed course in such a way that she infringed Rule 16. But if the port tacker were so minded she could certainly argue a case under Rule 16 in the protest room.

It is interesting that the two starboard tack boats rounding the mark after the one involved in the collision chose to sail high to avoid another port tacker rather than bearing away in front of it. That may have been for strategic reasons (wanting to sail on that side of the downwind leg) but it was probably also smart tactics to avoid any risk of getting tangled up with the port tacker.



Options for the race committee

OK. So I hope we can all agree that having a bunch of port tack close-hauled boats sailing into a bunch of starboard tack boats trying to bear away and raise spinnakers is a situation fraught with risks of collision. The classic race management solution to avoid this problem is to lay an offset mark to define a short reaching leg for the boats after the rounding the windward mark. Then when they do round the offset mark and start to bear away they will be several boat lengths to windward of the port tack lay line and so when the the boats going downwind meet the port tackers they will be settled on their downwind course and not trying to make dramatic changes of course.

It's a good idea and it has its merits. But there is an offset mark in this incident. And still the port tackers are tangling with the starboard tackers as they are bearing away to start the downwind leg.

So what went wrong? Why are the port tackers so close to the offset mark?

Let's be generous and assume that the race committee placed the offset mark correctly (although that doesn't always happen.) Maybe the port tackers overstood the layline? Or perhaps there was a big left shift late in the race? Whatever the reason, this offset mark clearly isn't preventing the problem it was designed to solve.

I have heard talk this year of a different race management solution. Instead of the conventional offset mark defining a short reaching leg, place a mark a few boat lengths directly downwind from the windward mark with the idea that port tackers on the beat must pass it to leeward. (Not sure exactly what language you would use in the SIs to achieve this. No boat on the windward leg may cross the line between the windward mark and the offset mark?)

It sounds as if this variation of the offset mark would achieve the aim of keeping boats approaching on the port tack layline away from boats in the process of rounding the mark and bearing away, as the port tack layline would essentially be the layline to this new "offset" mark.

Has anybody heard of a race committee trying this option? Any experience or views on how well it would work?



And now over to you. Have you been involved in situations like this? Have you seen, or been involved in, similar collisions? What is your plan when you are the starboard tacker or the port tacker? Do we need any changes in the Rules to help make this part of the race course more safe? Are there other things race management can do?

Risk

A major part of sailboat racing is learning how to manage risk.

How to play the odds.

When to take a risk to make a large gain.

And when to play it safe to avoid making a huge loss.

I'm not usually very good at this aspect of the game. I think I'm usually too conservative on the race course and don't take risks when I should. One aspect of my game that I think I usually play too safe is the windward mark rounding. My usual modus operandi is to approach the starboard tack layline six to ten lengths from the mark, find a gap in the parade of boats on the lay line, sail through it and tack. I hardly ever come on in port on the layine or within three boat lengths of the mark, and hardly ever try to tack below starboard tackers and risk not laying the mark.

But on Sunday it was different.

I was racing with the Duxbury Laser fleet again and the winds were forecast to be 15 gusting 25 but I don't think it ever actually was that strong.

I was still suffering from some lower back pain from the previous Sunday so I determined that I would race for an hour or so and then call it a day. Didn't want to overdo it.

As a result I didn't care too much about the results, so I had a mindset that I was prepared to take some risks. Roll the dice and see what happened.

The boat end of the start line was favored and I knew some of the sailors in this fleet would be fighting each other for the position next to the boat. I chose to play it safe at the starts and get a position a little further down the line with room to accelerate that was away from the mayhem at the RC boat.

As a result I was usually on the left of the leaders going up the beat. Sometimes sailing a bit faster than them (mantra: bow down) but not fast enough that I could tack and safely cross them all until they tacked. On the shortish course that often meant I was close to the port tack lay line before I could tack.

Normally this would be where I would start to panic and start looking for gaps in the starboard tack parade and bearing off to find such a gap and giving up way too many boats in the process of trying to make a safe windward mark rounding.

But on Sunday it was different. Some times I came in the port tack layline and managed to tack cleanly in front of the approaching starboard tackers. Some times I was further away from the port tack lay line and I chanced it tacking under a starboard tacker. Risks I would never normally take. It worked out every time and I rounded the mark in the lead, or in the leading pack every time.

Hey. Maybe I should try this more often?

I had good speed upwind and downwind. My leeward mark roundings weren't too shabby either. After four races my scores were 1,2,1,1.

Hmmm!

In line with my plan of only sailing for an hour or so, I decided to call it a day. Some wag later asked me if I had got tired of winning.

Not at all. But I chose not to risk hurting my back again by sailing for too long.

It's all about managing risk.

Risk vs Reward

I had a fun afternoon on Sunday, racing with the Massapoag YC Laser fleet in Sharon MA. The wind was blowing at over 10 knots from the S down the major axis of the lake. Except for the odd occasions when it was 1-2 knots, or from the E, or from the W. Hey, that's lake sailing. Deal with it.

I had a typically mediocre series of races but I did learn a few things about starts. Or maybe relearned them.

There was one race where the boat end of the start line was favored. Another boat and I set up high and a boat just to leeward of the committee boat luffed us up and closed the gap on us and stopped us from barging. Quite right too. I was able to tack and gybe around and start a little late. But the other attempting barger and the boat that luffed him ended up getting tangled up with each other and they both had terrible starts.

Lesson #1: Don't barge.

Lesson #2: Enforce your rights but don't be so aggressive in defending your position that you end up tangled with another boat and you both get bad starts.

Then there was another time when the pin was favored and I attempted a port tack start. When I had checked the wind about 90 seconds earlier it was impossible to lay the pin on starboard from the boat end of the line, so it should have worked. But the wind had shifted and I realized way too late that I would have to duck the first boat reaching down the line towards the pin. And then when I had ducked him I had to duck the next boat… and the next… and the next... Oops.

Lesson #3: Don't try to port tack the fleet unless you are absolutely sure you can pull it off.

Or perhaps it was really Lesson #4: Don't try to port tack the fleet unless you have nerves of steel so you won't chicken out when you can see the whites of the eyes of six starboard tackers reaching straight at you.

On the other hand in the races where I set up for nice safe conservative starts on starboard tack away from either end of the relatively short line, I got decent starts and respectable finishes.

Memo to self: You don't have to "win" the start. You just need to get a good start, near the favored end, with room to leeward, accelerating at the right time, on the line at the gun, and preferably bow out on the boats to windward and leeward.

Don't roll the dice.

How to Get Killer Starts in Laser Races

Last Thursday evening there was another webinar organized by Javier "Rulo" Borojovich, the head coach at the Laser Training Center in Cabarete. This one was about Starting Technique and featured as guest expert, UK Laser sailor Nick Thompson, currently ranked by ISAF as #5 Laser sailor in the world.

Nick Thompson

God knows I need to improve my starts but unfortunately - well fortunately really -Tillerwoman and I had agreed to babysit the four Massachusetts tiller extensions at the designated hour for the webinar while their parents went out on a well-deserved night on the town in Boston which was somehow earned by my daughter-in-law's blogging efforts. I think I mentioned before that she is the successful blogger in the family. People actually give her things like money and nights out on the town in Boston for her blogging. I don't know where I'm going wrong.

Where was I? Where am I? Oh yes babysitting the Massachusetts tiller extensions.

4 grandkids randomly doing stuff

 on a couch that isn't very level

So as I really really need to improve my starts, and as I was clearly not going to be able to concentrate on the webinar while four grandkids were running around the house pretending to be a ballerina or monster trucks or whatever it is they are supposed to be, and bouncing off the walls and singing songs about royals or tigers or making monster truck noises, and clamoring for something to eat or refusing to eat what is put in front of them, in other words just kids being kids… I asked Rulo if I could have a look at a recording of the webinar at some later date. And he agreed.

So once I had recovered from the babysitting experience (only joking kiddos - I always love spending time with you) and the terrible awful disgusting thing that happened just after their parents came home from their bloggy night out in Boston (you really don't want to know) I settled down quietly at home to watch the recording of the webinar and learn about starting technique from Rulo and Nick.

Rulo's presentation and Nick's expert contributions covered everything you would want to know about getting killer starts in Laser races including, how to decide where on the line to start, how to hold your position on the line, how to create a leeward gap, how to accelerate at the start, and how to hold your lane after the start.

Of course a lot of this is standard stuff that you will hear at any starting clinic or can read in any good book about Laser sailing. But there were also quite a few useful tips and hints that I hadn't heard before such as…

• Why Nick doesn't start in the middle of the line very often but why Robert Scheidt does and where someone who doesn't have very good boat speed (I think he was talking about me) should start.
• A trick on how to spot the RC boat at the end of the line when the view is blocked by sails.
• The importance of checking "drift rate."
• How to find a gap on the line in the last 30 seconds before the start (with a video showing Nick pulling this off to perfection!)
• Six tips to minimize leeward drift.
• Three ways to create a leeward gap.
• Five keys to protecting your gap.
• A trick to confuse the judges. Sssshhh. Don't tell anyone.
• Three best ways to practice starting.
• And much much more.

So thanks to Rulo and Nick for an excellent webinar.

And thanks to Emily, Aidan, Owen and Andrew for being good kids and so much fun (apart from that terrible awful disgusting thing that happened after their parents came home.)

The next webinar will be on 27 March and will be about upwind speed in light and medium winds with Laser Olympic Bronze Medalist Rasmus Myrgren from Sweden as guest expert. You can sign up here.
       

Ask the Tillerman #1

In response to my request to Ask the Tillerman some questions, a reader named Was it Was asked, "Am I normal in enjoying a bad start because I get to overtake more boats, than have a good start and watch boats go past me?"

Ain't that life for the mid-fleet sailor?

Happens to me all the time.

I guess the truth is that the 15-20 guys at the front of the fleet really are faster than me. And then there are 5-10 guys at the back of the fleet who, incredible as it sounds, really are slower than me. So, contrary to popular wisdom, it really doesn't matter whether I get a good start or a bad start.

If I get a good start I might round the first windward mark in the top 10, but then the fast guys will pass me and I will end up somewhere around 20th. If I get a bad start I might round the first windward mark with the tail-enders but then, even in a short race, I will pass a few boats and end up around 20th.

OK. Sometimes, once in a blue moon, I might get an amazingly good start and luckily go the right side of the beat even though all the good guys favored the other side and then I might round the first mark up with the leaders and might even finish in the top 10. Even a blind squirrel finds a nut occasionally.


So is it normal to enjoy a bad start, asks our friend.

Well, one way to look at it is if most of your starts are bad starts you had better enjoy those races else otherwise you would be miserable most of the time you are racing, and then you might do do something incredibly stupid and desperate like taking up golf... or even cruising.

And a start is just one moment in the race. Good or bad the moment is soon over. So why not enjoy spending the whole race passing the boats at the back of the fleet rather than suffer the frustrations of getting passed by all those really annoying fast sailors at the front of the fleet?

In fact, the more you think about, why even bother to try to get a good start?  Last time I did RC duty I noticed there was always a bunch of boats hanging out above the layline for the boat end of the start line not making any serious attempt to be on the line when the gun went off. They just waited until the rest of the fleet had started and then they rounded the committee boat and followed the fleet up the course. Were they deliberately getting bad starts in every race? And, more to the point, were they the smartest sailors there? Had they found the real secret of how to enjoy racing?

I have read advice somewhere, in one of those totally useless books which purport to teach you how to win races, that sometimes you should deliberately be OCS, and not go back to restart, so that you can get the experience of sailing in clear air and being able to decide your own strategy for the beat without getting bounced from tack to tack by all those annoyingly fast sailors at the front of the fleet. I think the point is to motivate you to try hard to win the starts so that you could sail like that in every race. Fat chance!

No. I think the opposite is the best advice.

The secret of happiness is to start last and spend the race overtaking other boats.

Which is a rather long way round of saying in answer to the original question.... YES.

I Have Stumbled on the Answer

I haven't sailed for a week or so.

I haven't even blogged about sailing for a week.

But I have been thinking about sailing.



I have been thinking that one reason that I suck at racing is that I don't concentrate on the right things when I'm racing.



Some of the things I should be thinking about when I am racing...

• Which side of the course is favored?
• What is the current doing?
• Am I on a lift or a header?
• What is the wind doing?
• Where is the next gust?

Some of things I am actually thinking about when I am racing..

• Do I need to adjust my sail controls?
• Can I cross this starboard tacker?
• What are my telltales doing?
• Why am I underpowered?
• Why am I overpowered?

In other words, I am spending way too much time with my head in the boat and worrying about how to sail the boat faster and dealing with the boats in my immediate vicinity, and too little time thinking about the big picture of how to get to the windward mark in the lead. (Ha ha! Well, at least to get to the windward mark in the top half of the fleet.)


It has become clear to me that I have penetrated to the very core of things and I have stumbled on the answer...



Leonard Cohen has a very similar revelation about 7 minutes into this video...






Am I overthinking this?

Sail in More Wind

The second lesson from Steve Hunt (aka on SailX as flow) is "Sail in More Wind."

Pretty obvious, right? The darker the water, the stronger the wind. The stronger the wind, the faster the boat.

I find this easier in SailX than in real life. I'm pretty good at spotting the gusts on flat water on lakes. But on the sea, where there are more little waves and chop, I find it much harder to see small changes in wind strength. I do have polarized lenses in my sunglasses which is supposed to help. And some days I can spot something and take advantage of it. But usually I'm not very good at spotting the stronger wind on the sea. My eyesight is certainly deteriorating as I get older and even my prescription lenses can't totally correct all the problems. Anyway, that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it.

Once again, Steve makes it look easy in the video....




There is more wind on the left so he fights for and wins the pin which is slightly favored.

This video is actually just as instructive about how to win the pin. Notice how Steve refuses to allow any boats to get to the left of him and then actually has to luff a bit above close-hauled to make the pin. As I was saying in the previous lesson, unless you are really sure of your boathandling, fighting for the pin can be a high risk choice. Notice how, of the five boats closest to the pin, three are OCS and one is penalized by the system for a collision with flow. The latter boat immediately protests flow. I wonder who won the protest?

Anyway, Steve is in the stronger wind and in the lead. Some wind fills in more in the middle of the course so he tacks back for it. He can't quite cross the boat in second place so he leebows him and then is pretty soon on the port tack layline for the mark. Notice how fast that came up. It's very easy to get pushed beyond the layline on these short courses in SailX.

Steve rounds the windward mark in first place, but then somehow is passed on the run by the boat that was in second place boat who used her windshadow to slow Steve down and pass him. In Lasers in real life, I always try and get clear of groups of boats behind me on the run. The wind shadow from a group of boats can really mess up your day.

But never fear. Our hero sees more wind on the right before his rival and heads over there to regain the lead.

Doesn't he make it look easy?

So why don't we all do that?

It's another one of those "words of wisdom" that everyone knows but it always seems to be the same guys that make it work for them time and time again.

Why is that?

Start Near the Favored End

SailX, the online interactive regatta racing game and virtual trainer, is currently running a weekly series of training videos by one of the best sailors on SailX, a fellow who goes by the name of "flow". It turns out that flow is, in real life, Steve Hunt, a well known American professional sailor and coach. Among other achievements he is a seven-year member of the US Olympic Team in the 470 Class, two-time Etchell World Champion, and Congressional Cup Winner.

Flow certainly knows his stuff when it comes to teaching mere mortal midfleet mediocrities like me how to sail smarter and faster, and SailX is an excellent visual tool to support his teaching. So I thought I would write a few posts linking to his lessons, and supplementing them with my own ill-informed and insane ramblings just to confuse my readers.

The first lesson in the series is about starting near the favored end of the start line...





In the first race, the pin is only favored by about 5 degrees and flow mentions that there appears to be more wind on the right hand side of the course. (The darker shaded areas mean more wind.) The questions I asked myself were (a) would I even be able to spot a 5 degree bias on the line? and (b) would it really be worth going for the pin in that situation?

Flow doesn't make a very well-timed start at the pin (he was distracted talking to us) and it certainly looked to me as if two other boats ESP-500 and notainslie got better starts near the middle and right half of the line and were more or less even with flow up the beat. Flow was also lucky in that no other boat seriously contested the pin with him. It's not always as easy as he makes it look here to win the pin and then tack and cross the fleet!

So let's do the math...

It looks to me as if the start line is about 25 boat lengths long. If we assume these are 15 foot dinghies that means the start line is about 375 feet long. If I remember my high school trigonometry correctly that means the the pin end of the line is about 33 feet to windward of the boat end, or just over two boat lengths. Which means that you are only one boat length further to windward than the boats in the middle of the line.  Is that a big enough advantage to be able to tack and cross them, assuming you all get equally good starts?

Hmmm.

In the second race example (clip starts at about 3:35) the pin is 8 degrees favored, and flow goes for the pin again. This time he has a group of boats just to windward of him on the line but he still manages to tack at the pin and cross them. Based on my math that shouldn't have been possible but I think he pulled it off because he was going faster at the start and was closer to the line at the start than they were. The tack (in a Laser) didn't cost him much and he just managed to cross the whole group. Not sure I would have had the balls to attempt that move in a real race!

The wind is clocking right and there is more wind on the right, but because of his tack at the start, flow is sailing into the stronger wind with the other leaders and is looking in good shape again.

He makes it look easy.

In real life (and in SailX sometimes) going for the pin like that can be a high risk/ high reward gamble. Sometimes several other boats have exactly the same idea and there can be a huge pile-up at the pin with perhaps only one or two boats coming out of the mess cleanly. In such situations it can be safer to start a little farther up the line.

Part of the skill in deciding what to do depends on "reading" the intentions of the rest of the fleet. Is a whole bunch of boats going to fight for the pin or are they all hanging out near the boat (as in the first example)? That's one thing I currently find hard to do. If I commit to a place on the line too early it sometimes turns out to be a bad choice because that's where the crowd chooses too. If I watch what the fleet is planning to do too long, I can leave it too late and there are no holes left.

I guess I need to practice on SailX more.

So what do you think?

How would you have handled those starts?

Do you think SailX is a useful training tool?

You can find all the videos in the Steve Hunt coaching series in this SailX article.

Why Words of Wisdom Aren't Crap

Last Monday I wrote a typically rambling and incoherent post in which I questioned why the "words of wisdom" we often hear from winners of regattas are often simply well-known basic principles about boat-handling or tactics or strategy, "wisdom" that has even been published in sailing books before. They are not the super-secret magic go-faster tricks that many of us are hoping to hear. I speculated on various reasons why this may be so.

Today I was accused of asking "whether words of wisdom are just crap."

No. I don't think words of wisdom are just crap.

Having pondered the matter over a few glasses of good Scotch whisky in the intervening week, I think I have finally seen the truth.

The reason why all sailing regattas are won time and time again by the same few sailors, less than 5% of the total number of competitors, is that the rest of us non-winners simply fail to apply and execute those basic racing principles as consistently and well as the winners do.

Sure the winners may have excellent boatspeed, may even know the odd go-faster secret, but when they regurgitate the same old well-known principles such as how to get a good start, how to sail a beat in shifty, puffy conditions, or how to sail fast in waves downwind... they are really doing us non-winners a huge favor. They are telling us what we need to hear. "Get the basics right and you too will have the chance to be a winner."

Yes, it may also be true that we non-winners aren't as fit as the winners, and that we may not have practiced as much as the winners; but the fundamental reason we don't win is that we don't have the right habits, the habits of applying those basic principles every time in every race.

So how do you change habits? How do you develop good habits? Read any book on the subject or just do the 21st century thing and google it. You will get the same answers. All the experts will talk about the same things...

Write it down

Positive self-talk

Visualization

Etc.

Etc.

In other words, the more you write about and think about and imagine what you want to do, the more likely it is that you will actually do it.

So no, I don't think words of wisdom are just crap.

Actually I think I need to read and study and write about and blog about those words of wisdom even more. Because then I might actually remind myself to apply those basic principles of how to win sailboat races, and convince myself I can really do those things well.

So I'm going to start blogging even more about words of wisdom, about all the well-known advice on how to race well, about how to win.

It might do me some good. It might even do some of my readers some good.

Watch this space...

Are Words of Wisdom a Waste of Time?

We racing sailors like "words of wisdom."

"Words of Wisdom" are what they call those reports by winners after a regatta or an afternoon of club racing.

Everyone who wasn't a winner wants to read them so they can pick up tips on how to be winners.

I'm as guilty as the rest of the non-winners.

But I have bad news for you other non-winners.

I think that words of wisdom might be a waste of time.

---

Why would I say that?

Well, a few weeks back I thought I would start posting some words of wisdom from various race winners and regatta winners on this blog. I thought that if I extracted the key points from some words of wisdom and rewrote them in my own words on my blog, then I might remember them, and then I would apply the words of wisdom in actual races.

The reaction from my readers surprised me at first...

I wrote some words of wisdom from Bill Brangiforte on sailing upwind in a large fleet and got a couple of comments that they were "pretty much right out of Stuart Walker's books."

I summarized some video interviews on the Improper Course blog which had words of wisdom from winners at the Florida Laser Masters Week. A commenter on the original post, remarked, "Well, nothing new here, but it's all about getting those basics right isn't it?"

What? These words of wisdom from top sailors who had won major regattas were "basics" and right out of some books?

Well, yes. I guess they were.

So what is going on? If regatta winners do so well by simply applying well-known principles about how to start, or what strategies to use in different wind conditions, or how to go fast downwind... then why aren't we all doing these things and winning regattas too?

---

I thought about it for a while, and came up with these seven possible reasons why words of wisdom might be a waste of time.

1. Perhaps these top sailors are not spilling the real secrets of how they won the races? Maybe they are just explaining how they won by repeating well-known "basics" or stuff from Stuart Walker's books? This is true as far as it goes, but really they also know some super secret go-faster techniques that they are never going to reveal to everyone on the Interwebs. This theory does appeal to the paranoid side of my personality, not to mention stoking my negative self-esteem and fueling my feeling that I will always be a crap sailor. But I do find it hard to believe that the top guys could be so mean.

2. On the other hand, perhaps these top sailors have some ways of going faster and winning races that are totally subconscious? They don't even know themselves why they are so fast. They are not deliberately hiding their go-faster secrets from us mere mortal mid-fleet mediocrities because they are not even really conscious of what they are doing themselves. I like this theory even better because it means the winners are not diabolically plotting to keep the rest of us down by deliberately misleading us. I can still think of them as nice guys. But their words of wisdom are still a waste of time.

3. Or perhaps these top sailors have magical powers and super sharp senses? For example, perhaps they can see what the wind is doing way better than those of us with average (or below average) eyesight? It's all very well to know that you should stay in the puffs but if you are not seeing the stronger patches of wind on the water as well as the eagle-eyed top sailors, then no amount of words of wisdom are going to help you. I think this is my favorite theory. The winners are super-heroes with magical powers. It's not so bad getting beaten every week by sailors with extraordinary superhuman powers.


On the other hand perhaps getting the basics right is all there is to winning sailboat races? There are no secrets. Everything worth knowing on the topic has already been written and talked about and published on the Interwebs. But for some reasons, those of us who are perpetual non-winners simply don't execute the basics right. Now why would that be?


4. Perhaps we are just too unfit to get the basics right and win races? This probably does apply to some of the words of wisdom I read about Laser racing. It's all very well to say that you should hike the whole beat with straight legs and your shoulders back, or sail the whole run balanced on the soles of your feet as if you were on a surfboard, but unless you have quads of iron you are not going to be able to do those things as well as the winners do.

5. Perhaps we know the right moves but we haven't practiced them enough to execute them properly? It's all very well to read some expert talking about catching waves and to always be sailing "downhill" on waves on a run, but it's a lot harder to do it right all the time unless you've spent an enormous amount of time sailing downwind in waves.

6. Perhaps we have bad habits and even though we know, for example, what we should be doing to get a great start, when the pressure is on we revert to our old habits designed to guarantee a mediocre start?

7. Or perhaps we don't have the right mental attitude to apply the words of wisdom we have heard or read? After all there are so many things to know. In the heat of the moment on the racecourse we forget all the words of wisdom about strategy and tactics and boatspeed and boat handling and boat tuning etc. etc. and hack around the course watching the winners disappear into the distance just like they always do.

---

So where does that leave us?

For sure you won't win races by spending every weekend by the fireside reading words of wisdom.

If you have been racing for a few years, you probably already know pretty much everything you need to know about winning sailboat races.

All it takes now is to improve your physical fitness; develop the right mental attitude; break all your bad habits; practice, practice, practice; and then go out and race a lot.

Oh good.

Who knew it could be so easy?

---

So what do you think?

Am I missing something?

Do you really learn new stuff from words of wisdom?

Does reading words of wisdom make you a better sailor?

5 Secrets Of How To Win Laser Regattas

Every February, hordes of Laser Masters sailors invade Florida to participate in three regattas at three different locations over a week - the Laser Masters Midwinters East, Midweek Madness and the Florida Laser Masters. This year, the first regatta was won by John MacCausland and the next two by Andy Roy.

Doug of the Improper Course blog was there and did video interviews with the winners to share their "words of wisdom" on how they won each regatta (which were sailed in very different conditions from each other.) Doug's post of the three videos is at 2013 Master Madness.

Here is my summary of the key lessons from those interviews (in bold) - along with my own ill-informed ramblings on each lesson (not in bold.)


Master Midwinters East: flat water, light and shifty - John MacCausland.

1. In light, shifty, puffy conditions, especially on the first beat, "race the wind not the other competitors." Pay attention to the puffs and the shifts rather than the groups of boats.

Great advice. If I look back on my own (very rare) successful races against good competition in light air in recent years, they were achieved by following this advice to an extreme. If I think I can see what the wind is doing and have a good plan for the beat, and then I can go off and execute my plan and not even worry about where the other boats are, I can sometimes surprise myself (and everyone else.)


2. A rolled sail (no creases) looks faster than a folded sail (with all those ugly creases) in very light air. Maybe it isn't, but it sure looks better.

Most Laser sailors buy folded sails. They come with creases that look like they've been ironed in. Those creases can last for years. In anything but the lightest winds it probably doesn't matter much. Depending on whether you go with North or Hyde sails and where you buy them, you can buy a rolled sail with no creases for about $50-$65 more than a folded sail (i.e. about 10% more.)

Common sense would suggest that a smoother sail must be faster. Those ugly creases in a folded sail must disturb the airflow over the sail mustn't they? But common sense isn't always right. Is it worth it? I have no idea.



Midweek Madness: flat water, medium, patchy - Andy Roy.

3. Getting off the start line well is so important. Stay away from the ends unless they are really favored. Go for middle of line or third of the way from the favored end. Get a conservative line sight off transom of committee boat. Use that transit and the mid-line sag to sheet in a little earlier than the boats around you and punch out ahead of them.

Hmmm. Pretty conventional advice and exactly what Bill Brangiforte was saying in the words of wisdom from him that I posted a couple of weeks ago. So why don't I do it? Why don't most sailors do it? How is that the guys like Andy and Bill can make this work for them, when it sounds so simple that everyone could be doing it?


4. Downwind speed in flat water. Puffs were random, sometimes from the left of the course, sometimes from the right. So start off in the middle on the run, keep an eye out for the puffs, and when you see one, get on over to that side. Use the puff to work back down. Then start looking to see where the next puff is.

More great advice. I can remember the occasional day of lake sailing where I have been able to do this well and get a good result occasionally. It's too easy (and lazy) to assume that just because one side of the run seemed faster in the first race, then that pattern will apply all day. You need to keep looking behind you to see where the puffs are coming from. One coach told me that that is one reason you should always sit sideways in the boat on the run, so you can keep looking upwind more easily.



Florida Masters: windy, waves, like being in a big washing machine - Andy Roy.

5. Downwind speed in waves when there was no steady pattern to the waves. Get up some speed by sailing by the lee or on a broad reach and then pick a wave to go back on. Think like a surfer. Where is the best ride? Keep the boat going downhill. Think downhill. Down, down, down.

I did sail the Florida Masters at West Palm Beach a few years ago and I remember how big and crazy the waves were. It's one of the few locations on the east coast of the US where they actually sail Laser regattas out on the Atlantic Ocean as opposed to a more sheltered bay.

"Washing machine" waves are not my forte. I still have nightmares about Hayling Island in 2010! Andy's advice is easy to say, harder to execute. Last night I participated in a webinar on Laser Downwind Speed run by Coach Rulo from the Laser Centre at Cabarete, along with guest speaker Anna Tunnicliffe. Anna was giving very similar advice to what Andy was saying here, although in 90 minutes of webinar Rulo and Anna did manage to go into a lot more detail about downwind technique.

Hmmm. I feel another "words of wisdom" post coming on...

In the meantime, do check out Doug's original video interviews at 2013 Master Madness. John and Andy explain this stuff much better than I can.