The importance of comparing your performance to another competitor during a race is an underrated part of sailing a boat competitively. We hear a lot about having good onboard communication about what’s happening on the boat. While that’s true, it’s also important to communicate what’s happening outside the boat and what’s happening relative to your nearest competitors. So, let’s cover some techniques to improve this aspect of your next race. For the purposes of this article, we will focus on calling upwind relatives.

It’s best to start calling ­relatives as soon as possible after the start. This first few minutes is a critical boatspeed part of the race, and the sooner your team can get locked in, the better. Oftentimes, the teams that get their performance going the soonest after the start are the teams that emerge from the fray in the best position.

Once you start calling ­relatives, do so with confidence, announce that you are calling relatives, and identify who or which boat you are calling relatives against. For example, “I have us with (name of boat).” Knowing who you are gauging performance against is important.

On a boat with true wind direction displayed somewhere, announce that number. For example, I might say, “Starting wind direction is one-eight-five.” If the wind direction changes during the lineup, this will be valuable information to provide accurate comparisons.

If there’s no TWD displayed on your boat, or you don’t have instruments, you can use your compass heading instead and say something like, “Starting heading is one-four-six.” It’s not quite as accurate as TWD, but it’s better than nothing.

Always refer to your boat first. For example, I might say, “Higher, same speed.” To avoid any confusion, don’t refer to them first. If they are higher than you, state, “We are lower.” Be consistent and always use the same process, no mumbling. Remember, the goal is to let your teammates know how you’re doing.

Some examples of ­describing clear-cut VMG differences are “higher, faster,” “lower, slower,” and “same angle, same speed.” However, if the speed and angle are split, you will need to judge which VMG is superior. For example, I might say, “Higher, slower, VMG them,” or “lower, faster, VMG us,” or “higher, slower, VMG even.”

Accurately and confidently judging performance and VMG differences takes time and experience, so if you’re new to it, there is no time like the present to start practicing. And speaking of practice: A great opportunity to get in the rhythm of calling relatives is during your pre-race tuning-partner ­lineups. (Of course, you do that already, right?)

At the beginning of an upwind lineup, try this technique: Imagine you were to tack. Where would you end up? Would you be behind them? Would you cross them? Would you hit them at their mainsheet winch? Their front hatch? Start every relative performance call with this information. For example, I might say, “If we tacked right now, we would miss them by 6 meters.” One minute into the lineup, I might say, “If we tacked right now, we would hit them on their transom; we have gained 6 meters since the beginning of the test.” Another minute later, I might say, “If we tacked right now, we would hit them at their mast; we have gained one boatlength since the start of the test.”

If you are clearly outperforming a competitor above you, or if they are in a compromised position, make the announcement that you are switching relatives to another boat. For example, I might say, “(Name of boat) won’t live there for long, switching to (name of new boat or sail number).”

If there are no boats above you to call relatives with, announce you are going to hike instead. This lets your team know why you’ve gone silent. For example, I say, “No gauges above us; I am hiking.” Or take it a step further and challenge your teammates to hike even harder. I say, “No good gauges above; showing the young guys how to hike.”

Having been a pro sailor and coach for a long time, I’ve experienced my share of situations where a lack of calling relatives or poor calling in general leads to unwanted outcomes. To prevent this from ever ­happening on your boats, let’s run through a few common scenarios.

Silence is deadly

What happens: We start the race and nobody says anything.

The result: We come off the line in a low mode that is not optimal VMG. The boats above us are able to live in an otherwise compromised position all the way to the layline, which costs us a lot of places.

The fix: Identify immediately who you’re calling relatives against and make it clear how your team is going against them.

Head in the clouds

What happens: We don’t take note of the TWD or heading when we start the relative calls. We state we are losing a lot to the boat above us, oblivious to the fact that the wind has lifted us 15 degrees.

The result: We start changing settings, away from what we know, to try to improve based on the feedback, but we only perform worse and lose a lot.

The fix: Announce the TWD or heading when you start the relative calls. Then you can allow for TWD/heading changes in your analysis of performance. For example, “We are doing well against the boats above considering we’re in a 15-degree lift.”

Comms breakdown

What happens: We say, “They are lower.” The helmsman puts the bow up to sail a higher mode because he only hears the words “are lower” (the other words err out in the wind), and the helmsman and trimmers assume we are the lower boat.

The result: We sail too high and slow, and get rolled by the boat above us.

The fix: Always talk about your boat first, not the other. In this case, we were already higher and should have said, “We are higher.” Instead, by switching between us and them, we ­create confusion.

Stay on task

What happens: We aren’t going well, so we stop calling relatives.

The result: At a time when we need to be honest and identify there is an issue with our performance, we go quiet. Nothing is done to address our performance issue, and we go backward because of it.

The fix: No one wants to be the bearer of bad news or a Negative Nancy, but this is an important part of the race. Be consistent. Be honest. Keep the process the same, rain or shine.

Lost in translation

What happens: We say, “Higher, slower.”

The result: Our skipper responds, “Is that good or bad? Are we gaining or not?”

The fix: If the speed and angle are split, finish your call with whether that mode is a gain or a loss.

Attention deficit

What happens: After a very long lineup, you are unsure as to whether it has been a gain or a loss over all the changes that have come and gone.

The result: You don’t really know how you have gone over the long term and just make something up.

The fix: From the beginning of the lineup, announce where you would be if you tacked. Five minutes later, you will know how you have gone by checking in using the same method. Maybe you haven’t gone well in the last 30 seconds, but overall you have moved forward by two boatlengths.

Hang up and dial again

What happens: The boat above you has a poor start, and now they are in your quarter waves going even worse. You keep calling relatives on them because they are closest to you.

The result: Your team thinks they are going very well based off your calls. But the boat you are calling is compromised. The next boat up is outperforming you, and you have not identified that your team needs to change modes to match.

The fix: As soon as the boat you are calling relatives against is compromised or going really badly, look for the next boat above them to keep improving your mode.

Lost in space

What happens: All the boats above you tack away. There are no other nearby boats to call ­relatives against, so you go silent.

The result: Your skipper yells, “Please keep calling relatives!” and loses focus in the rage.

The fix: As soon as there are no boats above you to call relatives against, announce that fact. And hike your butt off.

The takeaway from all these scenarios should be that it’s critical to continuously call your relative performance against your competitors, and when you do so, be clear, confident, accurate and consistent. Doing all of the above will help relieve tension on the boat and improve performance. If there is no one left to call relatives against, hike hard and do the rest of your tasks well. Enjoy yourself. And don’t forget to call your mom or dad after racing to tell them how well you went. If anything, it’ll be the most important call of the day.

The post How to Communicate Relatives appeared first on Sailing World.

As the sailing coach at Point Loma High School, I spend a lot of time talking to the team about crewing. I also crew almost exclusively in my role as a professional sailor, so between those two experiences, plus sharing information about crewing with other pro sailors, I’ve been able to boil down the essence of a great crew into three manageable parts. Keep in mind that these are “big ­picture” characteristics.

Let’s first start with mindset. In the morning, before you even get to the boat, you should be thinking: “I’m going to help out today in any way I can to help the boat and the team be as successful as possible. I’m going to work really hard; I’m going to have a great attitude; I’m going to show up early, stay late, and figure out how I can contribute all day long.” To do so, research what your job is going to be before you go sailing. Find out who’s in charge of the boat. Ask them what you’re going to be doing, when you’re going to be doing it, and the steps it takes, whether it’s trimming the sails, doing the bow, calling the time or whatever. And ask what you can bring—food, water, etc.

Next, show up early to help rig the boat. Showing up early allows you to check out the boat and see how everything works. And when the rest of the team shows up, you will feel more confident and in the know. Then work hard—help rig the sheets (or at the least offer to help), pull out the sails, and do whatever is necessary to help get the boat ready to leave the dock. While rigging, you can earn bonus points by being safety-conscious, looking around to make sure there’s no chafe on lines, missing ring dings, or anything that looks like it may break.

When it’s time to get the sails up, take great care in handling them. Gently flaking them out or unrolling them before attaching them to the boat is key and takes coordinated teamwork by two or more people. Taking great care with the main and jib is not only fast, preventing wrinkles and encouraging longevity, but it also shows the boat owner that you understand sails are expensive, like to win, and are grateful for the ­opportunity to be on the boat.

If you’re not sure what you’re doing while prepping the boat and putting it away at the end of the day, ask someone in charge or watch the veterans on the boat. Learn what they’re doing so you can offer to help them next time. Eager and attentive crewmembers are hard to find and always asked back.

The positive mindset used when preparing the boat for the day is even more important once on the water. I’ll never forget sailing in an alumni regatta with one of the best high school crew I’ve coached. I had noticed that anyone she sailed with did better at practice, and in that event, I found out why. She was always happy and positive, even after a tough race. At that event, we started with two great races, but the third wasn’t so special. But we passed a few boats before the finish. After the ­finish, it would be easy to be a little bummed out, but instead with a smile she said: “Great race, Steve! Way to pass four boats on the final downwind leg! That was awesome.” She kept the vibe in the boat so happy and positive that we went on to have some good races and won the regatta.

Sometimes a good mindset means keeping the mood light. An example of doing that at just the right time was when sailing with my buddy Erik Shampain. After I made a bad tactical call, and then we had a poor leeward mark rounding, the skipper and I digressed into a nonproductive discussion about past events. Although we didn’t notice it, that discussion was distracting us from sailing well. After a couple of minutes of this conversation, Erik, having had enough, interrupted us by saying, “Hey guys, hold on, I have a goldfish.” We both paused and with curiosity asked, “What?” He said, “Oh, I thought we were talking about stuff that doesn’t matter!” We quickly got his point, and we all started laughing.

With the mood lightened and our focus back on racing well in the moment, we went on to pass 20 boats and finished the race on a positive note.

Here’s another way to think of maintaining the mindset of helping out and contributing: The skipper often has the most pressure and typically has invested the most time and money into making everything happen. Their reputation is on the line, and they feel it. So, when I show up as a crew, I think, How can I help the skipper do really well? How can I help ease their stress and help them succeed? That’s my main focus. I use all the skills I have to do that: sailing skills, but also people skills by being positive and a psychologist, saying the right thing at the right time, and keeping the mood light. If you can do the same, you’ll be asked to come back—probably forever.

Now, let’s talk about skills. In small, two-person boats, your job may be pretty straightforward: trimming the jib and using your weight to keep the boat at the proper heel angle. On bigger boats, like Lightnings, J/24s and PHRF boats, you may be trimming, have other jobs, or a combo of both. You may be doing bow or simply calling the time in the pre-start. But regardless of what you’re sailing, knowing what you’re supposed to do and when to do it. By doing those jobs skillfully, you can add value to the team.

One skill that everyone needs to be aware of, and probably one of the most important, is weight placement. Moving your weight around to keep the boat at the proper heel angle is everyone’s job, and it’s critical for boatspeed. If you grew up racing dinghies, you’re probably tuned in to this already, but if not, be sure to ask the skipper or whoever is in charge on the boat where your weight should be at different points of sail.

Terry Hutchinson likes to remind his crew to “mind the boat.” In other words, pay attention to what the boat’s doing—its heel, its speed though the water, and how it feels. Tune in and let the boat tell you what it needs. At the end of the day, as Buddy Melges always says, we are presenting the boat to the wind, from the time the sails go up until they come down. Our job as crew is to affect its heel angle for optimal performance and trim the sails well while the skipper controls the angle the boat is to the wind. These three attributes determine our speed. Therefore, always be thinking about the boat, minding and paying attention to it, and feeling and listening to how it moves through the water. Try to get to the point where no one has to tell you to move.

An easy way to think of weight placement and how much you should be moving is to break it down into two conditions: telltale sailing, which is in light to medium air, and hiking conditions, which is when the boat is overpowered. When telltale sailing, the skipper mainly drives to the telltales, and it’s up to the crew to move around and keep the proper heel angle, hiking in puffs and scooting in during lulls. Once the wind is up, hike hard and let the skipper drive to the heel angle while the trimmers ease and trim sails. Knowing the difference between the two modes makes it easy to define your weight-movement goals. You’re basically asking, “Should I be moving around and paying attention to the wind and heel angle now, or should I just hike really hard?” Knowing the right time to do each is super important.

Another consideration while moving your weight is the view of the skipper. Top skipper Greg Fisher tells his crew: “Don’t sit in front of the TV.” For him, the TV is the telltales, the forestay and the waves. The skipper wants to see what’s coming, and they want to watch the telltales, so as you move in and out, don’t get in their way. When you scoot in, especially on a dinghy, you should slide in with your hips first, keeping your shoulders out and down so you don’t sit right in the skipper’s view. On keelboats, when you scoot in, you might lie backward to keep the skipper’s view open.

When you’re part of a well-oiled machine—maybe you’ve been sailing with the same ­people a while—you can get to the point where weight placement rarely has to be communicated; everyone understands what you’re searching for most of the time. With that said, it’s also something the skipper should talk about based on the feel of the tiller. If the skipper’s not doing it, ask: “Hey, how does the boat feel? Tell me what feels good, and I will try to keep it in the sweet spot for you.” And if you do that, the skipper will love you for it because you’re helping them make the boat feel right—and go fast. On larger boats with more crew, it’s best to have a skilled sailor call weight movements for the group so the whole team can move as one unit.

About that communication: Once you feel your skills are pretty good and you are doing your jobs on the boat well and at the right time, you can start to add more value by communicating. There is a lot you can say and, just as important, should not say at any given time. On ­bigger boats, it should be defined who should be talking and who should not. On smaller boats, the communication may fall on you, so knowing what to say and when is very important. If your job requires communication, follow this basic rule: Communicate what is important based on the current situation, and realize that the situation often changes.

For example, on the way out to the racecourse, the discussion might center on what sails you’re putting up. Then, while warming up on the course, the discussion is on boat setup and racecourse features. In the pre-start, it’s calling time and communicating threats coming during your final approach to the line. Once the race is underway and you’ve had a good start, the focus will likely be on boatspeed; if you’ve had a tough start, it will probably center on escape routes.

Let’s say we just started the race, had a clean start, and we’re going to sail straight for a while. Communication might focus on puffs and lulls, or our speed in relation to others. Then, later, after tacking onto port, the best communication may be ­identifying right-of-way starboard-tack boats. Once there are no more starboard threats and your lane opens up, the attention shifts back to the most important thing, which is simply to go fast for a while. Later in the beat, as you get close to the top mark, you may ask the skipper the downwind-leg plan, then shift into calling traffic to help get around the top mark clean, with no drama or fouls. That’s what I mean by communicating what’s most important at any given moment.

You may have heard that a fast boat is a quiet boat. Jimmy Spithill spoke to our high school sailors recently, and they asked him about communication. He said, “You want to be as concise as possible and convey ideas with as few words as possible at the right time.”

So, your job may be to be quiet in the pre‑start, or it may be to call the time, and you should do that really well. You should focus on being great at it. Ask the skipper or tactician, “How would you like me to call the time?” Is it every 15 seconds down to two minutes, then every 10 seconds down to one minute, and every five seconds down to 30 seconds, and then every second down to zero? Again, you’re communicating what’s important at that one moment in the race and working to be as concise as possible. Not overcommunicating during a race helps the skipper and tactician concentrate on making the boat go fast and making good decisions. And in Jimmy’s world, when you are foiling at 40 knots, things are happening so fast, there’s ­literally no time for long communications.

I heard one of the coolest tips for short and sweet comms while on a US Sailing team call. Tim Wadlow, a two-time 49er Olympian, mentioned his team had a communication for going straight. They just say “happy.” It comes from one of their favorite movies, Happy Gilmore. “If we’re ever in a situation where we’re in a big lane, sailing toward the mark, and we’re not thinking about tacking, our goal is just to go fast for a while. So, basically, we’re in our happy place,” Wadlow said. “So, we say ‘happy,’ which communicates that we’re going to focus on speed and heel angle, and simply go straight for a while.”

Knowing this, the crew can get low on the wire and fully focus on heel angle and sail trim—concise and in the moment. He also gave an example where they’ve just rounded the bottom mark, the lane’s kind of thin, and they’re pinching. “I’m thinking about tacking, but I’m not sure I need to yet, so I just say ‘looking.’ That one word lets the crew know not to get super low on the wire and be ready to tack because I’m looking around and considering bailing out.”

These two words convey a lot of meaning, and they mean something to the people on the boat. Come up with your own words for short and sweet comms, and have some fun with it.

In sum, know each step of your job and have a repeatable process that you follow every single time. If you do your job at the right time in harmony with everyone else, the sails will go up and down well, the heel angle will stay consistent, and the boat will go fast. Olympian Dave Hughes, who is one of the best crew in the world, says: “Be a student of the game. Ask questions, be curious, work hard, and you’ll always be invited back.”

The post Three Steps to Becoming a Great Crew appeared first on Sailing World.

After two years of ­campaigning the Olympic 49erFX, I recently returned to the Laser Radial (now known as the ILCA 6), and my enthusiasm for speed was ripe on one day of training in Fort Lauderdale. With the breeze pumping at 18 knots, I trimmed the sail for the first lineup of the day, feeling the load in the deck and the power in my quads. Then, with a big smile on my face, I eased the mainsheet 5 feet or so and let the boat rip. It felt awesome until I heard my coach, Erik Bowers, yell at me from the RIB, “Erika, it’s not a skiff! The boat’s not going to take off. Bring it back up!”

As much as I was enjoying essentially reaching around, Bower’s reality check was a good reminder for me to recalibrate what we all call moding, which is sailing the best angle for the given wind strength. The top sailors know how and when to shift between three different modes: high mode, velocity made good (VMG) and low mode. Each mode has its unique features and applications on the racecourse, but the key to speed is to select the correct one at the right time, so let’s explore how.

On an upwind leg, consider your high mode as the closest angle you can sail to the wind without the luff of the sail starting to break. Your best indicators in this mode are the windward telltales dropping slightly and the leeward ones streaming straight back. This mode sacrifices some forward speed and is similar to walking a tightrope; you have to balance speed versus height, and the sea state is especially critical because one small error in sheeting or steering will make you “fall off the rope” immediately.

The VMG mode is defined as the quickest way to make distance toward the mark. In other words, this can also be thought of as the best average speed toward the mark. This mode is a bit more forgiving because its boundaries are somewhere between the high and low modes. Oftentimes, true VMG touches both modes as you sail upwind.

The low mode is just below your VMG angle and somewhere above tight reaching. Placing the boat in this mode increases the load in your sail(s) and hull appendages, thus increasing your overall boatspeed. However, if there’s too much force over the sails and the underwater foils, drag increases and your boatspeed drops. Finding a low-mode sweet spot is important because having the same speed but sailing a lower angle than another competitor on an upwind beat never ­produces a good outcome.

Understanding the ­limitations of each mode is critical, but knowing when to exploit specific modes in different wind strengths is how the best sailors win the boatspeed race. For example, in light air, a high mode always trumps a low mode because sailing a lower angle doesn’t create fast-forward speed toward the mark. Thus, in underpowered conditions, the objective is to go the same speed and higher than other boats. When the wind increases in velocity, the challenge becomes finding the shifting point from forward speed in a low mode to optimal VMG. How to get to this point is different for every boat in different wind strengths and sea states. In the ILCA 6, for example, the transition to a low mode becomes favorable at about 13 knots. At this wind strength, the boat is able to pick up enough speed to overcome the benefits of a high mode. In the 49erFX, this crossover happens much lower in the wind range. At around 8 knots, or when both skipper and crew are fully trapping, the skiff wants to take off and tap into apparent wind sailing. During 49erFX races, it’s easy to identify boats stuck in a high mode off the starting line as they immediately drop back because the speed difference between high and low modes is colossal. In this case, the low mode produces the optimal height toward the mark without sacrificing speed.

Races are most often sailed in transitional wind strengths. On a single upwind beat, there can be moments where the high mode is the dominant VMG, and then a 1- to 2-knot puff causes the low mode to take command. The skill is realizing the subtle change in wind strength and instantly adjusting your mode while considering your tactics. A good rule of thumb is that your high mode will be your best VMG until your low mode becomes significant enough to be a real boatspeed weapon. For example, if you’re able to put the bow down to then promptly tack and get a cross in, the low mode becomes the best VMG to the weather mark.

Using relatives from other boats to check in with your mode selection during a race is extremely helpful for deciding which mode to maintain. The sailors on top of the results page have their mode selection dialed in. Though practicing these nuances before an event is great, the best VMG angle for a race can easily be determined during the pre-start. Going upwind and teasing the extremes of each mode only takes a few minutes, and testing what you find against another boat will confirm or deny your hunch. No matter what, establish a feel for the limitations of each mode. Once you have a good feel for them, find your room to play.

The post How to Find Your Speed Mode appeared first on Sailing World.

Kinetix AI, a deceptively simple and powerful analytical software tool, is now being used by sailors of all levels to up their results in a big way in what its creators say is performance improvement—simplified. It’s “video analytics software for sailors that helps you simplify your debrief and accelerate your improvement,” says creator Omer Brand, a professional sailor from Israel, who—like most innovators—created the application purely out of need. In the early days of his first Olympic 49er campaign, he didn’t have a coach or much of anything in the way of structured training, so Brand and his teammate relied on two GoPro cameras and a separate GPS tracker to analyze their training sessions.

“Every day after sailing, we would sit down and try to synchronize everything, and then try to make sense of it. Imagine for every two hours of sailing we had four hours of video and two hours of data. It was a process of up to six hours before we’d find something useful.”

His experiences as a professional sailor in the European big-boat scene and his work at a software startup eventually spawned an idea to employ the high-level data capabilities of the America’s Cup and grand-prix scene, but deliver them in a simplified format for the sailing masses. He took the idea to Roni Raviv, an avid racing sailor and tech entrepreneur with nearly 30 patents to his credit, and away they went.

“I built a first simple version with no automation, just a basic proof of concept, and went to him, and he said it was one of the most exciting projects he’s seen, so he joined me,” Brand says. “I went to him for advice and ended up with a partner. What’s great is that he knows how to build the software smartly. The result is an AI-based algorithm that makes complicated data simple to use and understand.” The algorithms are quite clever in their simplicity.

How simple? Very.

Using a single onboard GoPro camera to capture races or training sessions, RAW files stored on the camera’s microSD card are uploaded to the Kinetix AI cloud after sailing, where they are churned through Kinetix’s algorithm and then displayed on a feature-laden online dashboard. Other analytical software applications can do the same, Brand says, but Kinetix’s clever bit is fusing the camera’s data (GPS, accelerometer, etc.) with the video to reveal the user’s “golden moments.” These are displayed on a timeline and map/track overlay—and the video files are presented alongside it all to show what’s happening for real in those moments.

“The synching of the boat data with the video shifts the focus from the boat to the sailor,” Brand says. “The boat’s data measures the performance outcome, but the sailor is the cause. This is the limitation of traditional analytics tools or just relying on a GPS tracker. It tells you the outcome but doesn’t tell you the cause. Kinetix shifts the focus to the sailor, allowing coaches and sailors to see what caused any particular acceleration, deceleration or overcorrection, and focus corrections on the source of the problem.”

These golden moments are, he says, identified by the algorithm as abnormalities in your sailing. “The algorithm finds little nuances, things that are otherwise hard to find by simply looking at a video. If, for example, you’re sailing in a straight line for five hours and nothing happens, there will be no moments, but if you suddenly accelerate or decelerate, or there’s a sudden and abnormal movement, a moment is created around that. Tacks and jibes and mark roundings are easy to mark and see, but the little—and often critical—moments are harder to find, and that’s the level of our algorithm.”

The video element is the most powerful tool in the box, he says, in that it allows the user to see exactly what’s happening in each of these highlighted moments and, more importantly in a sailing team environment, allows for an honest team discussion.

“In a normal debrief, everyone tends to see or remember things differently,” Brand says, “but the video shows what’s really happening in the moment.”

Over the past two years, with the help of top-level coach Philippe Presti (America’s Cup, SailGP, etc.) and performance-sailing analyst Cyrille Douillet, Kinetix’s founders have continued to refine the application to serve a wide spectrum of sailors. One case study in particular, Brand says, was Maya Pilnik, a teenage ILCA 6 sailor from Israel, a client with whom he could relate. She hails from a small sailing club in the south of the country, and with a meager budget, she was stuck midfleet domestically. After using the software for a few months by herself and eventually with a coach, Brand says, she became a regular on the podium, and made it onto the national team and to the gold fleet at the World Sailing Youth World Championships—twice.

“Before, she could only see videos from the coach’s phone,” Brand says, “but suddenly she had another point of view that was easy to use. She stopped relying on feeling and memory, and started using data, and would watch the video and remember what she felt and thought.” Because she was sailing alone in the ILCA dinghy, she was talking to herself aloud—basically recording her own thoughts. “So, when she went to the software later, she could listen to her thought process—and her coach could hear her thought process as well. From then on, she took her self-training a lot more seriously.”

There are applications for club-fleet usage too. With a club account, all participating sailors and coaches are organized under the same umbrella. When a coach logs in, he or she can study the golden moments of all the sailors in the group, and even a club’s sailing director can see the interaction between coaches and sailors. “Basically, it’s also building a database for the club, and that’s a good thing,” Brand says. “Not a lot of clubs are logging a lot of data regularly, and most knowledge leaves when the coach eventually leaves. With this system, the data remains with the club.”

As a cloud-based subscription service, the application is accessible to dinghy sailors and keelboat teams with a $420 per year subscription ($775 for access to a fuller suite of analytics and features). Coaches and clubs can have access to the full suite and manage multiple teams and sailors under one umbrella. There’s also a companion app with additional features. For equipment, Brand recommends one GoPro (Hero 9 or 10), a tether line and a few mounting accessories for different parts of the boats, a spare battery or two for a day’s session, and a fast-processing microSD card. The software is also compatible with other sailing devices and GPS trackers that can be synced with the cameras. For camera settings, set to camera “never off” and as low resolution as possible to reduce file size and improve upload speed.

The post Kinetix, The Debrief Game-Changer appeared first on Sailing World.

In this series of technical articles on various components of rig and sail control, Palfrey will generically explain the primary function of key controls in a way that is relevant to a broad range of boats, using the build of two International 5.5 Metre Class yachts in Cowes, UK, to help illustrate his points. 

Launching this series with mast alignment is appropriate, as it really is the foundation of the overall rig setup. Starting with placement of the mast step, from a fore-and-aft perspective, the boat’s designer will have determined where that should be in order to properly balance the boat for best performance on all points of sail. 

Making Complex Mast Alignment Simple

During initial sea trials of a prototype, this mast step position—or the balance of the boat that derives from it—is a top priority. So, while this position is critical, let’s trust the designer got it right, or the team involved in sea trials gave accurate input as to the balance and overall performance of the boat and the correct position (or at least a narrow range) is settled upon. 

            The transverse position comes down to care taken by the boatbuilder. When I am involved in a new build, I always endeavor to be there on the day the mast step is positioned. Likewise, if I am tasked with setting up a mast on an existing boat, the first thing I will check is the transverse positioning of the mast step, as this will be a key driver in performance symmetry from tack to tack.

            On a new build, such as our 5.5, the mast step is placed into position while the boat is still on its level planes—the hull is level, the keel is dead vertical and the mast port in the deck will have been cut in the exact center of the deck. Or, if the mast port is molded into the deck, the deck is accurately placed before being bonded to the hull. Then, using a laser or plumb bob down from the center of the mast port, the centerline for the mast step arrangement is established. If you are having a new boat built and only inspected the build process once, this is the time.

            On an existing boat, if you are having trouble setting up your mast symmetric from tack to tack, or you have noticed that it performs better on one tack than the other or has a different feel/balance from tack to tack, check the rig’s alignments. It’s not difficult to do and certainly easier to check than foil symmetry and foil alignments.

            I take a pragmatic view to rig alignment on an existing boat. I think of things in terms of what is presented to the water and air. I then align those with each other, as opposed to ensuring every component (including the hull and chainplates) is perfect. I set the rig up in the same vertical plane as the keel. This is done on land and using a laser level (not that expensive these days – or even cheaper to hire for a day). It’s best done in dim light, so the laser light can be easily identified. The laser device is positioned on a solid platform, directly behind the boat by a boat-length or two so you can sight directly through the backstay to the sail track on the mast, with no obstructions. 

            Once the laser is set up, I’ll ensure the rig is at its base settings without any transverse chocking at deck level. I then level the keel vertically, by jacking one side of the trailer if required, so that the trailing edge of the keel is perfectly aligned with the laser light. I then project the laser light vertically up the mast. My first focus is on the hounds height (where the cap-shrouds are fixed to the mast). I use a set of binoculars to better view the laser-light beam on the rig. If it’s perfect, which doesn’t solve the asymmetric performance conundrum, it may be time to think about surveying the foils. But at least you have cancelled out the rig-alignment variable. 

            If the mast is off to one side at the hounds, I adjust the cap shrouds to bring the center of the mast to the laser-light. The second step is to progress down the mast to the point where the lower shrouds join the mast. Once happy with that, the third area I inspect is the mast port on the deck. I measure there to see if the mast is now naturally sitting off center. Chances are, that if you had to make adjustments to the shrouds, the mast will be off to one side, relative to your mast port or the transverse mast chocks you were using. If the differences are small (say 5mm or less), I will generally make custom chocks to support the mast on this new centerline, but I first confirm the mast sets up symmetric from tack to tack under sailing loads with these new shroud settings. At that point, I only adjust the lower shrouds to achieve a straight mast.

            If the mast is a long way from being aligned to the keel in a vertical plane, it indicates not enough care was taken in the build phase. It’s likely the keel is not aligned vertically to the hull, which sets up an asymmetry to how the canoe-body of the hull reacts from tack to tack (this is also a “foil” which generates lift and drag). This is a whole new can of worms that may require re-alignment of the keel. Oh boy . . . 

            Back to our 5.5 Metre boats, which are new builds and have had great care taken in the placement and alignment of hull, foils mast port and mast step. Every class or type of boat has set parameters. In the 5.5, the “J” measurement is fixed at a static measurement under the rules – meaning that the mast is secured at deck height with no movement fore-aft. This is identical to most larger keelboats.

            In order to get the most from our mast through the 20-knots true windspeed range (where we’d like a soft mast in light air and a stiff mast in heavy air – particularly so if class rules limit the number of mainsails that can be used in an event), we need some form of adjustment at the step of the mast. Jud Smith, one of the most decorated one-design keelboat sailors of our generation, once told me that the first thing he looks at when checking the set-up of a boat is the depth of the lower mainsail stripe, as it drives the overall power and setup of the whole aero package. 

            Having an adjustable mast step gives us direct influence over the lower part of the mast and therefore that lower-stripe area of the mainsail (generally 25 percent up the sail from gooseneck to mast-tip). With a fixed J measurement, if we move our mast step forward without changing other parameters (such as headstay length), we are straightening the mast, or perhaps inverting it in the fore-aft plane. This also acts to “stiffen” the lower-mast, as any backstay or mainsheet load applied will see less bend occur in that area. In heavy air, this is desirable, as it also helps to achieve more forestay load, which results in less forestay sag and a less dynamic forestay in waves (thus giving us a more static jib shape).

            With a deck-stepped mast (like most sportboat classes), we are looking to achieve the same characteristics in the mast section. But as we do not have the mechanical leverage between the mast step and the mast port to work with, we alter the rigidity of the mast with the aft-swept lower shrouds and boom vang. Fundamentally, this all about setting up a marriage between the spar and sail, but also importantly between mainsail and jib—so we achieve not only the right amount of power, but balance in the aero package.

            So that’s the “why.” Let’s take the conversation over to the “how.” 

On the 5.5 Metre, we are in a unique position where the mast is too stiff for the sail plan. Carbon-fiber spars are allowed, but the class’s minimum mast weight is more suited to an alloy spar weight, which means the spars are quite stiff. In 25 knots of wind, that stiffness is handy, as the mast is very reliable and totally stable, with the forestay carrying very high loads without the mast over-bending via compression. 

            Conversely, in light air, with reduced loads on rigging and sails, we generally need to “soften” the mast in order for the bend to better marry to the luff curve of the mainsail, and in some cases generate less forestay loads, so the forestay does sag and add extra depth and power to the jib. We will do this by moving the mast step aft.

            But in light air, without the loads, the mast is too stiff and straight. This has been somewhat overcome by raking the spreaders further aft for light wind locations and designing light air mainsails with less luff curve. That’s fine until you are caught out with the “wrong” mainsail. For this reason, we employ a system that pushes bend into the rig for lighter winds by moving the step aft. It gives us some extra range for the mainsail and also allows us to “mode” the sail plan deeper for more power/height, as opposed to flatter for less drag/faster forward.

            There is one other complicating factor when designing a mast step system for the 5.5 Metre. When sailing downwind, it’s fast to rake the mast so far forward that the tip of the mast is well forward of the mast port. This is achieved by allowing the mast step to move up to 100mm when the backstay is released. In this respect, it’s very similar to the Star boat. So, unlike a larger keel-boat, it is not simply a matter of moving a mast step fitting to a static location. We need control and stability upwind, but total freedom of movement downwind.

            As I write this, the creative and collaborative process is in full swing between sailors, designers, builder and sailmakers. We have been testing prototype ideas on our existing boat in the best way I know how—which is sailing the boat!  Stay tuned.

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It’s good to have rules of thumb to help you sail the boat as fast as possible in all conditions. Such guidelines can help the skipper drive their best and give the crew a common purpose in how they react to changes in wind. One distinction that can help you increase speed is to identify if you should be telltale or heel-angle sailing. In lighter winds, telltale sailing is appropriate—the skipper works hard to stream the telltales at all times for maximum speed, and the crew moves around to create perfect heel. In overpowered heel-angle ­sailing conditions, the skipper can steer much more freely, focusing on a consistent heel angle while the crew hikes hard. In light air, it’s all about maintaining speed; in breeze, it’s all about the heel angle.

Underpowered Conditions

Here, the crew controls heel angle and the skipper sails exclusively to the telltales. The goal is to stream the telltales, setting up the boat for maximum speed. The heel angle is totally on the crew, and it’s best if someone can communicate the power in the boat—maybe the skipper or mainsheet trimmer—to help coordinate the team’s movements. If it’s really light, you might be heeling the boat a little extra to leeward, and just how much needs to be communicated to the crew so the boat feels as good as possible.

In these light conditions, the jib trimmer should be to leeward playing the jib. If shifts come or the skipper needs to sail deeper to gain speed, the jib trimmer is right there to trim or ease, depending on the situation. The main goals the skipper is trying to achieve are sailing straight and keeping max speed. To allow that to happen, the crew moves to keep the heel angle perfect while the jib trimmer adjusts the jib.

For example, if there’s a wave set coming, the jib trimmer eases the jib while you bear off slightly. The bow down and coinciding jib ease keep the telltales streaming. The same thing happens if the boat suddenly slows—bow down and jib out to keep the telltales streaming. If the boat starts to feel great and the skipper can head up, the jib trimmer trims the jib with the turn to keep the telltales streaming perfectly.

Going straight, as opposed to heading up in a puff, or bearing off to pick up speed really connects the wind to the jib. Ideally, it never stalls. Some people call it “pressing” or “sailing fat” on the jib. Either way, you’re creating power, and that’s where the boat feels best. If the leeward telltales start to luff, the jib trimmer eases the jib a little to make the telltales stream rather than having you heading up. If you head up for heel-angle sailing in light winds, you end up pinching, and it really slows the boat. In a small puff, it’s much faster if the crew hikes against that power while you continue to sail straight.

During this light-air mode, the crew should be fully focused on moving around to keep the boat at the desired heel. When a puff hits, they should move to the high side quickly and smoothly to keep the heel perfect, and when the breeze dies, they should slide in. A slow-moving crew encourages the skipper to head up in puffs and bear away in lulls, which wastes power in puffs and height in lulls, and reduces speed. A ­well-coordinated team in light air is very fast—skipper sailing fast, jib trimmer working the jib, and crew super-concentrated on the perfect heel. Because it’s fast to have the jib trimmer play in the jib in lighter winds, the first person off the rail in a dying breeze should be the jib trimmer. They are much more effective to leeward, with a ­perfect view of the jib.

Building Breeze

Now the crew is starting to get up on the rail. They’re not yet fully hiking, but everyone’s on the high side. You trim the sails in a bit, the jib trimmer is on the high side, and the jib is cleated. The boat’s feeling pretty good. Now you can start sailing a little more to heel angle, which means steering up a bit in the puffs. The main trimmer is in the loop here as well, helping the skipper keep the boat at the correct angle of heel.

Keep in mind that, if there’s chop or waves, the boat is reaccelerating all the time, so you might not be able to pinch so much in the puffs in these conditions. You might be telltale sailing still if it’s real bumpy, so when you get a puff, the crew should hike and trimmers should ease the main or depower in some other way, depending on your boat—traveler down, backstay off, whatever you’re playing to keep the boat on its feet and keep speed through the chop.

In flat water, it’s fine to head up in the puffs a little to keep the heel angle down, raising the forward inside jib telltales to 45 degrees or so. As a rule, head up just enough for a little telltale lift when needed and encourage the crew to hike hard. Briefly pinching buys you time to depower and get the crew hiking, all the while ­keeping the heel angle perfect.

Overpowered Conditions

This is true heel-angle sailing. The breeze has built to the point where everyone’s fully hiked, and you’re easing the main or dropping the traveler to keep a constant angle of heel. The crew has essentially become ballast, and they are hiking as hard as they can. As long as the boat’s moving at a decent speed, you can head up as much as you need to keep the boat flat. In a big breeze, you might even luff a foot or two of the front of the jib when a big puff hits until you get sorted with easing the main, tightening the backstay or whatever you’re doing to depower. You’re going so fast and having so much power (too much) that sailing that high is fine.

A few years ago, when I was sailing my Etchells—just my third regatta after buying it—the breeze quickly increased, and we were overpowered. I headed up to keep the boat from heeling too much, bubbling the front 6 inches of the jib, and my main trimmer said, “Awesome mode! We’re flying!” And I was thinking, “What? I’m waiting for you guys to depower the boat so I can put the bow back down.” But I looked around, and we were higher and faster than everybody. We experimented with flattening the main and getting the bow down to stream the telltales, but it was not quite as good. That day we learned a new mode—that we could luff the jib in breeze and we’d go just fine. The main point here, though, is that in heel-angle sailing, the skipper should steer up to avoid heeling.

If it’s breezy but the water is flat, you can pinch a little more because there are no waves to slow the boat. If you’re sailing in waves and pressing on the telltales to go faster, constantly trying to accelerate, watch for flat spots. Every surfer will tell you that waves come in sets and in different shapes and sizes. Even on wavy and choppy days, there will be 5- to 15-meter ­circular spots that are pretty flat. Some sailors call them plateaus. If you enter a plateau and get a puff, try to feather or pinch. In general, you’ll probably be able to sail little higher than when in the bumps. Just before the waves return, drop the bow down, depower, and go for speed. In those conditions, you’re shifting back and forth between slightly bow down and true heel-angle sailing based on waves or flat spots.

The art of driving well comes after you understand everything we’ve been talking about, but then throw in the presence of shifts. Steering well suddenly becomes a moving target as you try to keep the boat at the perfect angle to the wind and coinciding perfect heel while the wind is shifting.

When that’s the case, here’s a good rule of thumb: If a puff is approaching from directly in front of you, it will most likely be a header. If it’s coming from your windward side over your shoulder, it’s most likely a lift. Knowing this can help you drive and trim the sails more accurately when they hit. The goals—maintaining a constant angle of heel and good speed—are the same, and if you can follow the shifts up and down while accomplishing that, you can really sail away from the fleet. For example, you get a nice-size puff that overpowers the boat. Normally during heel-angle sailing, you would head up to keep the heel the same. But if the puff is a header, you continue steering straight, the front of the jib bubbles, and everything works out fine. The shift helped you pinch without having to steer.

Conversely, again in a big breeze, you get a big puff, and it’s a lift. You understand that in overpowered conditions, a puff that’s also a lift is really going to knock you over. That’s because all of the sudden you are tight reaching, the opposite of pinching. It’s as if you bore away in a big puff, causing the boat to heel more. Rather than getting knocked over, good teams will “burp” the sails an extra amount right from the start, and the skipper will start heading up quickly and steer more than normal. That will help avoid the excess heel angle. At that moment, the main trimmer must ease the main a lot, and if the jib trimmer can ease the jib as well, or maybe the inhauler, even better.

On a J/70, for example, the jib trimmer might be inhauling the jib by bow-stringing the windward sheet on the high side, pulling the clew toward the mast. In that lift and puff, easing the windward sheet moves the jib trim-angle outboard, similar to easing the leeward sheet but better because the jib does not increase camber. It’s like dropping the main traveler—the whole sail barn-doors out while keeping the same shape and depowering the boat, and also opening the slot between the main and jib. Once back to a pinching angle, retrim the sails, and off you go having avoided excess heel.

In a blustery breeze, you can make big gains by balancing the concepts of sailing by the telltales and sailing by heel angle, knowing what your desired angle to the wind is and then factoring in lifts and headers along the way. The goal is to keep your boat in the best state possible, knowing that you’ll never be perfect all the time. As a skipper, when I head out for a race in shifty conditions, I think: “I’m going to try to keep my boat and sails at the perfect angle to the wind more than everyone else. And if I can do that a higher percentage of the time, I’ll probably be the fastest boat out there.” Keep in mind the two steering modes, and you can too.

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Accurately calling puffs and shifts really separates good sailors from the best. Andrew Campbell is among the latter. A while back, I sailed with him in the Lipton Cup on a shifty San Diego day. The onboard conversation revealed his uncanny ability to understand what the wind was doing. He’d say, “Nice right shift coming in 15 seconds,” and then, “Four, three, two, one—here’s the righty!” As that puff hit, we eased sails, the boat accelerated, and as we headed up to closehauled, we trimmed in sails. It was as if we were on rails. Fast-forward a bit, and he’d say: “Next puff is a header, five seconds out. Looks like a big one…three, two, one—here’s the header.” He was spot-on every time.

Seeing wind and anticipating its direction, like Campbell does, are two different skills. Seeing the wind involves finding the best wind on the course and positioning your boat in it. It’s the skill you need for good tactics. Anticipating a shift’s direction is a higher-level skill, one requiring detecting the puff’s angle as it approaches your boat.

Seeing the Wind

Two basics: First, stand up. You’ll often see top sailors such as Bill Hardesty, Michael Menninger and Tom Slingsby standing just before the race, positioning themselves as high as they can, either on the deck or boom, and looking upwind. They’re trying to see everything as if from a drone’s perspective because it’s much easier to see breeze from higher up. Coupled with constantly asking the crew where the most wind is, they plan to start and position their boat in the most favorable wind. Second, wear polarized sunglasses. They really help reduce glare and allow you to better see the breeze on the water as well as its edges. Simple stuff, but they’re both key to taking the next steps in reading the wind.

Finding the Best Wind

Finding puffs is especially important in light air because a small increase in breeze is a large percentage of the overall wind increase. Say you’re sailing in 4 knots and get a 2-knot puff. That’s a 50 percent increase. But if you’re sailing in 10 knots and you get a 2-knot puff, it’s only a 20 percent increase. To read the water, start by looking at the color contrasts—the darker it is, the windier it is. That’s pretty easy to see in flat-water venues. But be careful that sun glare or cloud shadows on the water don’t mislead you. In light air and sunny conditions, the sun glare can look a little bit like wind but might not be. Look for sparkles on the water, kind of a shimmering, diamond look. That’s wind. If you are concerned that lighting is affecting your view of the wind, try reaching down the starting line to see if the glare travels with you. If so, you know it’s just the sun.

Seeing puffs is trickier when it’s choppy or wavy because you’re seeing only the tops of the waves. There’s a lot less surface area compared with smooth water. It’s like being in the mountains. You can see other mountaintops but not much in the valleys. In chop and waves, you have to rely on what little you can see along with the heel angle of other boats on the course and previous knowledge from tuning and racing that day.

One trick to figuring out where there’s more wind on days when it’s hard to see is to look at the course as you would a whiteboard. If the same side of the course pays upwind and downwind, you can conclude that side has more wind. If opposite sides of the course pay upwind and downwind—course left versus course right—it’s likely a difference in current.

Anticipating Puff Direction

When spotting the wind and calling tactics, visualize where you have to put your boat to get into the meat of the puff or wind line and how to stay in it as long as possible. For starters, you need to recognize if the puff is moving or stationary. Some wind lines just sit there—they look like columns on the water. When that happens, sail into it for a while before tacking. The question then becomes, where do you need to tack to maximize your time in the puff? I like to picture the wind line from a drone perspective and pick the course that maximizes my time in the wind line, with the goal of sailing toward the mark as much as possible.

If the puff is moving, determine its direction of travel. I always think of a big arrow superimposed on the puff aiming in the direction it’s moving, and that arrow tells me the puff’s actual wind direction. Then, there’s a simple rule of thumb for shifts: If the puff is headed at my bow, coming straight at me, it’s going to be a header; if it’s coming over my windward shoulder, coming down to me, it’s going to be a lift. In a shifty breeze, where a puff is moving toward your bow, you might want to tack when it hits because you’ll be getting headed, and your new path will keep you in the breeze as it flows over you. Conversely, if the puff is coming over your shoulder, you’ll get lifted, so don’t tack. Before entering a puff, ask yourself, As we enter it, is this going to be a quick tack or slow? If it’s a fast-­moving puff and you get headed, you’ll probably tack, especially if the other tack is the long tack to the mark. If it’s a slow mover, you might have to sail into it a ways.

Consider a few examples: You’re sailing on port tack, toward the right side of the course, and a puff is coming at you, from the right and directly at your bow. You know that when the puff hits, it’s likely going to be a header. But there are rare instances where a puff will not be the shift you think it will be. Say you were already thinking of tacking because you were getting toward the right corner. The other tack is becoming long, so when the moving header puff hits, roll straight into a tack. If you’re a tactician, knowing that is great because if you’re thinking about tacking anyway and that header puff is coming, you can roll into a tack right when the jib bubbles and save a few degrees of steering. For example, let’s say you tack through 90 degrees and get a 20-degree header. If you just turn right when the jib bubbles, it means you’re now tacking through 70 degrees. You’re making less of a turn, and it’s a faster tack. Plus, you don’t spend any time on the headed tack sailing away from the mark; you just roll into the lifted tack on the other board, and off you go—a huge gain.

Now let’s say you’re sailing on port tack again, to the right, and over your left shoulder, on the windward side, a puff is rolling down toward you. That will be a lift. If a lift is coming, the goal is to generate speed out of it. Right as it hits, head up a little in anticipation, and ease the main and jib slightly to pick up speed. If you get a 10-degree lift, all of a sudden you’re tight reaching for a moment and the boat really takes off. Then bring the sails back in as you come up to the new closehauled course, ideally going above target speed. In this tactical example, you know you will continue sailing straight for a little longer, hoping to get a header before you get too deep into the right corner.

Clouds can also help you anticipate differences in wind strength and potential shifts. In tropical venues such as Miami, you’ll often see cumulus clouds. These puffy, white clouds are usually sucking wind toward them—inflow—and grow in size throughout the day. Because of this, there’s typically less wind under those clouds and on their edges compared with areas of the course in the sun. So, if the left side of the beat is covered with cumulus clouds and the right side is open and sunny, it’s usually best to head for the sunny skies, where there’ll be more wind. I experienced this in an Etchells regatta in Miami. Our team started at the boat and headed right into the open sunny skies. Most of the 50-boat fleet went left, so my risk meter was going off, but I stuck to the basic “sail in more wind” tenant of tactics, and it paid off. Our team, along with a handful of others who went right, was 50 meters ahead of the fleet at the top mark.

What about when there are dark rain clouds? These clouds have rain pouring out—­outflow—and are pushing wind in all directions as they dump rain and wind. They’re often moving pretty quickly, and if one is approaching the course, you can usually make big gains by sailing toward it to meet the increase of wind. Just like a moving puff, the wind direction is typically flowing in the direction the cloud is moving, in front of its leading edge. When you intercept the wind, the basic tactical rules apply: Tack if it’s a big header, which is often the case as you approach it head-on. If it’s a big lift, keep sailing. When the storm cloud has passed over, the wind will usually lighten and shift back, so stay away from the backside of those clouds if possible.

In addition to getting clues about the wind from the water and sky, you can learn from other boats. In your prestart tuning, note how fast other boats are moving, how much they’re heeled over, and their angle. This helps you identify locations of more wind or a more favorable shift. For example, if they’re near a shoreline and they’re getting a geographic shift, you’ll see that their angle near that shore is often bow-up compared with boats away from the shoreline. Continue those observations while racing because you can use the knowledge gained during your second lap and in the next race.

Downwind

Sailing downwind requires a slightly different type of anticipation because you’re moving with the wind, staying in puffs longer, and the approaching wind is usually behind you. Constantly look aft to locate the most wind, and position your boat so that a new breeze catches and overtakes you. Again, you need to see the size and shape of the puff and the direction it’s traveling. Using this information, you either go straight and let it come to you, or maybe slightly change course up or down a little to meet it sooner. Sometimes you need to jibe to intercept the best breeze. Simply put, the play is to let the puff come to you or jibe at the right time to meet it. With faster, planing boats, and especially catamarans, looking aft isn’t necessarily the answer because you’re going so fast. On a fast boat, look slightly ahead and to windward, similar to upwind sailing. When you meet the puff, you might be going fast enough that you can sail the whole run in it much more so than you would on a slower keelboat. Always work to maximize your time in those puffs. And if you must jibe to get to a puff, time the jibe to intersect the puff at a point that will allow you to spend the most time in it.

Sometimes, in a boat like a Melges 24, you get a nice puff, and 30 to 40 seconds later, you need to jibe to sail back through the puff to maximize your time in it. That’s where the art form of downwind tactics comes in. The tactician who can position their boat in a way to maximize their time in a given puff is sailing the most direct route to the next mark. On puffy and shifty days, focus on looking for the large puffs rather than the smaller, short-lived bursts. It’s easy to get tricked into setting up for a short-lived puff only to lose long term to those who intercepted the big puff somewhere else on the run.

The final consideration when looking for wind and anticipating its direction—upwind as well as downwind—is to think about lanes and boats around you. If you find the best puff on the course but then get tacked on, especially while sailing the tack that’s taking you most directly toward the mark, you’ll miss out on all of the potential gains. The best tacticians position their boat in the best breeze while also trying to sail in big, fat lanes. If you can position your boat in the most wind, keep a nice lane, and sail toward the mark, you’ve got the tactical trifecta.

Tip

Every morning, I wash my sunglasses with warm, soapy water, then rinse them and dry them off with a microfiber cloth. I do that every day, 100 percent of the time, to help me best see the wind. If it’s a breezy and wet day, a secondary benefit of this trick is you can rinse them with fresh water on the boat to quickly clean them again without having to touch the lenses. Water droplets tend to shed right off.

The post How To See Wind on the Water When Sailing appeared first on Sailing World.

ν Downwind finishes used to mean ­squaring back the pole, sailing as perpendicular to the line as possible, keeping your air clear and crossing at the favored end. For boats with symmetric spinnakers, that’s still the norm. But if you sail a boat with an asymmetric spinnaker, the game has changed. True, you’re still looking for the favored end and working to keep your air clear, but you’re now sailing higher angles more parallel to the finish line, and jibing is expensive. There are also more interactions with other boats as people approach from different angles, so choosing a clear lane and getting the layline correct is more critical. On the macro level, treat a downwind finish line like a gate—come in from an edge, with a clear lane, and finish at the favored (upwind) end. With some boats, such as the J/70 and J/105, wing on wing into the finish also adds another dimension, allowing you to shoot the line. In addition to the general goals, it’s wise to know a few things that can go wrong and avoid them. Let’s look at some specifics.

Judging the Layline

Similar to approaching a gate, one way to pick a good layline to the finish is to make it easy on yourself. I have watched many great sailors pick an angle toward the finish that puts them about 50 to 100 yards outside the finish line. From this position, it’s a much easier one-and-in call for a ­precise layline to the finish. Another benefit of targeting that area from far away is that if you get a header as you sail toward the line, you don’t overstand. You just get closer to, or lay, the finish. And if you happen to get lifted or jibed on by another boat, you’re free to jibe and keep your options open.

It’s difficult to pick the layline from half a leg away, and even if you get it right, you have limited options to play shifts or jibe away if someone steels your breeze. It’s nice to have real estate to work with as you approach the finish line, especially in a shifty breeze where things are changing rapidly.

When it’s time to pick the short layline in and you see that someone might jump you on your final jibe into the finish, it often pays to jibe early, before layline, to force the interaction sooner. Doing so gives you options to jibe away if needed, or possibly hold for a little bit and jump them on the final jibe.

The Port-Tack Approach

One thing that can make your finish go very wrong is coming in near the port-tack layline (from the right side as you look downwind) and being forced to jibe by a starboard tacker. When doing so, anticipate any starboard tackers who might be heading your way. If you see a starboard boat that will intersect with you, slow down to go behind them rather than being forced to jibe. We often see these types of interactions about four to 10 boat lengths away from the finish, and the jibing port-tack boat usually loses huge. Besides slowing to sail behind the starboard tacker, the only thing that can save you is meeting them in the three-boat-length zone of the finish line. If this is the case, they owe you room to finish.

There are a couple of ways to handle the slowdown. The toughest situation is when you’re almost crossing, requiring you to make a big duck. In this case, it’s better to slow down early by bearing away and over-trimming the kite. Another method is to luff the kite, but the bear-away/over-trim is better, quieter, and it’s easier to get going when it’s time to reload and head up behind the starboard boat. For the reload, everyone needs to hike hard, and the main must be eased to sail behind them.

If the starboard boat is ahead and it’s a smaller duck, you might be able to just head up and go behind them without slowing down. In a big breeze, heading up and going behind someone can put you at risk of wiping out, so if it’s really nuking, slow down early, probably with a luff of the kite. Going low with a tight kite and then heading up in a huge breeze is tricky because the head-up-ease portion might cause you to wipe out. Sometimes, when slowing down to pass behind, the starboard boat will jibe, and that’s fine. Just follow them into the ­finish or, if they jibe late enough, you might be able to roll them on port.

Winging It Across

I remember racing in the Helly Hansen Marblehead NOOD Regatta right before the Marblehead J/70 Worlds, and Tim Healy, a previous J/70 world champion, smoked us twice by winging into the finish in planing surfing conditions. Until then, I didn’t know that was an option in planing conditions. It was blowing around 15 knots, which is a low-plane mode in the J/70, and there were three to four boats coming into the finish line, all pretty close together. Both times, Healy bore away and winged the chute, shooting the line. While the rest of us were bow up and planing, he cut the corner and won the group each time. By sailing more perpendicular to the line in the final moments before finishing, he shaved valuable time off his race. It’s like shooting the upwind finish line by going head to wind and using your momentum to take the shortest path to the line.

How do you know if shooting the line by winging works best on your boat? My experience is, if you sail an ­asymmetric boat where a late-main jibe is fast, then wing into the finish if trying to beat nearby boats. A late-main jibe is when you bear away, pull the kite around, and hesitate with the main for a second while you’re going dead downwind. Then you throw the boom over and head up. Boats like J/70s and J/105s that have roller fuller jibs jibe that way and are prime candidates for ­winging. Boats that keep their jibs up all the time, like Vipers and skiffs, are not.

Of course, if you’re on a massive header and your course is somewhat perpendicular to the line anyway, don’t wing. But if you’re sailing an angle that’s a little more parallel to the line, you’re in prime winging conditions, and it’s probably faster than jibing. A jibe involves an 80-degree turn or so, while winging is closer to a 40-degree turn. The goal is to cross the line sailing at a 90-degree angle to it, so do whatever is right to make that happen.

Ideal conditions for winging into the ­finish line on a boat like a J70 are when the windspeed is around 7 to 17 knots. The light end of that range is not quite sustained winging conditions, so you must use momentum to make it work, and you might start your wing into the finish line as close as one to two boat lengths by winging the kite. If it’s breezier, you might already be on the wing; if you have marginal planing conditions, you can wing about three to five lengths away using the boom-over or kite-over technique.

There comes a point where it’s too breezy to wing to the finish line because, by doing so, you’ll wipe out. We prefer to always douse the kite on the port side of the boat, and we were on port-tack, so the main and the kite were on the starboard side. Once, in one race in 20 knots, we said, “Let’s bear away, wing the kite and douse it.” We bore away, pulled the kite over, and boom! Death roll to windward with everyone hanging from the stanchions—it went bad really quickly and all we could do was laugh. Luckily, we had it on our GoPro and got more laughs out of it later. That’s why I picked 17 knots as a top-end number for winging into the finish, and at that point, it’s probably best to wing the boom for a less violent “pop” of the sail.

At some point in big breeze, you’re going so fast that it doesn’t make sense to wing. You’ll be planing at such a high speed, you’ll just rip right through the line. Plus, as it gets windier and windier, you’re actually planing pretty low—sailing fairly deep. And the fleet’s usually pretty spread out, so you can just rip through the finish line.

Choosing the Favored End

I’ve found spotting the favored end of the downwind finish to be fairly difficult. It’s easier to choose the favored end at a gate because the marks are the same size. But at a finish line, the ends are a big RC boat and small mark, which makes spotting the “bigger” mark to determine the bias doesn’t work. If there’s a flag on the pin, it will always point upwind toward the favored end. But don’t trust flags on a committee boat, unless the flag is well above the boat. Big boats tend to skew the wind. In either case, it’s difficult to see a flag unless you’re really close, especially from upwind.

The most important thing is to sail fast and have a clear lane all the way through the line. And, as mentioned earlier, if winging makes sense, do so. Having said all that, if you have the luxury of picking the perfect layline into an end, I’ve found that most of the time race committees favor the pin end simply because they don’t want a bunch of sailboats anywhere near their nice ­committee boat.

If you’re midfleet and it’s going to be a photo finish with a group of boats, just like the gate, it pays to be on an edge, ideally right in the race committee’s face. This is true for all boats. It’s tough for them to write down numbers of a lot of boats all finishing at once. Boats that are blocking the rest of the fleet from their view inevitably get scored ahead.

On the final downwind, close to the ­finish line, I’m always looking around and ­constantly asking myself, How can I keep a lane all the way in and how do I minimize maneuvers? I always want to do one-and-in. If you can satisfy those requirements—one-and-in and a big lane—you have everything working for you to give you a great finish.

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Fall is the time for the big championships when the season’s work, practice and racing are on the line, put up or shut up. If you’re confident of winning your class title because you know your boat is going as fast as it can ever be made to go, then stop reading here and go out and win. But if you think there is something a little bit wrong — that you seem to be going at times and not at other times — then maybe a few tuning tips will lead you to more consistent performance. And, of course, it’s consistency that wins in series racing.

Frequently in One-Design & Offshore Yachtsman we talk about the major “go-fast” factors of sails and specialized gear. But you shouldn’t be thinking of big changes now. A common mistake is to install new and complicated gear right before a major regatta. This serves only to take up time that might have been spent practicing and to distract you with something in which you can’t have complete confidence.

When it comes to simple adjustments, the word “tuning” is virtually synonymous with the word “balance.” What you are trying to do after all your money is spent and all the gear is aboard and you have the best sails you can afford…what you are trying to do then is make the boat balance properly.

Unless it’s a very peculiar boat it will not go well until it feels like it’s going. When going to windward you should have a light weather helm. The helm should be measured by tiller angle, not by pressure. If the tiller has an angle of three to five degrees to the centerline when the boat is upright, then your helm is right. Pressure on the tiller can depend on the shape and size of rudder and is therefore not an accurate way to determine helm. However, it’s fair to say that if pressure on the tiller is extreme then either the boat does in fact have a lot of helm, or the rudder shape is very bad. Assuming good rudder shape (fairly vertical; not sticking too far out astern) there should be light pressure on the tiller to go along with the three to five degrees of helm.

If your boat does not have the desired helm — if it has no helm, lee helm or too much weather helm — here are a few ways proper balance may be achieved without the designer going back to the drawing board:

1. If you have a high-aspect (deep and narrow) centerboard, the angle at which it is carried will make a big difference in helm. If you have neutral or lee helm put the board down further (so it is further forward below water) thus moving your center of lateral resistance forward. Conversely, if you have too much weather helm, pull the board up slightly, which moves the area (and therefore the boat’s CLR) aft.
2. In many classes, the mast can be moved fore and aft. This can even be done under sail in some classes. If you have too much weather helm, move the mast forward an inch or two, not just at the base, but all the way up. This will move the center of effort forward and reduce helm. If lee helm is your problem, then the mast should go aft.
3. In some classes the jib tack can be moved fore and aft. Move it forward if you have too much weather helm, aft if you have lee helm.
4. If the mainsail draft is too far aft it will cause a tight leech, which will induce weather helm. You may ease the leech by tightening the Cunningham hole, or by easing the sheet and moving the traveler slightly to windward. This will put more twist in the sail, easing the leech at the top and reducing helm; but you should first try easing the leech with Cunningham control. Any time you put tension on the side of a sail you move the draft toward that side. Any boat will tend to develop weather helm as the wind rises, so the traveler should be eased to leeward as the wind comes up to help control helm and to make the boat easier to keep upright.
5. Most important (and closely related to the point above) all small boats (and most big ones) should be sailed as upright as possible except in the very lightest of winds. Any boat which uses human ballast should be sailed absolutely upright. This prevents excessive weather helm, gives the boat its most efficient shape, presents the centerboard and rudder to the water in their most efficient form and the sails to the wind in their most efficient form.

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There’s nothing more frustrating than sailing in light air and heavy chop; each wave sapping your precious boatspeed. Sailing well in these conditions requires determination, concentration, and the right technique. Combining all three can turn a painful day of sailing into a victory celebration.

To accelerate in normal sailing conditions, such as coming off the starting line or coming out of a tack, trim for extra twist and depth, and sail lower angles. When sailing in chop, acceleration mode is the only mode. Speed breeds speed. The faster you’re going, the more power you’ll have to fight the chop, reduce pitching, and build speed. Sail lower upwind than usual to keep the boat fully powered. Drive to keep the jib telltales flowing. You’ll want to press down to the point where the outside telltales start to dance, but don’t stall.

Power Up Your Sails

There are three sources of power in each sail: angle of attack, depth, and twist. When sailing in chop you want to extract all the power that you can from each source.

Set the mast straight to keep the mainsail deep, and ease the outhaul to open the foot. Soften the luff by easing the cunningham and halyard. For the jib, sag the forestay as much as possible without having it flop around, and move the jib leads forward to the point where the inside tell-tales break evenly along the entire luff. Trimming the sheet harder takes twist out of your sails, adds power, and helps you point, but over trimming can stall flow and slow you down; so, sail with more twist than normal to prevent stalling. Extra twist also provides extra airflow across the sails as the boat pitches back on the face of a wave and the bow lifts. This gives you maximum flow and power when you need it most—when you’re going uphill. The trimmer should trim as the boat pitches forward and the apparent wind moves forward, and ease as the boat pitches back, and the apparent wind moves aft, maintaining leech telltale flow through the full range of motion.

Inducing a little heel can help your performance in chop and create weather helm, which will help you keep the boat on the wind even as the chop tries to push the bow down. On flat-bottomed boats heel can also soften the landing when pitching. Another way to minimize pitching is to concentrate weight low. Send a crew below to sit on the keel. Limit movement to one person at a time, and move smoothly, like cats, not a thundering herd.

For any given day, there is a threshold speed at which your boat will be able to power through the chop and not lose speed. Be careful to keep your speed above that threshold as you reduce twist and try to point. Keep your sails deep—flat sails don’t make you point—and sheet a little harder, reducing twist. Maintain your threshold speed, and if you feel you are losing power, foot off.

Once you’re up to speed, you want to keep the boat rolling. If you see a particularly nasty set coming, foot for extra power before you hit them. By sailing low and fast you’ll have extra power to crush the big ones, or steer through them.Just as it’s critical to keep clear air, you can make life miserable for your rivals by putting them in your bad air. Don’t tack just to cover, but if tactical circumstances suggest it’s time to tack anyhow, take the opportunity to cover a rival. When tacking to cover in chop allow extra time and distance to accelerate out of the tack. Tack just as you cross your rival to make sure there is no avenue of escape. Lee-bowing an opponent is risky, a poor tack or bad set of waves could leave you parked, and ultimately rolled, by your rival.

Keep the Flow Going Downwind

As frustrating as sailing in chop can be upwind, it can be worse downwind. Just like going upwind, the first step to downwind performance is to build speed. Head up to a hot reaching angle with the apparent wind on the beam, or higher. This will get the boat moving and establish flow across the sails.Two things to search for while reaching around: more wind or a wind shift. Fresher breeze—just a knot or two—or a 10-degree shift can make all the difference in your ability to keep your speed while sailing a lower, more direct course.

To build speed, you need to keep the apparent wind forward. Once you’ve got the boat moving downwind, let the apparent wind guide you. Sail as low as you can while keeping the apparent wind blowing in from the side of the boat. If the apparent wind moves aft, then you’re sailing too low. The spinnaker trimmer should provide feedback. If the load on the spinnaker sheet lightens, the trimmer needs to pass that information to the driver, “No lower, I’m losing pressure, heat it up.”

Push down when you can and carry your speed at a lower angle while keeping the apparent wind abeam. But be careful; if you push down too low or hit a particularly nasty bit of chop, you’ll park the boat. When you lose your boatspeed, you lose your apparent windspeed and angle. You’ll need to head up to accelerate once again. At times it’s better just to keep it hot. Don’t try to push down, just keep your speed, crush the waves, and sail the extra distance.

As with tacking, jibes are a challenge. Look back, and try to time the jibe so you’ll come out in a relatively smooth patch of water. Also, be careful not to jibe into bad air. During the jibe, turn aggressively to get the boat to a hot exit angle, and trim aggressively to match. The spinnaker sheet will have to be eased to get the clew to the headstay—you may even have to grab the sheet and run it forward. In normal jibes the sheet is eased and guy trimmed together, but in big chop it’s important to first run the sheet out, and then trim the old guy/new sheet in.

An Exception to the Rule

In extreme conditions, when you’re unable to control pitching and establish flow downwind, you can make gains by sailing lower than normal. When the boat is slow no matter which way it’s headed, then the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. This only applies in the worst conditions. Normally, you’ll make big gains by reaching up and establishing flow, but in these extremes your effective sail area is dramatically reduced and your target boatspeed drops as well, meaning a low, slow angle will be as effective as a high, slow angle.

The worse the conditions, the more important it is to sail well. Everyone can enjoy a 15-knot day, but the only way to make a day of sailing in slop a good day is to get it over with more quickly than your competition. To succeed, focus on speed, and once you get moving, don’t let anything slow you down.

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