A-freakin'-men. I've always felt like I was at a pretty large disadvantage to all you guys because I started sailing only 5 years ago. I feel somewhat qualified to answer this way because I've been slowly getting stronger on the water. I've read everything I can and sailed on everything everywhere I can. I regularly race as crew or skipper and sail with as many different people as I can to try and absorb as much as possible. Last year I sailed/race on a Hunter 23, Nacra 5.2, International Tempest, F18 (four different boats), Nacra 20, and will try to run some club race committee stuff this year (it's amazing what you can see in a race while watching from a stationary point while not worried about sailing). I'm known as a boat-hore. Rick's stuff is great and I still re-read some of the sections from time to time to get my mind thinking about other things on the water. Bethwaite's book has some terrific information about weather/wind patterns and cause/effect too.

I haven't really set out to do on-the-water training but I race so often that it should probably qualify. After each race, review what went right, what went wrong, what the strengths were, and what the weaknesses were. Then come up with a plan to try and overcome the weaknesses by experiementing with different tunings or tactics for the next start or the next race. I don't stay real up-to-date with keeping a log but I do try to keep record of our setup, parameters, and results. Lastly, one-design racing is the best place to learn because you will have more opportunity to race head to head with someone.

While at the gym (6 mornings a week now leading up to the Tybee) and doing cardio on some trainer, I usually close my eyes and focus on sailing, look for wave troughs, reacting to gusts, rounding A-pin on the wire, looking at Team Tybee in front of us while we mow down their lead, etc. Keeps me thinking and motivated.

Jake,

Visualize Team Tybee behind you, and staying there

Jake,

I'm in the gym, have been since december. One of the reasons we did the way we did in Largo was because I simply maxed out on the spin hoists and douses.

My arms are already a 1" circumference bigger than they were when I started, but I still have a ways to go.

Thanks for the psychological tips guys. Lord knows I needed some of that

Jake,
Take Bonnie out for a nice romantic dinner and dont talk sailing for 24 hours. Betcha cant do it!

just teasin, Jake is sailing good these days, better watch out...

Jake,

if I understand you correctly, you dont go out to train but let racing do as your training?

I think that is a very good way make it difficult for yourself. With your mind busy on other boats, strategy, marks etc. you will not be able to focus on the simple things that you dont do well and correct them. Regular training sessions, where you have identified one or two weak points you need to work on before you go out on the water, is really neccesary.

The late Eric Twiname wrote two books I think every ambitious racer should read, "Start to Win" and "Sail, Race and Win". I would really recommend the latter to you as it is still in print. I would also recommend it for everybody who are stuck mostly on their own.


Sail, Race and Win on Amazon.com

Jake, it's spelled "boat whore." See? It's tattooed right here.

Besides not being a reality (yet ) where's the motivation to push harder in that?


Tried and failed countless times.


You're probably right - Mosley and I tried once to go do some practice but the wind didn't cooperate. Then too, I'm afraid to do any one on one training with boats around here for fear that they'll get better too! (not really). With regard to using racing as practice, it's important to focus on one factor, make small well thought-out changes, and accept the fact that it might make you perform worse in the next race. I still want to do a Rick White seminar.

Don't know about you Jake, but I find the most difficult aspect of racing is having the cool and confidence to maintain the lead when a competitor is bearing down on you. That's when having your head (or your crews') "out of the boat" can possibly bite you. That's when all the practice, and things like Mary mentioned, knowing if the puff coming is a lift or header, will keep you in the lead.

Dude... Apr 23-28... I have signed up... my crew is up in the air though (darn military deployments : )

Using racing as training is fine as long as your head is in it the right way, and you race often enough.

We race every week. When I was beginning in the Fleet I would concentrate on one area of performance for a number of races or even a whole series, then switch to the another area. Feeling out the skill area is primary, getting a trophy spot becomes secondary as a goal, and you have other boats on the water to gauge your progress by (whether one design or not). We'd also use pre start time to just do as many tacks and jibes as possible, and after the race do a little more of that or just pick a point and try different things to see how the boat responds. The skills accumulate, and even though the trophies aren't goal you end up with some of them too.

Still probably not as effective as two boat testing and intensive drills, but most can't free up that time.

Great thread, Tad. Glad you got it started.

Mary is correct about getting the drill book. Most of the Olympic coaches use it as I understand.., both monohull and multihull.
It is basically a collection of drills that have been used over many years of sail training.., plus a bunch I dreamed up.

There are a number of things I have done in the past for training.
For example, I find some sort of mark, or use my own and start doing donuts around it -- do a good enter wide, exit close mark rounding, sail a number of boat lengths, tack, bear off, jibe and round the mark again. Do it over and over and close the circle as you continue on.

Warning: Bad thing to do is to practice wrong maneuvers. In a previous post folks are practicing tacks every 20 seconds, which is fine. However, if you are practicing doing tacks with a bad technique, you are simply developing a bad habit that will be very hard to break.
A way to correct this problem is to somehow get someone to video tape your boat handling. You will be amazed at how bad you do.
For example, on a roll tack you should start the turn with steadily increasing pressure on the helm as you move to the aft windward stern of the boat, realease the mainsheet just as the wind goes throught the eye of the wind, stay there until the boat is on a close-reach heading, then swap sheet and tiller and move forward to ooch the boat out of the turn.
You may think you are doing this perfectly.., and then you will look at the videeo and see you:
1. Jammed the rudder over and made a brake instead of a turn
2. You went to the back of the boat first, thereby slowing it down before the turn
3. You forgot to let the mainsheet off and recleat it
4. You rushed to the other side halfway through the turn
5. etc., etc., etc.,
I recall taking a tennis lesson. I thought I had the best serve around.., nice toss, legs bent, toss hand up, racket up, slight pause and whipping of the racket.
Then I saw the video.., aaaagggghhhh ! I looked like a Keystone Kop.

By the way.., a commercial here. You can find the book Sailing Drills at http://store.catsailor.com/tek9.asp?pg=products&specific=jqcmjmrpm

Comments on some previous posts.
Time on the boat is a must. I have seen folks come to a major regatta and do well just because they sail a lot, even without others around.
In fact, I have probably won more races this year than any time in my years of sailing.., simply because we have a fleet of Waves that race twice a week and get in 4 or 5 races each outing. We sailed 55 races this summer just in our local fleet. With all that time on the boat, I managed to win every major event this year that I sailed in.

On Head out of the boat. One of my favorite drill in the book is the "Eyes Close Drill." All you are doing is taking away one of your senses. You still have four more.., and some of you rare folks might still have five. <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />
You can feel the wind on your cheek and your hair, feel how the boat is taking the waves, if you are trapped you know you flying a hull because there is more pressure on your feet, or perhaps the other way around, your head is under water.
All this is to develop a feel for the boat. You should be able to keep the boat at max speed without constantly staring at telltales.
If you ever watched Randy Smyth sail you would never have seen so much "rubber-necking" <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />
You must get your head out of the boat.
A little war story. Mary and were invited to a regatta as "Guest Sailors" and they were to arrange for a new Hobie 20 (when they first came out). That did not pan out and I had to sail with a guy on his new boat.
I was intrigued by the new toy and was really involved with all the strings, etc. We took a 6th out of about 25 boats. The next race I felt more comfortable with the boat and decided to ignore all the strings and just sail.., or get my head out of the boat -- watch the other boats for shifts, puffs and the like. We won.
The next day the guy left and I was put on a Nacra 5.8. Never sailed one, but had a 6.0. However, with a boomless rig you absolutely need a positive mast rotator upwind and downwind. He did not have it.
I was so bummed and focused on how ugly the mast and sail looked that we got a 5th. Next race, I talked myself into ignoring all that and got my head out of the boat and sailed by the seat of my pants. We won.
That taught me a big lesson.

How to improve: I tell my graduating classes each time (in my Rick White Sailing Seminars www.sailingseminars.com) that they should work on their weaknesses.
Most folks practice their strengths. You will find a guy that is good at upwind sailing usually working hard on that same thing all the time, ignoring his weaknesses.
I know my strength over the many years is my downwind sailing ability. I have worked hard on going upwind and now I find it one of my strengths. And my downwind ability has not suffered.., except in a Wave where I should lose 30 lbs and get faster.
My suggestion: write down all your weakness.., perhaps as many as ten of them.
Then, go back and prioritize them from weakest to less weak.
Go out and work on one thing at a time.., don't try to work on all of them. Soon that weakness will become a strength. If so, scratch it off your list and work on item two.
When you get done with your list, start over.

Mental Sailing: There was a nice post about imagizing. This is a great and strong thing to do. I use images while I do self hypnosis. There are many books on self hypnosis and all work on the idea of totally relaxing your body. Once there you can project images of great starts, great tack, picking out shifts, great mark roundings, and awesome finishes. It is like running a video of your doing a perfect race.
If you make a mistake in your image, hit the rewind button and start at the point just before the mistake and play again.., this time getting it right.
As Yogi would say, "Sailing is 90% mental -- the other half is physical."

At any rate.., great thread.
Rick

Not having the time for practice, and going racing instead is fair enough. But in my opinion and experience you also need to dedicate some time for pure training on the boat aside from the disturbances of racing. There are so many different things to work on, and while racing you might e.g. get to do 3 spi sets and douses, that is not nearly enough to optimize how to do it. Even if you concentrate on doing the tacks in a special way and working on those, you _will_ be distracted by the fact that you are racing.
It's the same thing with every sport I have done. You need to practice the basics if you want to be really good, and sailing is a very technical/composite sport where you need to be on top of both the physical side of it (movements, timing, balance, endurance, strength, agility etc.) and the mental side.

Now, when I was boxing, I did not start out in the ring. But worked on the basic movements, guards, blocks, taps and punches. When I mastered this, I could move on and do some controlled sparring before I was able to go into a match. Sailing is not directly comparable to boxing, but it's a good analogy as you will get murdered on the racecourse if you go out there without practice.
You will of course get better/faster just by racing. But my point was, and is, that you will be doing it the really hard way and you will probably never reach your true potential.

While I still agree that practice outside of racing is certainly a bonus. Tacking 50+ times up a creek while trying to overtake a boat just ahead is great practice - and you know pretty quickly if that tack was faster than the last (I'm talking about the Key Largo Steeplechase).

Now that you mention it, my tacking has gotten a little inconsistant and I had a couple of times at Tradewinds where it took a few seconds to get the boat going again (probably sheeted in too quickly). It probably is time for some drills.

Here is my two cents worth.
1. Take Rick’s course down in Key Largo like my wife and I did. During the seminar, you will practice drills in a crowd with sailors of vastly different skill levels. This has got to make you a better sailor. I assume that is why Kathy Kulkoski and Barb and Chip Short have repeatedly taken the seminar.
2. Then, buy the drill book. What I plan on doing this spring is practicing the drills Rick showed us while trying to visualize the drill as taught during the seminar class. I looked in the book last night and found myself saying; “Hey I remember that drill, that’s the one where we capsized on the first day”. Rick is correct about visualization; it really helps as long is it is coupled with a real life example that is not fraught with errors. Rick, the only thing I try not to visualize is that first day where boats were going over routinely due to the high winds (that was not fun).

There is another reason to take the seminar—you will make some great friends. Being thrust into a situation where you live together, sail together, eat together, and drink beer together can only build some close ties. Very few of you know who the heck I am and that will likely remain that way since the University keeps my wife and I pretty busy. However, it is the opinion of this novice sailor that many of you will improve by taking the course and develop some great memories (plus new friends). It is also interesting watching the videos each day of your sailing technique.

This is not a paid endorsement if you were wondering. I hope to take the course again in a few years.

Cheers
Bob
Hobie Wave
Inter 18 until someone buys it

Bob:

Way to say it. Come down and sail with us sometime. www.tcdyc.com. Register and join the forum. Great group of people. Six are going to Statue of Liberty race in NY in July. We are going to have some series races and drills from Ricks book. With marks setup on the weekends. Talked about it at fleet meeting tonight.

Good Sailing,

Doug Snell
Hobie17

It's a little late for this, and sorry if somebody already said it, but if you want to do 200 tacks and 200 gybes, it will take 200 figure of eights, not 50. If you do them on beam to beam, it will take 100 to do 200 tacks, and another 100 to do 200 gybes. If you do them upwind/ downwind, you will do 1 tack and 1 gybe per eight, it will take 200 again....

I agree 100% - The best thing any of us can do is to get to the stage of sailing the boat fast automatically. Thats not to say totally ignor what is happening around you but work on the basics.

Michael

To paraphrase Chevy Chase in Caddy Shack, "See the wind, feel the wind, be the wind. Nuu nuu nuu nuu nuuuuuu. Moo moo moo moo mooooooo."

That's why our seminars are organized the way they are:

The first day is devoted to boat-handling drills, the second day to starts, the third day to mark roundings, the fourth day to tactics and wind shifts. The fifth day makes you put all the components together in our version of team racing.

Boat-handling always has to be the initial building block, in order to benefit from the rest of the seminar.

I should add that I don't think it is a matter of which comes first -- boat-handling skills or understanding of the wind. They are inextricably bound together.

You cannot learn how to sail in the first place until you know where the wind is coming from. And you can't learn boat-handling skills, and do a proper tack and proper jibe, or park your boat, or point properly to windward unless you know where the wind is coming from.

The biggest problem some of our seminar students have (and it is immediately evident on that first day of boat-handling skills) is that even if they have been sailing for a couple of years, they do not really know where the wind is coming from. And they don't know that they don't know. Once they better understand the wind, then they can start to perfect boat-handling skills.

That's why I said earlier in this thread that it is a chicken-and-egg situation.

Throughout your sailing life you never stop studying the wind and the water, whether you are sailing a fast beach cat or a big, slow monohull.

I was just pointing out that study of wind and water is something that you can always practice when you are out sailing without other boats around, which I think was the question that started this thread.

It's not matter of first or last or instead of. You do it every time you are on the water -- you can even do it when you are anchored out on a little fishing boat.