Charlotte Rose, a ­two-time youth world champion and US Sailing Team athlete, has boathandling skills that are off the charts, which gives her the ability to quickly shift left or right on the starting line to get into an optimal position. While observing her at a recent clinic, I learned that she has four key starting moves: high build, double-­tack, half-tack and reverse. After watching her execute these moves with ease, I wondered how effective they’d be in boats other than ILCAs, so I brought them to the 2023 J/70 Worlds. My teammates and I spent a few days practicing them, and discovered that they worked well, even in a J/70. These four approaches can be used in almost any small boat—and in bigger boats, to a degree.

The High-Build Start

The high-build approach is powerful in medium to strong winds, when you’re on your final approach and you want to crowd the boat above you to create space to leeward. The setup starts by positioning your boat close to the boat above you and, with sails fully trimmed, steering just above ­closehauled. Be careful to keep the boat moving slowly through the water to prevent stalling. After sailing high and slow and creating space to leeward, just before the start, rotate the bow down and leave the sails fully trimmed. The boat instantly heels over and feels powerful. Then bear away 5 degrees or so, and ease the sails a bit to go for full acceleration. If it’s windy, you need only to turn down to a closehauled course. The boat will get up to speed quickly because there’s plenty of power in the sails. Because you’ve maintained flow across your blades and sails throughout, acceleration will happen fast and require less of a bear away. If you bear away less than those around you, the space to leeward will be bigger and the boats to windward will be unable to bear away to full speed.  

There are a few ­important subtleties. Keep both sails trimmed, and use the jib as your guide. Head up until the front of the jib starts to backwind—usually one-third to halfway back—and the boat will flatten. The key is to keep the boat flat. To maintain the high and slow sailing, trim the sails in and out. For example, if the skipper is having to push too hard on the tiller because the boat wants to bear away, ease the jib and trim the main. This helps the boat continue to track forward. If the boat wants to head up, trim the jib and ease the main. 

At the J/70 Worlds, the wind was mostly 12 to 18 knots—perfect conditions for high-build starts. It doesn’t work well in light air, because in these conditions, you need to keep the speed on and also bear away a fair amount to properly accelerate. Also, if you try to sail too high and slow in light air, the boat nearly stops, and it takes forever to get moving again. But in 8 to 9 knots or more, the high-build is a ­must-have in your tool box.   

Double-Tack Reset

The double-tack is another powerful move that’s underutilized. It allows you to create a ­massive amount of space to your left while filling space to your right. Basically, it’s two quick tacks, first to port and then to starboard, but there’s more to it than that. International 470 gold medalists Matthew Belcher and Will Ryan were masters of the double tack. They got it down so well that they could do it in the final 10 seconds and, in their second tack, would come out racing. Doing it in the final few seconds and with perfect timing also meant that if the boat to their left tried to match them, that boat would be late to start.

Use a double-tack whenever there’s space to your right and someone comes from behind and hooks or overlaps their bow just to leeward of you, or if a boat comes in on port tack and sets up in a lee-bow position. It’s a quick way to get separation and reclaim a hole on the line. On the J/70 or the Etchells, my teammate, Erik Shampain, audibles if the double-tack is an option. Whenever things are getting tight and we need an escape route, Shampain says to me, “Double-tack open,” and we roll into a tack, sail for as long as we need to, and then tack back. 

Most people feel as if they have to have a lot of space to do a double-tack without fouling the boat to their right, the windward boat. In the clinic, however, Rose could double-tack in the tightest space I’d ever seen. When I asked her how she did so, she said that the key is a normal first tack, such as a roll tack in a Laser, and then an instant tack back onto port with no roll. Doing the second tack as a roll tack is OK if you are feeling late, but a flat tack allows you to turn in a tighter space, and you don’t advance on the starting line.  

You need a bit of speed to begin a double-tack. Don’t try it from a stopped position. If you have room and want to sail for a length or two before tacking to starboard, you can. A subtlety to the double-tack is that when you complete that first tack, come out deep, aiming behind the boat to your right, which might make them think that you’re going to go behind them. Then, when you tack back, you’ll end up overlapped with them, with bows even. They’re now “locked” so that their bow is not free to hook you, and you’ve secured a nice hole to your left. 

Another basic rule of thumb is that if the boat to your right double-tacks, match them. When they tack back, lee-bow them. You’ll have created a huge hole, and they won’t have one. 

There are other purposes for a double-tack and considerations, other than just closing the gap between yourself and the boat to your right or separating from the boat to your left. If you sense that you’re early, tack, dip really deep to burn off time, and then tack back. If you’re late, tack and sail upwind, then tack back again, fully racing upwind. If the pin is favored and you need to close distance on the line, for example in a last-minute left shift, the port-tack part of the double-­tack will help you close distance on the line because that tack is more than 90 degrees to the line. If the boat is favored, when many general recalls happen as closing speeds are high, and you need to kill time, spend more time on port tack when doubling because it’s closer to paralleling the line, and you will kill time. For those scenarios, it comes down to being confident with your time on distance and your closing speed on the line.  

Half-Tack Reset

A half-tack is used when there’s not enough space to your right to do a double-tack. It works best in light and medium winds when you have speed.

Let’s say there’s a port-tack boat coming your way, and they’re likely to lee-bow you, and there’s a boat just to windward of you. Rotate your bow down, aiming just above the port tacker’s bow, and sail at them, which increases your speed. As you anticipated, they tack just to leeward of you. If you do nothing, they’ve stolen any space you’ve created to leeward, and you’ll be out of luck for this start. But, with your increased speed, do a half-tack, heading up and trimming your sails in, and sail about head to wind or maybe a touch past. Leave the jib in to the point where it backwinds. On an ILCA, the skipper can put their hand or left shoulder against the boom, pushing out a foot or so to backwind the main for just a few seconds. The backwinded sail pushes your bow to the right, opening up space between you and the boat that just tacked to leeward of you and sliding you closer to the boat to your right. Again, be sure you have speed going into this. In small boats like ILCAs, it helps to pull up the daggerboard to help the boat slide. In keelboats, we obviously leave the keel alone, but backing the jib really pulls the boat to the right, helping it slide or track toward the boat to your right. Be careful with this move, however, because you are considered a “tacking” boat. As long as you do not hit the boat to your right, you are fine. Once you’re close to the boat to the right, cut/release the jib, and rotate the boat back down to starboard closehauled to avoid a rules infringement.

To prevent tacking, the skipper must fight the helm, pulling the tiller toward them, keeping the boat gliding at either head to wind or slightly past head to wind. A more common move in the start is to shoot head to wind to get space to leeward. That’s fine, but this backing of the sails adds the slide to the right. While doing a half-tack, or as the ILCA sailors call it, a “slide,” keep the boat flat. The crew might even have to hike on the port side, the jib side, while the jib is backing, especially in medium winds. As the boat slides to windward, you can open up about a half-boatlength on the boat that just tacked beneath you. Now you have a hole to accelerate into. As your speed diminishes, uncleat the jib. We use the command “Cut!” The jib luffs, the skipper rotates the bow down to closehauled or slightly below, and we’re off. 

The half-tack doesn’t work well in big breeze, because it’s so windy, you might not be able to keep the boat from tacking with a backed jib. And if it’s really choppy, you risk losing your speed if you smash into a wave during your slide.    

Drop it into Reverse

Let’s say you have boats close to leeward of you, and you realize that they’re going to prevent you from accelerating because there’s no hole for you to drive off into. Nor is there room for a double-tack or half-tack. The solution is to reverse out of there, backing up until your bow can clear the transoms of the boats around you, and then reach off and find a better place to start. It’s a great move when you really have no other options. Because the leeward boat is probably luffing you, you’re pretty much head to wind anyway, so you’re in a good position to start the reverse.

The most important part of this is to recognize early enough that you’re in a tough spot and need to get out of it. Otherwise, you won’t have enough time for the reverse. In a J/70, it might be with 60 to 90 seconds left; in an ILCA, it’s probably around 45 seconds. The technique starts with pushing the boom out just until the boat starts to reverse, then release the boom and let the sail luff. This point is where a lot of people run into trouble. Rose taught me not to hold the boom out very long. If you hold it out too long, it might cause the boat to tack, and you could lose control of the bow. Also, briefly holding the boom out keeps the boat from going too fast in reverse, which will make it difficult to stop. Again, your goal is to start the reverse to get your bow free, then sail somewhere else.

Steering backward takes time to learn. The tiller loads up, wanting to slam to one side or the other, and the boat will be more responsive to helm movements, so keep the tiller as close to centered as possible, and keep weight adjustments subtle. It will help to hold the tiller or hiking stick firmly in both hands. Once your bow becomes free of the boats to leeward of you, turn the boat down, away from the wind, and you’re now free to reach to the next open spot on the line. Remember, the whole line is open to you; you can exit to starboard or port.  

The “bail out and sail somewhere else” technique works well because it’s better to be going fast in the final minute than to have no good option for accelerating because someone’s close to leeward. That’s death. If you bail and start reaching, you have a much better chance of pulling off a good start than if you just sit there in a tough situation with 40 seconds left. Typically, everyone else is bow up, going half-speed, while you can be reaching down the line with pace, searching for your next spot. And when you do find your opening, you can shoot into it with more pace than the boats around you.

We did a couple of scramble starts like this at the 2023 J/70 European Championships, which we won. Both times, we found a gap in the final 20 seconds, sailed into it with pace, and were able to tack and cross the fleet within 30 seconds after the start because the pin was so favored. You might call that lucky, but we were following a basic rule: When you feel like you’re in trouble, bail and go as fast as you can.

The beautiful thing about these four moves is that they not only help you create a gap, but they also give you more of a lateral game that you might not have otherwise. Practice these moves so that you’re  good at them, and make sure you have the mindset of trying to find open space. A good practice drill is to try to sail a full lap around a stationary mark ­without tacking. We tried it in an Etchells once, and we actually pulled it off. Start by sailing by a mark on starboard tack, leaving it to port, with speed. Shoot head to wind, and do a half-tack. Let the half-tack glide you above and to the right of the mark. Then release the jib, let the boat slow down, and go into a reverse. Once you’ve reversed past the mark, kick the stern out so that you’re now on a starboard reach, and sail back around to the port side of the mark. You’ve now done a full lap around the mark without tacking. It’s also a great drill to practice slow-speed maneuvers. Try it first in 5 to 12 knots. 

With these four starting-line moves, the next time you’re in a crowded spot in the final minute and half and don’t feel like you’re going to get a good start, you now have the option of positioning your boat somewhere else. As my high school students say, “Make your momma proud; don’t start in a crowd.”

As a multiple class champion and longtime coach, Steve Hunt has now expanded his ­coaching services to include virtual coaching at stevehuntsailing.com, a site created for the racing sailor to take their skills to the next level. With video tutorials and in-depth insight, Hunt and other top-level sailors aim to help ­sailors improve their speed, sail smarter, and improve regatta results—one race at a time.

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Sailing is a simple sport. It’s easy to get caught up overthinking it, but if you want to do well, just remember there’s a basic way to do everything, from starts to boat ­handling and straight-line boatspeed. However, getting a good start is the first step to getting good results, so let’s get to the basics of getting off the line and then take it from there.

First things first: Get out to the racecourse at least an hour early. In the half-hour or so before the start, do a number of head-to-wind checks. I do them in a timed sequence, not randomly, which is important. It could be every five minutes or every two minutes, but absolutely do your checks in the same time sequence so that what you record isn’t random. If the wind oscillates through a specific time period, you can better identify the timing of the shifts. If you do your checks at random, you could miss an oscillation. You’re looking for a pattern, so keep doing it until you recognize one. Then go off and sail upwind on both tacks. Record your headings relative to your head-to-wind readings—just write them on the deck or wherever is easiest.

The next thing I’ll do is ping the line once it’s set. One thing we see people do wrong is they ping the line going head-to-wind. You don’t start head-to-wind, so you want to ping it on your normal upwind angle; otherwise, whatever device you’re using will be inaccurate. You can do your ping on either side of the pin; it doesn’t matter. The angle should be whatever angle you’d start the boat at, and you want to be going straight for about five seconds before the ping so the GPS isn’t in wandering mode.

Next is your line sight. I won’t start ­without having a line sight. In fact, I will do three specific line sights: one on the line, one from two boatlengths down, and one that’s four boatlengths down from the line. Your first line sight will be on the line, your second will be one length back, and your third will be two lengths back from the middle of the line.

While you’re doing sights, run along the line, or use a handheld compass and figure out the bearing of the line. Either subtract or add 90 degrees, depending on which end you’re facing, and you’ll know what wind direction the line is even for. If the wind is right of that, then the boat is favored; if it’s left of that, then the pin is favored. It’s simple, and you can do it anywhere on the line.

Now that you’ve recorded your wind checks, have a good sense of what the wind pattern is doing, and have your line numbers, it’s time to take at least two runs at the line. You want two runs of at least a minute, on starboard tack, to get your ratio of time and distance to the line. The most commonly used starting devices display distance in meters. So, for example, let’s say you go 2 meters for every second. That means you can be 120 meters behind the line and hard on the line with no interference—that gets you to the line on time and at speed. So, do two of those runs to feel what that ratio is. Let’s say the ratio is 1-to-1 (like it usually is), and I have 30 seconds to go but I’m 40 meters from the line. This tells me I will be 10 meters late no matter what I do. That’s why it’s important to have that ratio.

It’s also important to keep in mind that you can always slow down. You can’t go faster when you’re hard on the wind. So, when I get to the actual number and still have 40 seconds to go, and there’s anyone between me and the line, I’m not going to get there on time because I don’t have a clear line.

Again, you’ll need a couple of runs to get that ratio right. And then, of course, the ratio depends hugely if you’re on a lift or a header in that moment. If it’s a header, you’ll need more time to get to the line; if it’s a lift, you’ll get to the line sooner, so it’s important to know where you are at, and that’s why it’s important know where you are in the wind pattern. You might have a 1-to-1 ratio in an even wind, but if you’re in a header, you better plan on an extra 10 seconds. If you’re in a lift, you might need to burn 10 seconds more.

The final bit of prep is with two and a half minutes to go before the start. Here, I’ll set up a couple of boatlengths over the line, near the middle, and do my last head-to-wind check. Why? Because I want clear air to do the check. This tells me where the windshift is in the cycle and where I want to start.

A good start is being able to sail for three minutes uninterrupted, in clear air, and not restricted by the boat below. If you can do that alone, you’ll be in the top percent at the weather mark, regardless of what happens after that. If you want to go right, then you need to start in a place that allows you to go right within 30 to 40 seconds after the start. I’m always willing to give up a boatlength or two to not start in the perfect place on the line if I have a reason to go to the right. Off the starting line, if it’s a header and oscillating, you want to go fast to the next shift. If you’re in a persistent shift, then you want to go high into it, not fast forward. It really is that simple.

Starting at the favored end isn’t the ticket to success—most of the time. It’s more important to be able to go the direction you want immediately. At some point after the start you will need to tack, and that should be as soon as you’re confident you can cross the boats behind you and on the other side. Don’t wait until you get to the layline. It’s OK to give up a few boats on your side to go back a little early and be able to close off half or more of the fleet. It’s a good gamble, and we don’t see that done often enough. The best people can see the big picture and a couple of moves ahead. They can see what wins the regatta rather than that race, and that’s a big distinction.

Soon after the start, you should be sailing either offense or defense. Offense means you’re not happy with where you are in the race, and you have to take some chances to improve yourself in the regatta.

Now, we all know even the best plans can go wrong in the closing minutes of the start, especially in big fleets, so it’s also important to have an exit plan so you’re not getting tacked on right of the start and bounced back and forth. Predetermine which tack you want to be on and where you want to go. So, if things go wrong, determine ahead of time whether you want to exit on port or starboard tack, and be ready to do it.

In the bottom third of the racecourse, meaning soon after the start, you should be sailing either offense or defense. Offense means you’re not happy with where you are in the race, and you have to take some chances to improve yourself in the regatta. Defense means you’re happy with where you are in the regatta, and you stay with the group you’re with. You’re doing anything you can to maintain your position rather than doing everything you can to go forward in the fleet. Just like any other sport, playing offense or defense means you have to count points—and I’m astonished by how many good sailors do not.

A word about relying on GPS devices and pings: You have to be careful because the race committee will occasionally move stuff after you’ve pinged, so these might not be accurate. This is why it’s important to use your eyesight and your line sights all the time. For example, if your ping says you have 15 meters to go and your eyes tell you ­differently, then you better be careful.

Also, if you have your ratio to the line and know you’re behind it, it’s better to make something happen sooner—even if that means a tack. It’s better to tack with 30 seconds to go than a minute or two after the start when you’re about to get ping-ponged. Decide at 30 seconds to go whether your approach is going to work. If not, you can either tack or put the bow down and try to sail around people who are going slow. Either way, you can’t just sit there and wait. When things are good, time is your friend; when things are bad, time is your enemy. If you don’t like what’s going on in the moment, do something about it. It really is that simple.

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For a couple of years, I’d been watching the results for Club 420 racing, and two names always kept appearing at the top: Cordelia Burn and crew Sarah Moeder, from Bay Head YC in New Jersey. I really wanted to know how they managed to win almost every Club 420 event they entered, some by wide margins. Since they were an East Coast team and I coach on the West Coast, I’d never seen them race. But this past July, at the 2021 Club 420 Nationals in New Jersey, I got my chance.

There, I observed and got a few great videos of Burn and Moeder implementing their winning strategy, and as luck would have it, I got to coach our group of West Coast sailors along with coach Sarah Burn, Cordelia’s older sister, who also dominated the C420 class until she moved on to college. Sarah told me her younger sister was pretty conservative on the starting line, seldom started at an end, avoided major errors and was very fast. In watching them, that’s exactly what I saw.

We were coaching a big group of mostly West Coast sailors, which included the eventual winners of the event, Piper Holthus and Sophia Pearce, both on a team I started coaching during the pandemic called NB4T, or Newport Beach 420 Team, based out of Bahia Corinthian YC. Holthus and Pearce followed a similar starting strategy to Burn and Moeder: They were also really quick around the track and sailed super-smart upwind legs. After the first day, they were in the top of the fleet. In our evening debrief, Holthus, the skipper, provided a succinct explanation of their upwind sailing strategy that was nothing short of brilliant in its simplicity. Their decision-making mostly involved the compass headings and the crew calling ­percentages to layline.

Two teams, two great approaches. Here’s how Burn and Moeder managed the starts and Holthus and Pearce called the first upwind legs.

The Start

For this event, the 132-boat fleet was split into two groups, which meant there were 65 boats on the line. It was a big line, and before the start, Burn and Moeder hung out above the center of the starting line, near the gate area, about five boatlengths to windward. In that time, they looked upwind for pressure and did a few head-to-winds to keep track of the shifts. They’d already figured out the bearing of the starting line, and their wind checks were to figure out the favored end of the starting line and recognize which phase the wind was in. That helped them make a game plan for where they wanted to start and where they wanted to go on the first beat.

By being upwind of the starting line and out of the melee of boats going back and forth, Burn and Moeder had few distractions and were able to focus more on the wind, as well as get accurate head-to-wind numbers with no disturbance. They could also see up the course a lot better. Once they did their final upwind check, they bore away and sailed wing and wing, dead downwind, toward the starting line. Or, depending on where they wanted to start, they reached back down. As they came down, they looked for an open space in the section of the line in which they wanted to start, which was almost always just left or right of center, depending on their game plan. The cool thing is, being above the line looking down at the fleet, they could more easily see groups or clusters of boats. Their goal was to avoid those clusters.

As they got back to the line, there were around two and a half to three minutes before the start—plenty of time to get into the mix, do their own setup, and manage the congestion, avoiding crowds. One time, I saw a crowd form around them at about a minute left, and Burn simply bore away, jibed, sailed out of it, and ended up 20 yards to the right of where she had first set up, which was more open.

With this technique, don’t come down so late that you can’t find a space. You have to know when your fleet likes to set up. And remember, the more crowded the starting line, the sooner you have to come back and claim your spot. I call it “coveted real estate.” That might be when the line is a bit short for the number of boats racing, or possibly everyone wants to go right and is setting up in the upper half of the line, creating a crowd. You can learn this through experience with your fleet and real-time observation of its behavior. The more coveted the real estate, the sooner you’ve got to get to your area and stake your claim.

One of the keys to ­starting in the middle of the line is you can’t be timid. It’s a mistake to start just right or left of center and be bow back or a little nervous about being over. That’s because, typically, one end is favored, and if you start bow back in the middle, you won’t have a decent race because you’re going to be too far behind those who started at the favored end. So, if you’re going to use this approach, be bold and push the line, making sure you have the confidence provided by a line sight, solid pings, or a great eye for seeing the starting line. Burn and Moeder did that, as did Holthus and Pearce.

You must also have good speed. If you do, you can give up a little starting-line bias by not being right at the favored end. In a 65-boat fleet, if the boat end is favored, position yourself slightly right of center in open space; if the pin is favored, set up slightly left of center in open space. It’s OK to let the open space dictate where you set up. Sometimes you can get a little closer to the favored end and that’s fine; sometimes you’re a little farther away. With solid boatspeed, you’ll make up some of the bias you’re giving up, and by starting in low congestion, your chances of a great start go up dramatically. This is a major key with this formula. You might not be winning races, but you increase your chances of solid single-digit finishes. Another way to look at it is that you are decreasing your chances of making major mistakes and finishing deep, such as trying to win the pin and getting caught in a pileup while the fleet sails on. Also, this conservative approach allows you to hedge, tactically. If you start at the pin, go left and the right pays, you will be deep. But if you start left of center, go left and the right pays, you are closer to midfleet when you start your comeback.

Once they started, both teams focused on sailing the long tack. In this regatta, it was often sailing straight—starboard was often long or at least neutral. But a couple of times there were big left shifts and port became long. By punching out a little bit at the start and being fast, if in a left phase, you can shortly get onto port tack. Then it’s just about locking it in and going fast.

Managing the Upwind Leg

After the first day of the regatta, Holthus and Pearce had all single-digit finishes, which in a 65-boat fleet is great, and they were tied for second overall. I asked them what they were doing upwind. Holthus said: “Coach, we started in low density, got on the long tack and focused on sailing fast. After the 50-50 midpoint, Sophia would start calling percentages to layline to help me know where we were on the course and how much time was left to layline. She would say, ‘40‑60, 30-70, 20-80,’ etc., and that information helped me determine what type of header we were willing to tack on. If we had plenty of time to layline, I would wait for a big header. If time was running out, I would tack on a smaller shift. Once on the new long tack, we repeated the process, maximizing speed toward the mark and minimizing ­maneuvers. That’s all we did.”

It sounded familiar because I have my buddy Erik Shampain call percentage to layline for me, as other tacticians have teammates do for them. It really helps the tactician place the boat on the course from a top-down view, without looking around too much. For example, dead center on the course, on starboard, is 50-50. That means 50 percent of the course is in front of you to the port tack layline, and if you were to tack, you would have 50 percent of the course in front of you to the starboard tack layline. If you were to plot your position on a grid system, you’d be in the center of the course, relative to the wind’s current phase. In other words, you might not be dead center geographically, but with the current wind direction, you’re equal distance from each layline.

Being 50-50 also means you have equal options: No tack is long, and you can sail straight or tack, depending on what side you like or what phase you are in—lifted or headed. If Holthus and Pearce got a big header at 50-50, they would tack, but if lifted, they would continue ­sailing straight.

Let’s follow them on a typical leg. They’ve gotten the start they wanted, and Pearce is now calling out the percentages and says, “40-60.” That means the other tack, port tack, is starting to become the long tack, but they still have 40 percent left to the port layline. If they were lifted at 40-60, they’d continue because they have time to wait for a nice header.

Pearce’s next call is “30-70.” Now Holthus is thinking, OK, if we get a header, we’re going to tack because the other tack is getting long. But we have a little time left to wait for a nice-size header. It’s a 15-degree oscillating day, and she’s ­waiting for a bigger shift.

Pearce soon says, “20-80.” Holthus is starting to itch to tack now. After being lifted for a long time, she is willing to tack on a smaller header just to head toward the mark again. So, they tack to port at 20-80, down 7 degrees from the all-time lift, which is actually just a neutral number. If they had been super-lifted and continued on starboard, they would have eventually reached 10-90. Then, even if they were still lifted, they should tack, leaving some real estate to play with and expecting the wind to shift back left at some point, lifting them up toward the mark on port. In an ideal world, you can tack in the 30-70 to 20-80 range to head the other way, but the shifts play a part in your decision, and sometimes you have to be patient, hoping for the header to come soon before you get too close to layline.

Being 50-50 also means you have equal options: No tack is long, and you can sail straight or tack, depending on what side you like or what phase you are in—lifted or headed.

In our example, Holthus and Pearce tacked at 20-80, which means that on port tack they’re now 80-20, the long tack toward the mark. Now while sailing on port tack the percentages start to change: 70-30, 60-40, 50-50, and then 40-60. In an ideal world, they could sail all the way to the starboard tack layline area, get a header and then tack, but that is rare. In this example, they get a big header when at 40-60, so they tack back to starboard to get on the long tack and stay in phase. One minute later, they get a big left shift, so they tack back, and that takes them to their final starboard layline call. They round the top mark a solid seventh. With great speed, patience and strong decision-making, they pass three boats over the next 20 minutes and finish fourth, a great keeper in a 65-boat fleet.

If you spend some time thinking about percentages to laylines, you will realize that if you get a header, it changes your distance to layline. Headers make the tack you are on shorter, heading you away from the mark, therefore putting you closer to layline. Lifts make your tack longer, which is why you sail them upwind. For example, if you are 40-60 and get a header, all of the sudden you are closer to layline and might be 30-70 or even 20-80, so you tack.

The girls executed the above strategy for the whole regatta, getting great starts, positioning themselves just to either side of center of the line in open space, and boldly pushed the starting line without being over. Then they simply sailed the numbers upwind using ­percentage-of-layline calls to help make decisions.

All of this came together in the final race. At the start, they liked the right side of the course where they saw more wind, and the wind shifts were in a left phase. Because of this, they started just right of center in a great hole, pushed the line, and shortly thereafter got onto the long port tack. After a solid first beat, they were in second at the top mark behind a boat that took a more aggressive approach and sent it hard right. They slowly reeled in the leader over the next lap in a dying breeze, and took the lead on the final run by getting low of the leader and jumping them on the final jibe into the leeward mark. Not looking back, they extended to win the race by more than 50 meters to top the 132-boat fleet and earn a national championship title. It was a beautiful way for Holthus to finish her Club 420 career before heading off to Georgetown, and it was an awesome win for her crew Pearce, who has been working harder than everyone on becoming the best crew possible throughout the pandemic.

I was so motivated by watching these phenomenal sailors’ simple strategy, I figured I would give it a try in the J/70 at the 45-boat J/70 Pre-Worlds and the 65-boat world championship a few weeks later in Marina Del Rey, California. Lo and behold, we had two great regattas, finishing first and
second, respectively. Thank you, ladies!

The post How to Win Your Next Race appeared first on Sailing World.

The post Sailboat Racing Tips: How to Hold Your Position on the Starting Line appeared first on Sailing World.

Water, water everywhere, and not a line sight to be had. Have you ever felt that way? If you’ve taken a racing clinic or read a how-to-race book in the past 10 years, you’ve probably been taught the value of getting a line sight. The procedure is as follows: find an object on shore that lines up, more or less, with one end of the starting line when you sight through the opposite end of the line. Then, when you set up for a mid-line start, the line sight gives you a reference to judge your distance from the line.

In the old days, before we were taught the value of line sights, top sailors would simply line their boats up with the nearby competition, and make sure their bow was poked out slightly on the front row when the gun went off. Guaranteed good start.

Then regatta organizers began assigning bow numbers. And race committees became more sophisticated in their methods for catching premature starters. Poking your bow out became very dangerous if you didn’t know exactly where the line was. Hence, the current affection for the line sight.

The problem with line sights, however, is that you need to be close to shore to get one, and the shore has to be littered with items you can sight. What do you do if the racecourse is well offshore, as most big championships are? Here’s where you have to master a new technique: the transit.

How a Transit Works

Sailboats are designed and constructed symmetrically, otherwise they wouldn’t go the same speed on both tacks. The port half of the boat is a mirror image of the starboard half, with the forestay tacked on centerline, the mast stepped on centerline, and the rudder hung on centerline. All three line up, and chances are that other pieces of your boat’s hardware are also mounted on centerline. These centrally located items are used to take a transit.

Let’s imagine you are cruising toward the leeward starting pin, positioned exactly on the starting line. Crouch down in the cockpit, so your line of sight is just on the weather side of the mast and aligned with the forestay. You should be looking straight forward so you can see the precise direction that the boat is traveling. While sighting forward, steer so that the boat is pointed exactly at the leeward end of the starting line.

Next, while still crouching low in the cockpit, turn around and sight aft, over the rudderpost and, say, through the center of the traveler or backstay. Now you are looking precisely aft, on a line that is reciprocal to the course that you are steering. If you’re positioned exactly on the starting line, that aft sight, or transit, will point directly at the reciprocal end of the line: the starting flag on the committee boat. Now you have taken two transits and confirmed you are exactly on the starting line.

Using a Transit Below the Line

It’s easy to use a transit when you are exactly on the line. When approaching from below the line, it’s a bit trickier to know how far off you are. Let’s return to our previous example. You’re reaching toward the leeward end of the line, smack in the center of the starting area. But this time you are below the line, and you need to know by how much.

Just as before, crouch in the cockpit and steer so as to line up the mast, forestay, and leeward pin of the starting line. Then glance astern on the same transit. Let’s say your stern transit points to a spot three boatlengths downwind from the committee boat’s starting flag. Using your high-school geometry, you know that since you are 50-percent of the way down the line, you take half of that three­boatlength distance from the committee boat to find your distance to the line. The answer is one and one-half boatlengths (see illustration).

If you were one-third of the way up the line from the leeward end when you made the transit, you would take 33-percent of the three boatlengths; this puts you one boatlength off the line. If you were two-thirds of the way up the line, closer to the committee boat, you would be two boatlengths off the line.

The accuracy of this measurement depends on correctly estimating how far down the line you are, as well as taking a proper transit sight. With surprisingly little practice, however, you can be accurate to within a boatlength. And with a season of practice, the margin of error can decrease to one-half boatlength.

Tips for Using Transits

Here’s the best way to learn how to do a transit. At a regatta where the race committee will set a long starting line, get out to the start­ing area early. Ask a fellow competitor to sight the starting line while you sail straight down it. Use your transits to try and stay directly on course. As you concentrate on your position, have your line sighter point to windward when you are over the line, and to leeward when you are behind. This gives you feedback on your transit. This is how America’s Cup bowmen practice calling the line.

When you’re in the final five minutes before the start, sail above the fleet and use your transits to sail directly down the line. When the one-minute rule is in effect, or the fleet is aggressive, be sure to duck down into the fleet with plenty of time to spare. But look over your shoulder, to keep track of where the line is as you head back into the crowd. If you have a mental image of where the line is, it is far easier to sail back up to it in your final approach.

Sometimes, when the fleet is timid or the current is foul, you will have the space to continue reaching down the line, using your transit to stay a boatlength below it. When the gun goes off you simply head up for a front row start. Chances are, the boats you left in your gas will shout that you must be over early. But with your transit, you know better.

It’s not always so easy, however. With an aggressive fleet you will have to sail back down into the lineup with at least two minutes to go. With that much time, it’s easy to lose track of where the starting line is. The solution is to poke your bow back out in front of the lineup with a minute to go, so you can see the leeward end. When you have a visual on the pin, line up your transit and make a quick judgement as to your distance off the line.

You should have a good idea if your “bunch” is going to be behind the line at the start. Then you can decide whether to hang back or pull the trigger early. Like any other weapon in your arsenal, you have to know when to use it.

Ed’s note: Ed Adams—now a fulltime professional coach—was Senior Editor at Large for Sailing World.

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You know you’ve had a bad start when you can’t execute the game plan determined before the race. Two critical things must happen if you wish to recover: the helmsman has to sail the boat as fast as possible while in dirty air, and you need to decide where to go to get clean air.

To go fast in the second row takes power, because there is less wind and more chop in the wake of the first row. This means the backstay and cunningham must be eased, and the leads moved forward for a fuller headsail. Depending on how you decide to escape from your nightmare, the sheets should be trimmed for footing or pointing. The most common escape begins with a session of prolonged pinching, so make sure the traveler is all the way to weather and the sheets trimmed a click tighter. But be careful, a common mistake is to overtrim off the starting line.

After the boat is going as fast as possible, the burden falls on the tactician to find a clear lane to tack into. Think realistically; you are in a position where there is plenty of disturbed air and confused seas. The goal is to find a lane you can live with for at least 2 minutes. You may have to settle for a lane that gets you going the right way, but limits you to either a pinching or a footing mode.

Before you tack for clearer air, make sure no one will tack on your wind. (If they do, the dreaded ping pong match in the middle of the course will begin and, five tacks later, you’ll be 3 minutes behind.) Look at the boats to windward for any crew movement. If you see a genoa trimmer to leeward, or a tactician tailing a runner, chances are they’re about to tack. Wait for them to actually push the helm over before you tack — if you go too early, they’ll tack on you. The bottom line is: take a good hard look at the boats around you before you clear out.

RELATED: Here’s Why the Long Tack is a Winning Move for Sailors

OK, you are finally able to tack. Now where do you go? Sticking to your game plan after a bad start is tough. Once you have a clear lane, the tactician must evaluate whether the predetermined game plan is working. For example, if the plan was to go left for the first part of the beat, but a bad start has forced you onto port tack, take 30 seconds to look at the fleet to determine if the boats that went left are actually gaining. If they are, get back to your plan. If not, revise the plan.Let’s go back to the starting line and break it down into three sections. In each section, clearing out after a bad start requires the same basic principles men­tioned above, but for each scenario you can use specific actions to get back on track.

The Weather End

The obvious way out of a bad start near the weather end is to tack to the right immediately. The closer you are to the weather end, the thinner the traffic blocking your path to clear air. A tack just after the start is not without danger, however. Be wary of starboard tack­ers who are restarting — they have rights.

Another common boat-end mistake after “pulling the trigger” too early is to delay your restart. If you know you are going to be over, get your boat moving fast, tack around the committee boat and restart. Chances are you won’t be far behind, and all the peo­ple who have bad starts right in front of you will clear out, leaving you a lane.

The Middle

I often start in the middle of the line to avoid heavy traffic at the ends. Normally, bad starts here happen when you’re late and you let a leeward boat turn up and start before you. The leeward boat instantly establishes a leebow position which will eventually affect your air. Patience is key in this situation. If you can hang in your lane until the second-row boats on your weather hip tack and clear, a lane to the right will open, allowing for a clearing tack. To “hang” with a boat, on your lee bow (and probably another slowly driving over you to weather) you must pinch the boat, picking an angle that maintains a sliver of clear air for as long as possible. Don’t foot off below the boat on your lee bow, and don’t tack away too early. If you tack too early, you’ll end up dipping the boat to weather, who may then tack on your air and begin a ping-pong match.

Another option —definitely the more dangerous of the two — becomes available when you have 10 seconds to go and realize you’re destined for a bad start. Bail out by tacking onto port and sailing against the grain before boats in the second row realize they are the second row, and find yourself a hole to cut through the mass of starboard tackers. This is fraught with danger; however, big danger can lead to big rewards. The helmsman bears full responsibility, as the tactician can’t move the starboard tackers out of the way.

Leeward End

Bailing out at the leeward end is tough, for obvious reasons. Clearing out to the immediate right is not an option as the majority of the fleet will be blocking your path. If your game plan calls for heading left, you need to assess how much dirty air you are willing to sail through to get there. If you decide to stay on starboard, crack your sheets and start reaching for clear air. Hopefully, the early loss will be forgotten when the wind shifts left. Reaching for clear air will only work when you are five (or fewer) boats up from the pin. If there are more than five boats, you will reach for eternity and clear air will never appear.

This is when you are forced to bail out. The same principles we discussed earlier apply here: be patient, wait for the proper clear lane to the right, and keep the boat moving as fast as possible. However, instead of looking for a lane you can live with for two minutes, all you need is a short lane that can take you to an area where there’s a break in the line of starboard tackers. From there, you can look for another lane to tack back to the left.

The post How to Recover From a Bad Start appeared first on Sailing World.

A boat that gets off the ­starting line in a good position and has good upwind speed is probably going to be near the top of the fleet at the first weather mark. That’s easy to say but challenging to do, especially the starting part. However, if you learn to follow a script or plan that makes the starting routine mechanical, you’ll discover that each start becomes better, and your starts, overall, become more consistent. The good news is that plan can be followed wherever you start on the line and whatever the breeze.

How do you know when you’ve managed a good start? Simply put, you’ve gotten off the line in the front row with competitive speed so you can take advantage of the first shift. It’s cool to be able to blast off the line with a boatlength or two lead and have the fleet over your shoulder. But even just one boat hanging on your weather hip eliminates your opportunity to tack on the first header and, as a result, a good start is wasted.

Determine Where to Start

The race committee’s goal is to set a line basically perpendicular to the wind so that no single boat has an advantage, regardless of where it starts. However, the wind almost always shifts, and seemingly does so at the last minute. If the line is fairly short and/or one end is favored by 5 degrees or less, starting in the middle becomes an excellent choice, giving a conservative starter the opportunity to take advantage of a shift from either side of the course. The fastest ­college ­sailors often start near the middle of the line, knowing that they can protect the left side of the course or tack and consolidate the right.

However, in big fleets—50 boats or more—or on a line where one end is heavily favored, say, 15 to 20 degrees, then starting closer to the favored end becomes more advantageous. I emphasize closer, as it can be risky to start right at the favored end because everyone’s trying to start there. Starting a third of the way up or down from the favored end is much less risky and can make it easier to get off the line.

Remember, the angle of the wind relative to the starting line determines which end is favored, and unless the course to the first mark is way off square to the wind or the starting line is skewed by more than 30 degrees, the course to the first mark shouldn’t have any effect on where you start.

Follow Your Pre-start Checklist

While there are several ­different methods in checking which end is favored, unless I am sailing in a small fleet or on a small inland lake, I use the compass. If the line is short and the fleet is small, head into the wind and note which end of the line the bow points closer toward. That’s the favored end. On longer lines with more boats and in more-extreme ­conditions (very light or very heavy winds), the ­compass is much more accurate. Take a compass heading while sailing down the line and compare it to your head-to-wind reading. If more or less than 90 degrees (which tells us if the line is square), not only will you know which end is favored, but also how much it’s favored. In addition, once you have the line compass bearing, you can double check which end is favored anytime, anywhere (and away from all the traffic on the line) just by ­heading into the wind.

If you have GPS technology, ping the ends of the line once the line is set. Luff head-to-wind, close to the committee boat, moving very slowly so it’s easy to get a good reference. At the leeward end, set up outside the line, again head-to-wind and moving slowly, where it’s easy to gauge exactly when on the line. Once you have confidence in your pings lining up, managing the last minute becomes much easier.

Without a GPS (and to ­double check your GPS settings), rely on line sights. Start at the weather end, on starboard tack, closehauled, loosely trimmed and moving slowly, four to five boatlengths below the line. Start taking line sights with something onshore through the leeward end of the line. Ideally, you’ll have one at four to five lengths, three lengths and two lengths off the line, as well as the final shot right down line. Those early “safe” line sights are crucial in gauging the speed and timing to the line, because invariably the sights down the actual line become tough to maintain in the last 10 seconds, when the fleet is lined up. Sometimes a line sight to weather through the committee boat by the forward crew can be a valuable check in the last 10 to 15 seconds.

Check for current at all spots on the line, recognizing that there could be current at different speeds and different angles at each end. Practice the laylines at each end to gain confidence in the approach angle to the line, and especially where you ideally would want to start. Finally, practice your actual maneuverability and the speed required to maintain control of your boat. It’s important be able to recognize when you are too slow to be able to head up or bear off, even when using your sails to help control the boat.

Own Your Final Approach

While many sailors develop a series of different approaches to draw on for starts in different conditions in different size fleets and for different positions on the line, I focus on one approach for every start. Therefore, I know exactly how I’ll set up, no matter where I want to be on the line. The only variable becomes the timing. The two most common approaches are starboard luffing, where boats line up several lengths below the line several minutes before the start, and the port-tack approach, which is my favorite.

With the port-tack approach, come in a boatlength or two below the bulk of the fleet; most boats will be luffing on starboard. Depending on the breeze, the waves and the size of the fleet, I’ll look for and then tack into a hole on the line close to one minute before the start, depending on the conditions and fleet lineup. In some ways, this approach might seem risky because you’re sailing on port tack toward a group of starboard tackers. However, remember that one of the most important goals of the starboard tack boats is to develop a hole to leeward. If this hole is big enough and left open, it’s an open invitation for a port tacker.

One of the keys to a ­successful port-tack approach is the tack into the vacant hole. This tack should be slow and controlled so that once around and onto starboard, your bow will be slightly behind that of the boat to weather. Speed after the tack should be slow so that you are immediately in a position to become the leeward controlling boat. Leave yourself the opportunity to accelerate and not be dangerously close to the line. This is one of the major differences between the starboard and port-tack approaches. During the port-tack approach, you are attacking the starboard boat’s position, while those using the starboard approach are usually trying to defend.

If you’re the approaching port-tack boat, you must sail all the way through the tack and onto your starboard closehauled course before you can assume your new, leeward boat rights. And you must give the weather boat room and time to fulfill its new obligation to keep clear. Once the port tacker has completed his tack to starboard, the now windward starboard tack boat must begin to keep clear and assume the port tacker has now become the leeward boat with rights.

What if there isn’t a hole at the spot where you want to tack? In that case, you probably wouldn’t want to start in that pileup of boats anyway. Instead, sail down the line a bit farther until a more inviting hole ­presents itself.

Obviously, the starboard-tack boat will not just sit and wave you on into the hole they have been working hard to create. They should defend by bearing off toward you as you approach. If the hole is small, or the tack from port to starboard becomes rushed, the port tacker most likely will become discouraged with that spot and sail up the line looking for the next hole.

Once you know how you’ll approach the line, the remaining variable is timing. Ideally, you’ve practiced your timing in that five or 10 minutes before the start. When I set up with the port-tack approach, I determine how long it takes to get from the leeward end pin to my spot of choice on the line, unless the line is super long. I sail back and forth several times in order to determine how long it takes, and then add 10 to 15˛seconds for the tack. Usually, I try to complete the tack onto starboard by 55 to 60 seconds before the start, depending on the breeze and the size of the fleet—the lighter the breeze, the lumpier the wave state; the larger the fleet, the earlier the tack. If we know it takes 40 seconds to get to that spot, we’d leave the pin with 1:45 left before the start.

Once in position, ­control your hole and the boat to windward. This doesn’t demand any sort of attack that requires the use of the rulebook. It requires you to maintain a position where your boat can dictate when the windward boat can trim in and accelerate. Position your bow slightly behind the windward boat’s bow but still in clear air. Your course should be just above closehauled with your sails luffing. Use mainsail trim to help maintain this bow-up position. Try to maintain a boat’s width or slightly less between you and the weather boat. If the weather boat begins to trim and accelerate, trim, gradually head up, and force it to slow down. As long as they’ve been provided the opportunity to keep clear of you, they will also need to luff.

At the same time, work hard to stay off the boat to leeward, if there is one. Constantly watch the leeward boat’s position and speed. If they accelerate and sail higher toward you, react by doing the same to maintain a safe distance—hopefully as much as two to three boat widths. This hole to leeward is key in allowing you to sail slightly below closehauled, in first gear, in order to accelerate in the five to 10 seconds before the gun.

In the last 15 to 20 ­seconds, the GPS pings and/or line sights are important gauges that will give you confidence in your positioning. Pay close attention to your placement relative to the lineup of boats close by. Especially watch the two to three boats to windward, always trying to maintain the same slight bow-back position throughout the entire starting approach. That will give you a runway to accelerate into so you can begin to trim before the competitors above do. If any of those boats to weather trims and begins to accelerate, trim immediately and match its speed, no matter where it is on the line or the time before the gun. If even one of those boats gets the jump and ends up on your wind after the gun, it can be game over.

One tip is how to slow the boat when you find yourself dangerously close to being over early. Our instinct tells us to turn down, away from the line. However, bearing away usually means burning up the valuable hole to leeward and, in fact, you end up accelerating right into it. Instead, head up to near head-to-wind. The boat will slow more quickly and slow the weather competitors. You’ll buy more time and save distance to the line. Most important, you’ll build the hole to leeward and close the ­distance to windward.

Especially for the first minute after the start, boatspeed is king. Fight the urge to point as high as possible until the boat has sailed through all the gears and is at top speed. Definitely do not pinch. A common mistake is to trim the sails too tightly, too quickly. If the sails are trimmed right to the closehauled position before the boat has the time to sail through the gears, the boat will load up and slide sideways. Talk about ­burning up the hole to leeward!

On our boat, we divide all the responsibilities where, in the last 15 seconds, I am simply steering when and where the crew indicates. If we’re sailing with three, the jib trimmer keeps track of the line and our position relative to the boats to weather. That person has control of our final timing and dictates exactly when to pull the trigger. The middle person keeps the time and looks aft and to leeward for boats approaching late on port or behind and low on starboard. Our boat is anything but quiet in these last seconds, but this constant influx of information allows me to concentrate entirely on boatspeed.

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The more I examine the results of previous seasons, the more it becomes clear that success in sailboat races is directly related to sailing the first 100 yards of every race correctly. It’s not just a matter of getting a good start. You have to know what to do when you get into the lead. Or, if you get a bad start, it becomes a matter of being resourceful enough to recover. Either way it takes an aggressive approach in your strategy from the moment you get on thewater.

The common attitude of sailing the first part of the beat—just waiting to see how things are going and then getting to the side that seems better—just doesn’t pay off. Get out there early, well before the first gun, watch the breeze and try to figure out what it is doing. If you have a compass, write the headings on your deck with a grease pencil. Do whatever is necessary to keep track of the breeze. Then, once you’ve determined what it is doing, you can begin establishing your priorities for the leg, but you must do all this well before the starting sequence. This is the real key to success in the first 100 yards.

To help myself sail that tricky first part of the race, I created a priority chart, rating each strategic consideration in terms of its relative importance in different conditions (see chart). As I began using the chart, I was surprised to find that some of my usual considerations were not so important as I had thought. For instance, I used to always try to get into a position that would allow me to tack, if necessary. But as I used the chart more and more, I found that in many conditions, that priority should take a back seat to some other priorities. The chart helped to pull everything into perspective. To fully understand how to use it, let’s examine each strategic area.

Clear Air

In light winds, clear air is always ranked most important. Unlike when sailing in most other winds, when it’s light, it’s imperative to have clear air so that you can develop even average boatspeed. If your speed is less than average, because you are eating bad air behind a couple of other boats, you’ll be quickly left behind, no matter how well you play the other options.

In medium to heavy winds, clear air becomes slightly less important since speed is not affected by dirty wind as much as in light conditions. Clear air is least important when the breeze is very shifty and strong, for then, where you go becomes almost as important as how fast you go.

Correct Tack

As the wind builds to over 5 knots, sailing on the correct tack becomes the top priority. It takes over from clear air since, as the wind increases, average boatspeed can be achieved even if the air is somewhat obstructed. So, as you come off the line in a fair breeze, going the correct way should be the main priority, as it allows you to gain more (or lose less) than any of the other considerations.

Notice that in light winds, sailing on the correct tack is still very important, although less so than in the higher wind ranges. Only when the wind is light and shifting persistently less than 10 degrees does correct tack take a back seat to anything other than clear air.

Ability to Tack Easily

This category has a surprisingly low ranking on the priority chart. When I realized I’d rated this area so poorly in nearly every wind condition, it occurred to me that this was one of the largest problems I’d been experiencing on the racecourse. Perhaps it’s been a problem for you too.

How many times have you started next to a group of boats and been really frustrated because you were sailing into a header, but just “couldn’t” tack because of all the boats on your windward quarter and your strong reluctance to tack and take a few transoms? You wait and wait, and finally they begin tacking off. But by the time you’re able to tack, the shift has gone back the other way. Or in a persistent shift, by the time you are able to tack, so many people have gone to the correct side that you end up miles behind and have to struggle the rest of the race just to catch up.

From the heavy emphasis placed on correct tack, it appears that you should almost always tack when it appears advantageous to do so, even if it means taking transoms and losing a little distance in the short run. After all, the more important priority is going the right way.

Only in a very shifty breeze is it recommended that you place emphasis on positioning yourself where you can tack at will. Even then, getting on the correct tack should be weighed more heavily in the decision-making process.

Good Boatspeed

Boatspeed plays an important part in any race and should always be considered important to doing well. However, in the table, notice that in very shifty winds, boatspeed takes a back seat to all other factors — correct tack, clear air, ability to tack easily and continue on the correct tack. This is because when the shifts are relatively large, position (largely the result of the other four factors) yields much higher dividends and should therefore be the first priority.But when the breeze is steady, boatspeed becomes a much more important factor because less distance is gained per shift. In other words, if it’s shifty, think mostly about the shifts; if it’s steady, think about boatspeed.

Continue on Correct Tack

This is a very important area that is often overlooked. It deals with situations such as letting a port tacker cross in front of you rather than forcing him to tack on your lee bow, possibly forcing you the wrong way. There are many times early in the beat when similar close situations arise and a fast decision must be made about what to do, whether you are the right-of-way boat or not. Using the chart makes decision-making easier. For instance, in shifty winds, it is advantageous to stay on the proper tack as long as the shift lasts. If you’re on the correct tack, most of the time it’s better to duck a close port tacker than to have them tack on your lee bow and hurt you. But, if you’re not on the best tack, call for rights and force your competitor to tack the wrong way, and then tack away yourself, onto the correct tack.

On the other hand, if you’re on port tack and going the right way, you would probably do best to go out of your way to duck a starboard tacker rather than be forced off in the wrong direction. In a steady breeze, though, this is not so much the case. Suffice it to say, that whenever you’re going the way you want to go, try to keep other boats from forcing you to do otherwise.

Method ‘Midst the Madness

The essence of all this “prioritizing” is that you give yourself a method of making cool, logical assessments of what’s happening on those first 100 yards of the race course, helping you to remove yourself from the heat of the battle so you can make rational, clearheaded decisions. It really can be a help, considering how those few, harried moments just after the start are often the most confusing moments of the race.

Regardless of how successful your start has been, the decisions that must be made subsequently are clearly some of the most important ones you will make in the entire race. If your start has been good, do you try to get in front of the fleet for control, or do you go to one side of the course looking for a shift? Do you cover the boats around you or sail to the other side of the course to cover the boats there? Or, do you just try to sail your own race, not really worrying about the rest of the fleet?

If your start has been less than successful, there are even more considerations to contend with. In addition to those already mentioned, you must also now think about clear air, boats calling for right-of-way and whether or not to let port tackers cross you. With so many important things to consider, the chances for a serious error are good, which is why this chart may help you make sense of it all as it has for me.

The first time I used the chart is a pretty good example of how well the system can work. I was at the Laser European Championship, held in Bangor, Northern Ire­land. We were using a gate-start system in a race about halfway through the series in a 12-knot wind. I wanted to be one of the first boats through the gate and thus headed for the line early. But I got there too early and had to make a desperate tack .to get away. In the process, I capsized and the fleet was away before I could get going again. Thinking I had nothing to lose by trying something new, I began recalling the priority chart. The breeze was persistently shifting slowly to the right, so I began sailing in that direction. Because gate starts often force the boats very close together, all of the boats were pinning each other on star­ board, which was the wrong tack. While the rest of the fleet was frantically trying to work out from under and behind each other, I was soon sailing in clear air on the correct tack. I concentrated on staying on that tack and going fast, just like it says on the chart, and rounded the weather mark second in a fleet of 117 boats!

While this example shows how the priority chart can help you physically remove yourself from the head-to­ head combat that often takes place right off the starting line, the real value of it is that it can get you mentally organized for any situation that comes your way. More importantly, it forces you to think in terms of doing the best you can over the entire leg rather than simply concentrating on passing nearby boats.

Subsequent Weather Legs

The priority chart is just as valid for subsequent weather Legs as it is for the first beat, especially if the fleet is closely bunched. Whenever you round a leeward mark and start heading upwind again, the situation arises once more where you have a lot to do and think about in a very limited amount of time. And what you do in the initial part of that weather leg can quickly determine the order in which boats will finish that leg.

The main difference between the first part of the first beat and the first part of all other beats is that, on the later beats, you must shift smoothly and quickly from off-wind gear to upwind gear, as well as deal with varied tactical considerations, depending up on the numbers and position of the boats around you. Nevertheless, the method of arriving at the correct way does not change. Simply follow the priority chart.

If you should reach the point where you want to start playing defense (maintaining your position) the importance of a single factor, such as going e right way, is reduced. A common example of this often occurs on the final beat, when the only boat close behind you tacks away from the correct tack in a longshot attempt to get by you. So long as you won’t lose any other boats, it only makes sense to tack away from the correct tack yourself in order to cover. For the normal beat, however, the priority chart logic is very reliable.

As you approach the leeward mark, consider what happened on the beat(s) before and add that information to the plan. Then decide how to begin the next beat, not neglecting or overlooking any of the important criteria from the chart. At the 1980 Laser Midwinters, I was just behind the series leader at the start of the last beat 0f the last race, both on the course and on the scoreboard. Based on experience gained on previous weather legs in that race, I knew exactly what range to expect for lifts and headers.

After a short distance, we sailed into a small header and the leader immediately tacked. Recognizing that the header still left us in the lifted range, I continued on the same tack. Then, when a significant header finally arrived, I tacked, took the lead and clinched the series by one­ quarter point. Without the confidence I possessed in knowing precisely where I stood in terms of wind direction and the priority chart, I might not have been able to sail those first 100 yards of the final beat as surely and aggressively. The final results would certainly have been different.

So, before the next sailing season begins, take a close look at your racing results from last season. Think about what you did right and wrong and why things turned out as they did. Chances are, you’ll discover the key to your successes lay in your ability to make the correct decisions in the first 100 yards of each beat. Get in the habit of attacking that part of each race with confidence and organization and I’m willing to wager you’ll show signs of improvement in your overall racing accomplishments this coming season.

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When it comes to pinging the starting line, the biggest mistake you can make is not being closehauled when pinging. If you are beam reaching on the line and the unit is on the line, the unit draws the imaginary line on the actual line. However, when you are starting, your bow is well in front of your physical unit and so you would be over early. On our J/70, we work very hard to be closehauled, which means the unit is drawing its imaginary line 7 feet back from the actual start line. Then when we start, at zero meters, our unit is 7 feet off the line but the bow is right on the line.

For this reason, it’s also important to be on starboard when pinging. This is especially true if one end of the starting line is biased by more then a few degrees. Pinging outside the line at either end is just fine and perhaps more accurate if your goal is to win an end. Another reason to be on starboard is that when pinging, the ends are often crowded and at least you have right away over someone coming in on port and disrupts your ping. To improve accuracy further, I often go to the bow of the boat (yes, even on the J/70) and call the ping very accurately from there.

Anything you can do to let the GPS catch up with reality is beneficial, so in addition to being closehauled, it’s helpful to come in medium speed and not turn too much. I like medium speed because that is likely your speed 10 to 15 seconds before the gun when you need the distance to be most accurate.

RELATED: Start Before the Start

After you finish a race, hang near the committee boat until the last boat finishes. Ping the boat ASAP and then run the line to the pin and do it again. Keep an eye on the ends of the line to make sure the committee isn’t moving them. Remember, race committee boats and marks are always moving a little due to wind, waves and current. In addition, a GPS is really only good within a meter or two. Remember to not only use your pinging device, but also look around outside the boat to make sure your distance to the line displayed matches what you see. A bad ping or a drifting boat or mark is not an excuse for being over early.

Top Principal Race Officer Bruce Golison says, don’t be afraid to ask the race committee how the ping was. They can generally hear when you ping and can tell you if you were “aggressive” or not. Sometimes you can tell just by the looks on their faces!

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2018 WORLD CUP SERIES MIAMI

Want to be able to hold your position on the line with the best of them? In dinghy sailing and skiff sailing, down-speed boathandling will get you well on your way. That’s because some boats, such as skiffs, often set up as early as 3 minutes from the start and have to hold their position on the line by doing tiny circles right up until the start. To do those, the goal is to always be in one of three modes—going forward, backward, or sideways—and never lose flow over the blades. A lot of people end up sitting on the line with no flow, and as a result have no control over their boats. But if you always have some form of flow, you have control. The goal of this drill is to maintain that flow and get really good at transitioning from one mode to the other. All you need is an inflatable mark, one you can hit without damaging the boat. In a nutshell, here’s the drill: Sail to the mark on the starboard tack layline, passing the mark to starboard. When the transom clears the mark, shoot head to wind, then backwind both sails and use the rudder to crab, or slide, the boat sideways to windward. Once on the other side of the mark, sail backward until the mark is off the port bow, and then repeat the drill. The most challenging part is moving the boat sideways after you first clear the mark. You must learn to balance the foils and the sails so you can put the bow just barely through head to wind, not yet on port tack, and get the boat to move sideways without spinning out to the left or right. Back the main on the port side with the bow slightly through head to wind. Then pull the tiller to windward—to starboard. The sails will push the boat up to the starboard side of the mark and rudder will push the stern up. When you first try this, you’ll likely have to scull to keep the boat under control, which of course is illegal. But the better you get at balancing the sails and foils, the less sculling you’ll need and eventually, if you balance the sails correctly, you won’t need to scull at all. The goal is to slide without having to use any rudder. It’s almost like you’re doing a really quick double tack. Done well, you’ll slide to windward of the mark without ever falling onto port tack.

Any time you’re doing the sliding part of this drill, you’re at risk of fouling a boat that’s sitting on starboard to windward of you. Get yourself as closely tucked in next to the boat to windward as possible without getting so close that they can touch you if they put the bow down. To do that, you have to know how far the boat’s going to slide. Also, you’re essentially tacking, as you’ve gone beyond head to wind, and you don’t get any rights until your bow is returns to a closehauled course.

The final segment is reverse mode, backing down past the mark. Site over the tiller, and the direction the tiller points to is the direction the back of the boat is going to go. For instance, if the tiller points to port, the stern is going to go to port. You now have reverse flow over the blades, meaning you still have steerage and thus control of the boat. Once your bow is to leeward of the mark, transition back to the starboard-tack mode.

If you can hold your position on the line, the more starting will become a tactical battle. If you’re the leeward boat, your goal is to be in sync with the windward boat. When the windward boat goes forward, you go forward. When the windward boat goes sideways to windward, you go sideways to windward. When the windward boat goes backwards, you go backwards. You’re doing that with the expectation that each time they make a small mistake, they fall into you a little bit more. A few mistakes on their part, and all of a sudden you’re in control of the windward boat.

If you’re windward boat, stay out of synch with the boat to leeward of you. When the leeward boat slides to windward, go forward and call starboard. That’s going to stop them from going sideways, and their next move will be to sail backward. When they do that, you should slide to windward. If you can get out of sync with the leeward boat, you control them.

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