Heel, starts, and skiffs

The idea was to get an early start today because most people were leaving in the afternoon. In the end, we only made it on the water half an hour earlier. The first drill was one I haven't done before - heeling on the whistle. Michael had us heeling to windward and leeward, upwind and downwind. The point is that we are all lazy about keeping the boat flat at times and this drill really demonstrated how slow that is. The heel affected the steering which resulted in more rudder which slowed the boat. On the downwind, I was reminded of how much heel helps with a gybe. Heel to windward going into it turns the boat, then flatten for the pump, then heel to windward again to straighten up.

On the gybes, I was steering too violently today, but slowed it down later on. As with tacks, I am better at gybing onto port than onto starboard. I need to work on being symmetrical.

Michael has been yelling at me to be more energized in the boat, like a coiled spring, like an explosion for two days. Maddy also commented at the end of the day that I'm quite static in the boat, not responding as much as the others. Last summer I had a similar comment from Noah, when he pointed out that I should be more aggresive with the boat like Braden. I have at times been more dynamic. I think this is mostly a mood thing. Being cold and feeling cautious about falling in probably results in slower movement in the boat. Come to think of it, I had advice from Peter last year to move more in the boat - fore and aft as well is in and out.

I'm having trouble with static starts. When we line up in irons on the line, I have trouble getting the boat to roll to leeward. Often when I flatten, I don't get a lot of power - mostly because the boat is pointed too high after spending too long trying to roll. It works better if I stand up, but I need to smooth it out and figure out the timing so that I'm not late or early off the start.

Today I was feeling frustrated with the number of people that screwed up the starts by trying to squeeze in where there was no room, or rolling in front of people on the line. I need to watch out for that more and be aggressive about defending my spot. The trouble with practice is that you don't protest as there are no consequences and the kids seem to push the rules as a result. Even in a race it is difficult to enforce the rules at the start because there is so much going on that it is often difficult to know what actually happened. It is difficult to focus on lining up and defending at the same time. I need to refresh my memory on the details of the rules at the start.

In the afternoon I was the only non-skiff sailor so I went in the coach boat and watched the 49er, I14, and 29ers for a while. Same principles as the Laser, with the added fun of a jib and a spinnaker. At the end of the afternoon, I hopped in the 49er with Liam Law. Liam very calmly and patiently showed me the ropes, both as crew and as skipper. It was a fun ride - I wouldn't mind doing it again sometime. I do realize that it wouldn't be as fun in less than ideal wind conditions as capsizing in the skiffs can be quite an event.