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Old 11-07-2014, 01:33   #76
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Re: How to choose a good skipper

[QUOTE=goboatingnow;1581829]Actually I would disagree. Racers, especially inshore racers can afford to push a boat upto and in fact exceed its limits. Failures have little consequence, supervision and rescue is close at hand. Ocean racing tends to have expensive over specced gear that few cruisers can afford.

What good cruising and long distance passage making teaches you is to " husband resources " the key is to arrive in one piece. Pushing another 0.25 knots is irrelevant, especially if you risk gear failure or put a crew in danger.

Anyone who has sailed through any serious weather gets a fine sense of where the limits are IMHO.

I have delivered many boats where the owners were accomplished racers , some made very bad cruising ones.

Dave


Dave, I don't think that you have grasped the point well here. SOME inshore racers can afford to exceed limits and pay the bills to recoup. This does not describe most lower level racers... the kind of folks that will take on inexperienced crew for races. These guys pay their own bills and don't like to bust up gear. I know, for I was one such for a lot of years before going cruising. And I think that the racing made me a better cruiser in the long run, especially the single hand racing, but that isn't the subject treated here. We're talking about getting early experience as a sailor from sailing OPBs.

And why would not a racer understand that the key is to finish the voyage ("arrive in one piece")? DNFs due to gear failure sure hurt the season standings, and as I used to say, "ya gotta finish in order to win". I only failed to finish two races in all my years of racing. One was when I lost a turtled spinnaker overboard under the Golden Gate bridge and decided that turning the engine on and being sure of recovering it before it sank was better than continuing in the race after I failed to recover it (this was singlehanded with a typical SF seabreeze blowing). The other was when I inadvertently took two Bonine pills instead of one, and could not stay awake... really scary when this happens in the midst of the Potato Patch shoal! The rest of all those races I managed to keep my self funded boat going all the way to the finish... sometimes in first place. I didn't break much gear 'cause I could not afford to replace it.

Finally, sailing successfully through heavy weather does not show you where the limits are. It is the UNsuccessful ventures that show you where the limits were! But that is a hell of a hard way to learn!

So I stand behind my approval of joining a race crew to help learn about sailing in a useful way. You sure as hell won't learn all of the essential cruising skills, but you can learn how to sail a boat well. And for what it is worth, from my observations of folks who proudly display ASA this and that, the formal training route does not always do such a hot job of instilling those cruising skills either!

BTW, we don't race our cruising home formally, but we sure tweak the sails when sailing the same direction as another similar boat (or a cruising cat!).

Cheers,

Jim
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Old 11-07-2014, 13:19   #77
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Re: How to Choose a good Skipper

Interesting development. The skipper of the competing boat from the last regatta just called and said he was sad to hear I didn't want to race anymore and extended the invitation for his boat. Sailed with him twice, he's a good guy. Curious to see where it leads!
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Old 11-07-2014, 14:16   #78
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Re: How to Choose a good Skipper

Quote:
Originally Posted by snort View Post
Next time, take a close look at the hat.


Bad skipper


Good skipper!


or...
use your personal radar detector on the "skipper's" personality.
This is really funny because it's true.
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Old 11-07-2014, 15:20   #79
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Re: How to Choose a good Skipper

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Originally Posted by Offshore74 View Post
Interesting development. The skipper of the competing boat from the last regatta just called and said he was sad to hear I didn't want to race anymore and extended the invitation for his boat. Sailed with him twice, he's a good guy. Curious to see where it leads!
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Old 11-07-2014, 16:07   #80
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Re: How to Choose a good Skipper

Some good advise. If you dont like the skipper get off the boat ASAP.
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Old 12-07-2014, 05:50   #81
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Re: How to Choose a good Skipper

The best thing to do is race with as many boats and skippers you can. You may find the screamer taught you some new tricks you won't see again. Also remember you sail to a higher degree when racing. Some skippers yell out of urgency not anger, and then frustration.

To the "we don't need to race to sail" crowd, we see them a lot. They typically sail a hunter and can be recognized from a distance by the leech of their sails flogging because they aren't trimmed properly or should reef. Or they're motoring when they could be on a run.

On the flip side in sailed recently with a know it all that didnt , and wanted to tell u how to do your work and don't touch her cockpit. Now I know why they made rule47.2 or whatever the one is about finishing with all the crew u started with.

Think of it this way, if you didn't get experience on the yellers boat u might not have gotten a ride on a better boat.

I love taking a boats stern with not much to spare and the big eyes from the inexperienced crew. Hey if we were racing u would have had 4" not 4' of miss
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Old 12-07-2014, 06:11   #82
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Re: How to Choose a good Skipper

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I love taking a boats stern with not much to spare and the big eyes from the inexperienced crew. Hey if we were racing u would have had 4" not 4' of miss
That's why I love trimming main. It's very technical and when the cross is close you (and everyone else) really know who's steering the boat.

When the helm and the maintrimmer are in synch and you really are no kidding hitting the polars and pointing and going fast and you make the crew above you tack away- it is tres cool and you become a believer all that crap they put in trimming guides and racing books.

Now when you lose, of course, it's because the tactician is a dumbass...
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