Tactics to Win E-Book

Nick Craig

• Herausgeber: Fernhurst Books Limited
• Kategorie: Lebensstil
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Beschreibung

Unless you have unbeatable boatspeed, tactics are vital to winning sailboat races. Multi-champion, Nick Craig, shows you how to develop a strategy and what tactics to adopt on every leg and at every mark of the course. His first book, Helming to Win, was described as "original, thought provoking… like no other that has gone before it". He now turns his highly analytical mind to the subject of tactics. He discusses the inputs into strategy, starting and the race plan (going through each leg in turn). Nick then tackles mark tactics, covering every different type of mark, and fleet tactics on every leg of the course. He finally focusses on boat-to-boat tactics, again on every leg of the course. In each situation he covers attacking and defensive tactics, either to get ahead or make sure you stay ahead. Non-spinnaker, symmetrical spinnaker and asymmetric dinghies are all covered because Nick has won world or national championships in each of these types of boats. Having read Nick's first book many said that it had transformed the way they sailed. This book will have the same effect on your tactics and should see you moving up the leaderboard.

Leseprobe

Copyright © 2018 Fernhurst Books Limited

First published in 2018 by Fernhurst Books Limited

The Windmill, Mill Lane, Harbury, Leamington Spa, Warwickshire. CV33 9HP. UK

Tel: [phone] | www.fernhurstbooks.com

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise, except under the terms of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 or under the terms of a license issued by The Copyright Licensing Agency Ltd, Saffron House, 6-10 Kirby Street, London, EC1N 8TS, UK, without the permission in writing of the Publisher.

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This publication is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regard to the subject matter covered. It is sold on the understanding that the Publisher is not engaged in rendering professional services. If professional advice or other expert assistance is required, the services of a competent professional should be sought. The Publisher accepts no responsibility for any errors or omissions, or for any accidents or mishaps which may arise from the use of this publication.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 9781912177097 (Paperback)

eBook ISBN

9781912177776 (EPub)

9781912177783 (Mobi)

9781912177790 (ePDF)

Front cover photograph © Jesus Renedo / Sailing Energy

Back cover photograph © Alistair Deaves / OKDIA

All photographs © Tom Gruitt

Except: p10: Sue Pelling; p13: Raymarine; p19: Tim Hore; p26: Alistair Deaves/OKDIA; p83: Elena Giola

Designed & illustrated by Daniel Stephen

I would like to say a huge thank you to my lovely wife Emma for giving me the time to write this – I did try to keep it to 10 minutes an evening once the kids were asleep!

Thank you to all my excellent crews over the years who have dragged me round the course and enabled me to sail in many classes and experience lots of tactical situations on which this book is based.

Many thanks to Tim ‘Sat Nav’ Garvin for taking the time to read the draft of this book and provide many excellent inputs; his eye for detail is far better than mine!

NICK CRAIG

MASTER TACTICIAN

Nick Craig has won championships again and again in a wide variety of classes. This has been achieved through fantastic boatspeed and boat handling, obtained through focused practice, and a tactical awareness which is second to none.

Single-hander (no spinnaker)

OK (5 x World Champion, European Champion, 8 x National Champion)

Finn (National Champion)

Phantom (National Champion)

Single-hander (asymmetric)

D-One (3 x World Champion, 4 x European Champion, 5 x National Champion)

Double-hander (no spinnaker)

Enterprise (3 x World Champion, 6 x National Champion)

Double-hander (symmetric spinnaker)

Merlin Rocket (2 x National Champion)

Double-hander (asymmetric)

RS400 (8 x National Champion)

B14 (World Champion, 4 x National Champion)

Team racing

BUSA Championships (2 x Champion)

In total, so far, Nick has won 35 National championships, 5 European championships and 12 World championships and he doesn’t show any sign of slowing down – 6 of these championships were won in the last year! On top of this, Nick has won the UK’s ‘Champion of Champions’ event (The Endeavour Trophy) 6 times – only topped by his crew on 3 of these occasions, Toby Lewis, who is a 7 times winner!

Nick was awarded the YJA Yachtsman of the Year in 2011 and the Yachts & Yachting Amateur Sailor of the Year in 2013/14.

Nick’s first book, Helming to Win, was a totally original and unique book, developed through his amazing journey from club racer to championship winner – achieved without the benefit of a coach but through his own hard work, determination and ability to analyse the reasons for his successes and failures and learn from this. Tactics to Win takes this journey one stage further, focussing on specific areas of strategy and tactics. Once again it is well thought out and manages to be both thorough and succinct.

“A welcome return of the ‘Sail to Win’ series from Fernhurst Books and you could hardly ask for a more qualified sailor to explain how to win races as a helm than Nick Craig.”(Yachts & Yachting, Jul 2015)

“The content is easily accessible in a very nicely managed layout that allows you to dip in for inspiration. Highly interesting, as well as hugely entertaining, to get inside the head of Nick Craig.”(OKDIA)

“Packed full of intelligent insight, brilliant top tips and engaging photo sequences.”(Sailing Magazine)

CONTENTS

FOREWORD

CHAPTER 1 Introduction

CHAPTER 2 Strategy

CHAPTER 3 Starting

CHAPTER 4 The Race Plan

CHAPTER 5 Mark Tactics

CHAPTER 6 Fleet Tactics

CHAPTER 7 Boat-on-boat Tactics

CHAPTER 8 Bringing It All Together

FOREWORD

Boatspeed is what most sailor’s concentrate on because, if you are faster than the other boats, you are going to win! However most top boats in a class go at pretty much the same speed, so sailing a shorter distance than your competitors, or in less disturbed wind or waves, are also vital ingredients to winning races. These are achieved by getting your strategy and tactics right.

In this book, multi-championship winner, Nick Craig, tells you all you need to know about strategy and tactics.

While I have enjoyed and benefitted from working with some superb coaches throughout my sailing career, Nick has not had that opportunity. He has worked it all out himself, and that makes this book especially useful. Most people reading it will, like Nick, be amateur sailors, only able to sail at weekends and the odd week for championships. To be able to learn from someone else who has trodden the same path is invaluable. He knows that you can’t go sailing every day, like the Olympic sailors do, and so you have to make the most of every opportunity to learn and put into practice what you have learned.

It is so obvious from this book that this is what Nick has done. He puts every trip on the water to good use and throughout the book there are anecdotes from his sailing career. These go back to sailing Cadets in the 1980s to more recent experiences in D-Ones, OKs, Merlin Rockets and the Endeavour Trophy.

Because of Nick’s amazing success in such a variety of classes he can cover tactics in single-handers, symmetric spinnaker boats and asymmetrics and you know that it is championship-winning advice in all of them!

From creating a strategy and race plan to tactics on each leg and at each mark, Nick covers it all in this excellent book. Reading it will improve your strategy and tactics and give you a better chance of winning.

Good luck!

Saskia Clark, MBE

470 sailor: 3 times Olympian: Olympic gold medallist, Rio 2016; Olympic silver medallist, London 2012; World Champion, Barcelona 2012.

CHAPTER 1

Introduction

Smart tactics are the magic ingredient which enables a fast sailor to step up from being a championship contender to a consistent championship winner. Smart tactics enable sailors to jump from boat to boat and still be in the leading group of any fleet. The joy of tactics is that they are repeatable and learnable. Boatspeed and sniffing windshifts and pressure are black arts whereas tactics can be learnt.

It is often said the highly tactical nature of sailing makes it similar to chess but on water. That is a good analogy as, just like chess, there is an exhaustive range of attacking and defensive options which can be perfected with quality practice, note taking and a keen interest in tactics. However, the analogy ends there because sailing is exhilarating, outdoor and good material for a chat over a beer after a race!

This book starts with the big picture and then drills down into starting and the race plan. It will then outline attacking and defensive options as you go through the race. Finally, this book describes boat-on-boat tactics to enable you to perform those vital close-in overtaking or defensive moves.

The best practice for tactics is racing against high quality opposition in as big a fleet as possible. I have seen teenagers come out of Youth classes with superior tactical acumen compared to the most experienced adult sailors because they have sailed in large, competitive fleets virtually every weekend whereas that fantastic experience only happens a couple of times a year in many senior classes.

“We raced against Ben Saxton & Alan Roberts at the 2012 Endeavour Trophy and we were soundly beaten. Ben was in his early 20s at the time and I was in my late 30s having sailed the Endeavour at Burnham quite a few times. As well as being very talented, Ben & Alan had both sailed a lot of hours and, more importantly, quality hours. They both grew up sailing in large, high standard fleets so, by their early 20s, were already highly tactically astute having packed in more quality big-fleet sailing by their early 20s than most sailors manage in a lifetime.”

The young Ben Saxton & Alan Roberts win the Endearour Trophy for the first time in 2012

CHAPTER 2

Strategy

Having a big-picture strategic plan is critical before you race. From this strategy, you develop your starting and race plan and alternative plans in case things don’t work out as you envisaged. Without a strategy, your start will potentially put you on the unfavoured side of the fleet and your race plan will be directionless.

Key Inputs

1. Attitude to Risk

Your attitude to risk in each race depends on whether you are ahead or behind your outcome objective. If you are ahead of your outcome objective, you should sail more conservatively. This low-risk approach typically helps deliver a consistent series. However, if you are singlemindedly focused on your outcome objective, you should increase risk to try to hit your goal if you are behind it. So you will typically start a week low risk. And hopefully end it lower risk! If you can stay low risk, others will have to increase their risk and probably rack up points. But if you’re behind your objective, it may be very appropriate to hit a corner in the last race to try to claw back points to hit your goal or perhaps engage in some more aggressive, higher-risk boat-on-boat tactics.

If it is an exceptionally windy day, you may choose to reduce risk by dropping your tack rate as each tack is a potential capsize hazard. In extreme cases, this may mean starting on starboard and tacking near the left corner to enable a 2-tack beat. If you are seeking to de-risk on a windy day, you may also aim for a 1 gybe run or even tack instead of gybe (‘chicken gybe’).

In extreme winds, conventional wisdom says gybe when you are sailing fastest to reduce apparent wind. There are a couple of other nuances to this. Aim to gybe surfing down a wave with a big gap before the next wave and ideally on a big wave. This will give you most acceleration and time to gybe. And you should aim to gybe in a lull. Once you’ve found a lull and a nicely spread out wave set, that is the time to maximise speed to reduce apparent wind before the gybe.

With a leeward gate, judging the layline for the left-hand buoy (facing downwind) can be tricky but this is the buoy you are aiming to round to save on a gybe. You should bias towards overlaying as you can always drop you spinnaker early if needed and tight reach into the left-hand leeward buoy. If you underlay, you will have to gybe again to the right-hand buoy which increases risk.

Ideally position yourself on the layline (blue) but, if not, overlay (yellow)

2. Course Bias

This is the most important factor in deciding which way you might head up the first beat. In most scenarios, you should aim to have your bow out on the long tack as soon as possible. More often than not this will lead to distance gains. So, if the first beat is starboard-tack biased, you will be looking to position your boat to the left of the fleet so that you gain from any header. As you are on starboard for most of the beat, time is on your side and at some point a header should arrive which you will profit from. You will be unlucky (or not have tracked the breeze very well) for the breeze to only shift right as you sail up the beat resulting in you losing out. Vice versa for a port-tack biased beat.

By always aiming to have your bow out on the long tack, the odds are stacked in your favour for the shifts going your way, which greatly helps deliver big fleet consistency. You should have a good reason not to have your bow out on the long tack. Even if you have no idea what the wind will do (which is more common than many sailors like to admit), following this golden rule will mean that you gain more often than not. This will make it appear that you do know what the wind is doing after all!!

Sailing can be a complex sport so when you are unsure what is happening strategically, sticking to this simple rule generally works. Awareness of how the fleet is distributed is instrumental for making this golden rule work. That is achieved through a lot of big fleet racing and being able to sail fast with your head out the boat (covered in Helming to Win). A top crew should have continuous awareness of your position versus the fleet and be able to feed this back as relevant.

You should keep re-assessing this and all information as you race. If the run is biased to one gybe, the beat will be biased to the other gybe, unless there is tidal influence.

“At an OK training session at Christchurch in 2016, the run was sailed on port gybe. Everyone in the high quality training group spotted this and tacked quickly onto starboard at the leeward mark so sailing the long tack first. None of us had clocked the amount of tide we were sailing in, so the beat was actually pretty square with more breeze on the right. The first boat to tack back to the right won that mini race. So 2 lessons: 1) Allow for tide when linking run and beat course bias; 2) Something can be learnt from every race, even a short one at a training session.”

Aim to have your bow out on the long tack (blue); the two yellow boats are taking a gamble

Sometimes circumstances over-rule the general rule (e.g. more wind or a tide effect)

3. Wind Pattern

You should track the wind for as much as an hour before the start to understand the shift pattern. Typically the wind will be oscillating, swinging, bending, converging or have no pattern (rare!).

Track the wind for an hour before the start

All of these scenarios provide useful information. It is critical to be honest with yourself and not seek a pattern when there isn’t one. Knowing there is no pattern is really powerful information rather than wasted time wind tracking, which may be how it feels. Knowing there is no pattern drives a strategy of sailing up the middle to hedge risk. Other sailors who have assumed a pattern may well be caught out on one side of the course by random shifts resulting in big scores for them.

You should continue to routinely track the wind between races. Practice beats can help with this.

Understanding the weather forecast to understand where the next shift may come from can help. However, weather forecasts tend to be over quite a long period and the first beat is typically short for dinghy racing. You should understand the impact of land and clouds on the breeze, whether the wind is an unstable or stable breeze, how a sea breeze may develop and its impact on the gradient wind. This is a big topic which is covered in Wind Strategy, also part of the Fernhurst Books’ Sail to Win series.

The compass can play a highly effective role in helping to work out the windshift pattern before the start, ensuring that you tack on windshifts and stay in phase with shifts during the race. However, it is all too easy to become fixated with the compass and lose sight of other boats and wind patterns on the water. The compass should be glanced at occasionally, more as a support to your decision making. The compass can help you get back in phase with the windshifts if you’ve lost your rhythm. It can also quickly help determine if you are on a lift or header as you round the leeward mark if there isn’t a land reference or you don’t already have a feel for the angles.

A compass can be very useful

Keep in mind that a big windshift outside of the oscillation range typically indicates a persistent shift driven by a new weather system. So, in that case, it can pay to sail into a header to find an even bigger shift and more pressure. Having your head out the boat, looking at clouds and being aware of the weather forecast help distinguish between a large oscillation and a persistent shift.

A top crew plays a key role in keeping track of the compass numbers and helping to put the helm back in phase if the helm loses rhythm.

In light winds, there is often more breeze at the edge of the course where it isn’t so disturbed by the fleet. So sailing the corners more is sometimes required. Pressure is a much more important factor in light winds as a few knots more wind will make a big difference to both your speed and height whereas a few knots more wind when it is windy makes less difference.

In light winds there is more breeze at the edge

If the wind is unstable with big holes, your priorities should be more focused on sailing for pressure. If the wind is more stable, windshifts become more important than pressure differences.

A great example of this is the Ora and Peler winds at Lake Garda. The Ora in the afternoon is windy, pretty stable and with big wind bends / more pressure near the cliffs. The morning Peler thermal wind is lighter and shiftier, especially as it dies later in the morning. Very different tactical approaches are required in the morning versus the afternoon at Garda!

Standing up can provide a better view of pressure differentials over the race course, especially in light winds. These can be subtle. So, if you’re not sure where there is more wind, just go with where your instincts say there is more. The more time you spend looking for breeze differences in light winds, the more often those instincts are right!

4. Tide

Prior knowledge of a venue, either through your own experience or by talking to others, is the most valuable information you can find. Tidal charts are also useful but may not be subtle or detailed enough to provide the insights you need for short-course dinghy sailing.

You can often find information on the day by observing where shallow water may be, looking for tide lines and seeing who gains in split tacks with a tuning partner. On your practice beat, you should stop next to any buoys or fixed points up the course to see how much tide there is and whether that varies over the course.

During the race, you should keep your head out of the boat and observe any tide differences. The best indicator is whether boats are gaining from different parts of the course that doesn’t seem to be related to wind differences.

After each race, you should go over the race again in your mind to try to work out which way is paying to work out where shallow and deep water might be.

A top crew can play a key role in tracking the fleet and helping to determine which way is paying. Having a handle on this during the race is very helpful to modify your game plan if necessary.