had a frustrating second day on the water, a little windier than my first. as soon as i got the sail up i would start to sail into the wind. I just couldnt get the sail far enough forward to stop this happening. I tried shifting my stance forward but i then couldnt find my balance to hold the sail up, im thinking that i need to shift the position of my hands back on the boom, does this sound right?
any tips would be greatly appreciated, sucks there is no schools in tassie, might have to get a few lessons when im in qld in june.
Cheers
Bit hard without seeing your gear, do you have a centre board? If so retract it.
Sounds like you know the basic cause, centre of effort behind the centre of lateral resistance.
Some times shifting the mast base can have the opposite effect, ie, moving mast base forward, can shift centre of effort back, because the sail gets racked backwards, if you also move forward to make the sail more upright, the centre of lateral resistance also moves forwards because you have more rail in the water.
What you need to do is move your weight back, to shift C.L.R. back, try also moving mast track back, so you can angle the rig more forward, and the C of E with it.
Your hands should always have the sails centre of effort centred between them, otherwise one hand is going to be working much harder than the other.
Your hands should be in a position on the boom that feels balanced, ie it's not pulling harder on the front or back hand.
I think the problem may be that you're standing too far back. If its really light wind, you can put your front foot next to the mast foot (facing forwards) and the back foot a little bit behind it, facing sideways so your feet are in an L shape.
Putting weight too far bck on the board will turn it up into the wind. Soon you will develop a feel for the best place to stand.
Thanks that makes sense, i found that the main pressure was on my forward hand on the boom, hence i was thinking that my hands were to far forward, that may well be the case if i havnt got even pressure im thinking. Ill try moving the mast track backwards, didnt think of that, i was moving it foward but that just made the problem slightly worse. and try the centre board up. doh! that makes sense now i think about it......
Cheers mineral, makes me think im using my front hand too much and leaning towards the back of the board to get my balance. thanks for all the ideas 
, hope thursday brings nice weather for me to get out again!
One more tip - get low! Straighten the front leg with your front foot next to / beside / even just in front of the mast base, and bend the back leg so you're down nice and low - eyes at boom level or even lower. Drive through the front foot to keep the nose of the board from heading upwind.
Also don't over-sheet (don't bring the sail too far in with your back hand)... it's a classic beginner mistake. Let us know how you go!
carbonsugar.com/racing/power-to-weight-your-stance-vs-antoines/
this a great site i use to work on technique. It is written by one one of AUS top racers Sean O'brien and goes through everything in the absolute detail. So have a look its has really improved my sailing. All i have done is gotten people to take pictures and videos of me and i have compared them to the pro's. i found this really fast to learn better technique.
It's just a very common beginner experience. Used to happen to me all the time, more so on one tack. I'm not sure how it went away.
Be conscious of how many directions you can move the sail/rig.
- Forwards/backwards
- Sheet in/out
- Windward/leeward (into wind/away from wind)
- You can also sheet in with your front had or back hand.
- All the combinations of the above.
You want the sail/rig to look like image #6 in this very useful for you article:http://www.boardseekermag.com/technique/beginner/steering/steering-v2.html
(weird, number 6 has gone. here's another)
My guess is you aren't sheeted out enough. See how the rig is not in line with the board?
agree with panda,
it is a very common beginner problem. it is to do withthe setup and rig grab
this is the way you should approach things (by the book).
1.feet along centreline of board spaced evenly on either side of mast base.
2.uphaul sail
3.hold uphaul just below boom and get board and sail perpendicular
(hand closet to nose of board should be just below boom head wit hother hand under that) important......
4.move back foot back
5.turn front foot so pointing towards nose of board and place beside or just behind mast
6.place hand (top hand on uphaul-- see item 3) on boom about 6-7 inches from boom head
7.move hand holding boom across your body in front of your face towards nose of board. (note: holding boom too close to body will make you fall backwards at this point. make sure hand is about 30+ cm away from your face as it passes.
8. place other hand on boom about 30cm back from front hand
9. straighten front leg and keep back leg bent.
10. sheet in by leaning out
11. keep arms straight and you will move forwards.
12. if you keep going into the wind straighten front arm more by pushing hand towards nose further and twisting upper body.
hope this helps.
thanks for the info guys, going to head out in the morning so ill let you know how i go!
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A beech is a tree! BEACH BEACH BEACH!!!
And fullstops! And... and...and...and...
Hey Buster, where'd your post go? Now mine just looks like silly inane (is that a tortology?) rantings.
Hi Ian
I recommend getting a trainning DVD called "Beginner to Winner" (Jem Hall). A visiting seabreezer from Sydney recommended it to me down the beach one day. I should have got something like this when I first started. If you can't go to a school, then this is the next best thing. Good luck with it mate :)
Ja
well got up nice and early today to find what can only be described as glassy, so off to start building my mountain bike track, heading back to town at about 1.30pm i noticed that the breeze had picked up slightly, so headed down to to Howden to see what i could do.
Finally out on the water at about 2pm and the breeze had managed to find something, so time to put my tips into action.
1. Moved the mast right back.
2.opened up my stance, bent the back knee out, pointed front foot forward.
3. left my front hand on the mast and just used my back hand to bring the sail in.
4. got my hips forward (trusted the sail to hold me)
5. concentrated on keeping the boom leveled out.
What do you know it bloody worked a treat..............
got some steering in, some tacks (which i had trouble with), and a gibe or two.
Anyway thanks for for the tips, was a bloody great day out on the water, although i was pretty stuffed when i realized i had sailed a fair way from home and was not that great at heading into the wind and was not really keen on sailing to the beach and walking home around the shore. so got the better half to kayak over to me and tow me the 100m or so back to the forshore.
