Some advice regarding RYA courses, if possible.

[Solation]

Hi there,

So I'll get straight to the point. My dad recently bought a power boat and I'm currently doing the Day Skipper theory and practical with my dad and brother. No sailing experience since I was a kid recently, been on boating holidays in rivers in the past but nothing serious.

Problem being, well, I really love sail boats and I'm doing the Day Skipper on my dad's boat for fun and so we can go out as a family together really.

I'm also looking to start sailing (dad's boat has reignited my sailing dreams haha) and I'm considering taking a 5-day Competent Crew course with a friend who is also looking to learn to sail. Will I be wasting my time with it? I do not know how to sail currently.

I know power boats are different to sail boats, but I'm guessing a lot of knowledge (especially the shore component) will be applicable to any boat really. I'm not looking to own a boat for a while, but it would be nice to maybe offer to help on crew a boat if offered the chance!

Thanks so much!

 

[Babylon]

Quick answers:

Perhaps, assuming the Day Skipper Practical is on a sailing yacht rather than a motor boat, many might argue that you won't need to also do the Competent Crew course on a yacht....?

BUT you'll still learn a great deal about the practical side of sailing and being a useful crew member on any sailing yacht if you also did the five days Comp Crew - i.e. double your time getting initial structured training afloat, see it all as a combination of opportunities to learn, and on two different boats with two different instructors. This, with the DS Theory and Practical on top, will surely improve your chances of blagging a spot as crew on other people's yachts. (All assuming of course that money for the courses is not a problem.)

Other ways to then gain more experience afloat, and specifically of the pure sailing side of things:
(i) Find out what yacht-racing opportunities there are for you as crew - you'd need to be able to travel and be super reliable so you're there on time for every race in the series.
(ii) Contact a local yacht club with the view to putting up a notice or similar saying you're available to crew.
(iii) Learn to sail a dinghy, and possibly get into a bit of dinghy racing first or as well - this will stand you in excellent stead for the rest of your life when it comes to helming and trimming a sailing yacht.
(iv) Find out about crewing on deliveries - contact Pete at Halcyon Yachts (a member here) for further advice.

 

[Sticky Fingers]

Babylon s/he's not doing DS Practical on the yacht, it's a mobo. Your ideas for gaining experience are very sound.

Other points.

• Comp Crew won't teach you how to sail. See Babylon's post above. You need to learn the basics of this, DS Sail assumes you can handle a yacht and also assumes you have passed the theory.
• You can't do Comp Crew or Day Skipper Sail and 'convert' it to power, or vice versa. So if you are doing DS practical on the mobo, but want DS sail, you'll need to do it again if you want DS sail.
• Theory Day Skipper is the same power or sail.

So in your shoes Solation, if you really have minimal knowledge of yacht sailing, you need to build up some experience; if you're going to do this with courses I'd skip the CC, get some crewing in on freebies / club boats / friends' boats, do a Start Yachting then your DS Sail. The DS Power is pretty useless in that respect but may well be good fun anyway. All days on the water are worth something.

 

[Concerto]

There is plenty of free information on the RYA web site. This link is the start for yacht sailing.
Yacht Sailing | Sailing | Getting Afloat | RYA - Royal Yachting Association

 

[prv]

Comp Crew won't teach you how to sail.

Doesn’t it? Genuine question, since I learned from my parents as a kid, but if someone were purely following the official RYA scheme, where on that progression are they meant to learn sailing itself? I did do a Day Skipper Practical years ago just to have something to show charter companies, and while we did some pontoon-bashing, moorings, and of course man overboard manoeuvres, I don’t recall any teaching of how to actually sail. It was assumed we already knew that - but *something* in the RYA syllabus must officially teach it, surely?

Pete

 

[Solation]

Thanks for the advice. Yes, learning the DS power is mainly just for fun with my dad and brother who are more serious about power boating, plus it'll be nice to be able to take my dad's boat out on safely on occasion and like you mentioned, it's all good experience on the water.

I am taking the onshore/theory part of the DS course too, so it's nice to know it's the same for sail and power.

Regarding the CC and whether it teaches you to sail, well there seems to be a difference of opinion on various providers websites, so I think it'll be best for me to call a couple and see what they suggest. I agree with Babylon in that even if there is some overlap, it's all practice and I'll be on a boat for 5 days with a friend learning so I think I'll have a fun experience regardless.

Hope you are all well and thank you for the advice.

 

[Babylon]

Solation, you are very welcome!

 

[[70521]]

Ignore the above advice about dingys unless you enjoy being wet and cold or a constant wet bum. Same goes for racing that's unless you enjoy being shouted at by somebody who has an ego the size of a small planet and only interested in winning; unless you want to race.

If cruising is your thing find an active crusing club and a good skipper who will teach you things; you will learn far faster.

Personally, I am a fan of the RYA training scheme as it teaches things in a consistent way, try untying a OXO when done in a "strange" way with a five knot tide! You will be well above CC level go straight to DS sail.

 

[duncan99210]

OK, here’s my take.
I learnt to sail dinghies at a young age but never did a formal course. Then did nothing for years until I did CC with the Army, which taught me basic yacht skills. Then a few trips on yachts over the years.
Then I took up diving and learned a good deal about coastal navigation finding dive sites and getting the tides right. I also did various RYA powerboat courses and wound up as an instructor.
My wife (no sailing experience at all, lots of power boating) and I then went to Corfu and did CC and DS in a two week course. Refreshed my memory and taught my wife the basics. Great value and I’d recommend going somewhere warm to do the same if you can afford the time and money.
The so what of all this is that making passage from point A to point B isn’t actually the difficult bit: a modicum of practise whilst you’ve got a lot of water to make mistakes in will pay benefits. What you need to learn is close manoeuvres, anchoring, mooring, picking up a mooring and so on. Those skills need to be taught and the best way is in a relatively formal setting with bags of practice.

 

[ctva]

Ignore the above advice about dingys unless you enjoy being wet and cold or a constant wet bum. Same goes for racing that's unless you enjoy being shouted at by somebody who has an ego the size of a small planet and only interested in winning; unless you want to race.
...

Bollocks!

That's like saying all cars are convertibles and you will always get wet.

Most go dinghy sailing once they have learnt and do not get wet. Best way to learn the sailing component.

As to racing, you describe a section of the club racing community. The majority are normal(ish) and are more concerned about the lack of crew and encouraging more people into the sport.

Join a club, the RYA site has good info on wherever you stay.

 

[Skylark]

I'm also looking to start sailing (dad's boat has reignited my sailing dreams haha) and I'm considering taking a 5-day Competent Crew course with a friend who is also looking to learn to sail. Will I be wasting my time with it? I do not know how to sail currently.

Welcome to the forum.

The CC course sounds like the ideal place for you to start. I recommend that you buy the accompanying book "Competent Crew Skills", available as a paperback or an ebook.

products | Shop | RYA - Royal Yachting Association

Another good publication, well worth buying, is the "Yachtmaster Scheme Syllabus & Logbook". These two books should help dispel any myths.

products | Shop | RYA - Royal Yachting Association

I qualified as a sailing instructor three years ago after taking early retirement from a 40+ year engineering career. I don't do it full time, I only do it for enjoyment so I'm not as experienced as some of the career-instructor-posters on here.

A fair number of people go straight to the Day Skipper course claiming to already have experience. It is sometimes, not always, evident that such candidates don't always have a good grounding in the basics. The CC course should give you a very good grounding in the basics of sailing.

Another of my observations is that it's also immediately obvious if a candidate has dinghy sailing experience.

Best of luck, I hope that you enjoy all of your RYA courses

 

[[70521]]

Most go dinghy sailing once they have learnt and do not get wet. Best way to learn the sailing component

That will explain why the "safety boats" are so busy fishing people out of the water. . Including some people I know who might get to the next World Championships in their class.

I am no fan of wet bums and struggle to find any advantage in sailing a four meter dingy over a ten meter one to learn how the sails work.

 

[RJJ]

That will explain why the "safety boats" are so busy fishing people out of the water. . Including some people I know who might get to the next World Championships in their class.

I am no fan of wet bums and struggle to find any advantage in sailing a four meter dingy over a ten meter one to learn how the sails work.

Dinghy sailing is definitely the quickest way to get a feel for the actual sailing bit. Admittedly it's physical and you might well get wet.

Things you do on a dinghy and can't do on a yacht
- tack two hundred times an hour
- gybe two hundred times an hour
- helm, trim the main, balance the boat, and keep lookout, and adjust the kicking strap all at once.
- physically balance the boat, acquiring an instinctive feel for what the ballast does on a yacht
- raise the centreboard, giving you an instinctive feel for how the keel gives you lift
- remove the rudder, helping you understand the fore/aft balance in the rig
- experiment with fore/aft trim
- sail dead downwind or by the lee, out of control, so you know what it feels like and how to avoid it
- feel excess power and safely experience the instant effect of hiking, spilling wind, stuffing up, or increasing twist
- gybe reach-to-reach, practising different body positions and mainsheet techniques, capsizing in the process, learning what works etc
- pick up moorings or floating buckets, hundreds of times, using different approaches and without boring the pants of your four crew who just want to get to the pub.

These activities develop skills, acquired and honed more quickly (and cheaply) on a dinghy than a yacht. You can learn those skills on a yacht, but it takes longer, and many people never learn them at all. Plenty of cruising sailors with heaps of miles who can't safely steer a deep broad reach in a blow; many would say "it's dangerous"; in some cases they don't actually know what's dangerous and what's not, they can't do it so (quite rightly) they have to take a more cautious approach. Much better if they'd learned their skills the same way as the great yacht racers - on dinghies.

All these skills, as well as making you a more rounded sailor in moderate weather, are intrinsic to the ability to manage in atrocious weather. What a dinghy sailor does to keep control in a force 5 is the same as what a yachtie does to keep safe in a force 8. The difference is the dinghy sailor is more likely to have done it dozens of times and can do so instinctively.

There are loads of things to learn of course and dinghying won't help at all with e.g. engines, mooring lines, navigation, radio, liferaft. But if you're intent on being a decent yacht skipper, I strongly recommend a bit of dinghy sailing as part of your progress.

 

[Easticks28]

Bollocks!

That's like saying all cars are convertibles and you will always get wet.

Most go dinghy sailing once they have learnt and do not get wet. Best way to learn the sailing component.

As to racing, you describe a section of the club racing community. The majority are normal(ish) and are more concerned about the lack of crew and encouraging more people into the sport.

Join a club, the RYA site has good info on wherever you stay.

Truest comment on this thread ! (I'm an SI Keelboats ).

 

[Concerto]

Dinghy sailing is definitely the quickest way to get a feel for the actual sailing bit. Admittedly it's physical and you might well get wet.

Things you do on a dinghy and can't do on a yacht
- tack two hundred times an hour
- gybe two hundred times an hour
- helm, trim the main, balance the boat, and keep lookout, and adjust the kicking strap all at once.
- physically balance the boat, acquiring an instinctive feel for what the ballast does on a yacht
- raise the centreboard, giving you an instinctive feel for how the keel gives you lift
- remove the rudder, helping you understand the fore/aft balance in the rig
- experiment with fore/aft trim
- sail dead downwind or by the lee, out of control, so you know what it feels like and how to avoid it
- feel excess power and safely experience the instant effect of hiking, spilling wind, stuffing up, or increasing twist
- gybe reach-to-reach, practising different body positions and mainsheet techniques, capsizing in the process, learning what works etc
- pick up moorings or floating buckets, hundreds of times, using different approaches and without boring the pants of your four crew who just want to get to the pub.

These activities develop skills, acquired and honed more quickly (and cheaply) on a dinghy than a yacht. You can learn those skills on a yacht, but it takes longer, and many people never learn them at all. Plenty of cruising sailors with heaps of miles who can't safely steer a deep broad reach in a blow; many would say "it's dangerous"; in some cases they don't actually know what's dangerous and what's not, they can't do it so (quite rightly) they have to take a more cautious approach. Much better if they'd learned their skills the same way as the great yacht racers - on dinghies.

All these skills, as well as making you a more rounded sailor in moderate weather, are intrinsic to the ability to manage in atrocious weather. What a dinghy sailor does to keep control in a force 5 is the same as what a yachtie does to keep safe in a force 8. The difference is the dinghy sailor is more likely to have done it dozens of times and can do so instinctively.

There are loads of things to learn of course and dinghying won't help at all with e.g. engines, mooring lines, navigation, radio, liferaft. But if you're intent on being a decent yacht skipper, I strongly recommend a bit of dinghy sailing as part of your progress.

Yes, you can learn to sail quickly in a dinghy, BUT everything also happens a lot quicker than a yacht. This can be a disadvantage as frequently a dinghy reacts too quickly to explain what is happening. I learnt to sail on a 30ft yacht and then went to a dinghy, then on to a larger yacht and offshore racing. Cruising came over a decade and a half later. What I do notice with a lot of cruising yachts is how badly set the sails are, if they be bothered to even hoist both sails.

 

[Babylon]

There are also dinghies and dinghies...

Dinghy racing in super-responsive plastic or cold-moulded boats never interested me in the slightest, but - while still gaining crewing experience on other people's yachts after my CC course - I bought an old wooden gunter-rigged 12' Gull dinghy. This was designed by Ian Proctor (same designer of the Wayfarer) to teach his own children to sail in. I trailed it to the Norfolk Broads, to the River Hamble and to Fowey, as well as sailing it on the Thames in Oxfordshire. Try as I might I never once managed to capsize it - but I learnt an absolute ton about small boat handling in a wide variety of conditions - which translated beneficially to then learning to handle and trim my own heavy 27ft long-keeled yacht when I bought her a couple of years later.

Also, the OP is clearly quite a young person, so his/her attitude to getting 'wet' will be quite different to older people!

 

[[70521]]

I've never needed to tack/gybe anything like the rate of 200 times an hour, but have been a member of a crew that tacked 16 times in an hour, we did count, but she was 105 tonnes and 30 meters - that took skill and teamwork.

Perhaps it's just me but I've sailed a few dingies got cold, wet and miserable. I abandoned them as a bigger boat did all the same thing and you could make a brew.

The wonderful thing about sailing is it has so many ways of doing it. Choose what is right for you and go with it.

 

[jbweston]

Of course it depends what it means to 'learn to sail'. I suspect we all have a different picture when we try to imagine someone who 'can sail'.

Does it include how to avoid losing someone overboard at night, or how to cut sandwiches in a seaway, or deal with an inspection by Lithuanian border police? Are we talking of being able to get the last 2% of performance out of a fast boat, or just knowing which jib sheet to winch and approximately how far?

I 'can play football'. But I'm 66, overweight and never did understand the rules beyond needing to belt a ball into a net.

 

[Spirit (of Glenans)]

Dinghy sailing is definitely the quickest way to get a feel for the actual sailing bit. Admittedly it's physical and you might well get wet.

Things you do on a dinghy and can't do on a yacht
- tack two hundred times an hour
- gybe two hundred times an hour
- helm, trim the main, balance the boat, and keep lookout, and adjust the kicking strap all at once.
- physically balance the boat, acquiring an instinctive feel for what the ballast does on a yacht
- raise the centreboard, giving you an instinctive feel for how the keel gives you lift
- remove the rudder, helping you understand the fore/aft balance in the rig
- experiment with fore/aft trim
- sail dead downwind or by the lee, out of control, so you know what it feels like and how to avoid it
- feel excess power and safely experience the instant effect of hiking, spilling wind, stuffing up, or increasing twist
- gybe reach-to-reach, practising different body positions and mainsheet techniques, capsizing in the process, learning what works etc
- pick up moorings or floating buckets, hundreds of times, using different approaches and without boring the pants of your four crew who just want to get to the pub.

These activities develop skills, acquired and honed more quickly (and cheaply) on a dinghy than a yacht. You can learn those skills on a yacht, but it takes longer, and many people never learn them at all. Plenty of cruising sailors with heaps of miles who can't safely steer a deep broad reach in a blow; many would say "it's dangerous"; in some cases they don't actually know what's dangerous and what's not, they can't do it so (quite rightly) they have to take a more cautious approach. Much better if they'd learned their skills the same way as the great yacht racers - on dinghies.

All these skills, as well as making you a more rounded sailor in moderate weather, are intrinsic to the ability to manage in atrocious weather. What a dinghy sailor does to keep control in a force 5 is the same as what a yachtie does to keep safe in a force 8. The difference is the dinghy sailor is more likely to have done it dozens of times and can do so instinctively.

There are loads of things to learn of course and dinghying won't help at all with e.g. engines, mooring lines, navigation, radio, liferaft. But if you're intent on being a decent yacht skipper, I strongly recommend a bit of dinghy sailing as part of your progress.

+1. I learned on courses on open, engineless 19ft keelboats, an alternative which is sadly no longer available in Ireland, and also on cruising boats in parallel. While I have to admit that my skills are not as honed as those who came in by the dinghy route, I believe that I did most of the things you mention, including repetition of all the manoeuvres ad nauseam.
You forgot about the refinements of gybeing the mainsail repeatedly while maintaining a (more or less) straight course, sailing backwards, and coming alongside a moored boat or a pontoon under sail. There was also the opportunity on these small boats to be introduced to raising and lowering spinnakers while secured by the stern to a mooring.
There is definitely a lot to be learned on smaller boats that can be transferred to cruising yachts. I would recommend the OP seek out a sailing school that provides courses on Keelboats.

 

[RJJ]

I've never needed to tack/gybe anything like the rate of 200 times an hour, but have been a member of a crew that tacked 16 times in an hour, we did count, but she was 105 tonnes and 30 meters - that took skill and teamwork.

Perhaps it's just me but I've sailed a few dingies got cold, wet and miserable. I abandoned them as a bigger boat did all the same thing and you could make a brew.

The wonderful thing about sailing is it has so many ways of doing it. Choose what is right for you and go with it.

Absolutely agree with the last part. However the observation I have made before is: whenever we do one of these "how do we learn to sail" threads, there's always the same set of great advice. Sail dinghies, sail with lots of different people and on different boats, read this book, do that course, try some racing, join a club etc.

The only bit that people dispute "no benefit in that" is the dinghy bit and it always seems a bit silly. Sure you don't HAVE to do it and you can master yachting skills without it (and it can be wet, etc) but it can also be fun and get you to those skills much faster and more cheaply.

The point is that if you want it get good at something, you need to do it lots of times. After just a short afternoon's dinghy sailing you can have done more tacks than most of us do in a whole season, and without annoying your cruising guests.

Of course, tacking a yacht in a force 3 in flat water isn't that hard, and maybe some might consider is sufficient skill, but what about tacking in big waves, or without a jib, or in a hurry, or when conspicuously overpowered, or efficiently so as to make minimal loss against the tide), or in light airs, or reach-to-reach? Sure, you can develop those skills as a yachtie, but any halfway competent dinghy sailor already has them in his pocket.

Also, if you have mastery of a skill (vs competence in easy conditions) you may be better equipped to supervise and coach others.