What would you do?

[Bathdave]

I was crewing for someone on a race at the weekend, slightly short handed and a couple of people don’t race on the boat often and I haven’t been on it much this season

Chaotic preparations boat wouldn’t start only made it just in time to start line after swapping engine and house batteries, not clear where we were on start sequence...I had a timer on my watch and offered to manage the timings ...our RC normally transmit warnings on VHF as well as flags, so I picked up a handheld and clipped it to my life jacket ...

In the event, no VHF countdown or start, and we nailed the start and we’re off...needed to fly the spinny almost immediately so I went to bow to prepare it...VHF pinged off my Lj over side...

So I feel bad about it, ... should I be offering to pay for it as it was my mistake, or is it a racing incident and part of the cost of owning and skippering a boat in a race series, things get broken and costs incurred...these things happen?

 

[RichardS]

Would the owners insurance cover it? You could offer to pay the excess.

Richard

 

[Poignard]

You are obviously a gentleman, and I hope the skipper is too.

You should offer to pay for it and he should thank you for your kind offer and politely decline it.

 

[lw395]

Depends on a) whether you won the race and b) the relative wealth of oneself and the owner.

 

[davidej]

You are obviously a gentleman, and I hope the skipper is too.

You should offer to pay for it and he should thank you for your kind offer and politely decline it.

This is obviously the right answer and, i hope, if I were the skipper, I would refuse.
After all you went aboard to help him out.

 

[[3889]]

You are obviously a gentleman, and I hope the skipper is too.

You should offer to pay for it and he should thank you for your kind offer and politely decline it.

Yep

 

[Bathdave]

This is obviously the right answer and, i hope, if I were the skipper, I would refuse.
After all you went aboard to help him out.

Well I went ahead and offered, and he has not declined my offer but has confirmed he would like me to pay for it

in response to another helpful comment, he is many times more wealthy than me..

I think I shall just have to politely decline to crew for him again ...

 

[dom]

Well I went ahead and offered, and he has not declined my offer but has confirmed he would like me to pay for it

in response to another helpful comment, he is many times more wealthy than me..

I think I shall just have to politely decline to crew for him again ...

I’d personally suggest not paying more than the fair price for what was after all a used item.

Time honoured principle: wanting to win is fine, at all costs a little odd, but also fine ....once it’s the owner’s!

It might be civic to warn prospective crews of his errant and avaricious ways.

 

[Seajet]

Sad, but seems the best idea.

 

[jordanbasset]

Well I went ahead and offered, and he has not declined my offer but has confirmed he would like me to pay for it

in response to another helpful comment, he is many times more wealthy than me..

I think I shall just have to politely decline to crew for him again ...

Best option I think

 

[Iain C]

Hmmm...slightly tricky. Clearly you are a decent sort, however do you normally clip a VHF on to your LJ? Did you ask or tell the skipper first?

TBH if you asked the skipper and he said "yes please do it" then that would pretty much absolve you of responsibility IMHO. And the skipper should have said "put it back below" before you went forward. If you just helped yourself to it, only clipped it on with the plastic clip (which are always rubbish) and no safety lanyard, and then went off to the bow with it where you didn't need it and then promptly dropped it over the side, as skipper I'd be a bit miffed to be honest. All the stuff about batteries and crew shortage is not really relevant IMHO, there's a number of things that could have been done that would have kept it safe and on board.

I brief crew on my boat that there are four places for a winch handle. In it's pocket, in a winch, in your hand on the way to a winch or a pocker, or in a mackerel's skull...nowhere else. If someone then kicked one over the side because they'd left it lying around, I would not feel guilty about getting them to replace it. If you broke something in someone's house, or scratched their car with yours in their driveway, you'd not think twice about making that good again, regardless of that person's financial standing compared to yours.

What about a chat over a pint and an offer of a contribution to get a floating hand held in case it happens next time?

 

[Mr Cassandra]

Well I went ahead and offered, and he has not declined my offer but has confirmed he would like me to pay for it

in response to another helpful comment, he is many times more wealthy than me..

I think I shall just have to politely decline to crew for him again ...

It appears that this fun racing is a chore to you, do you not get any pleasure doing it ? . if not you have made the correct decision .

 

[lw395]

Well I went ahead and offered, and he has not declined my offer but has confirmed he would like me to pay for it

in response to another helpful comment, he is many times more wealthy than me..

I think I shall just have to politely decline to crew for him again ...

Seriously, shelling out what £150, as a one off, against a mistake you personally made is not unreasonable.
My remark about the relative wealth of owners and crew was a reminiscence of students crewing for people who think they've had a cheap weekend if the boat bill is under 4 figures.
Do you contribute anything to the boat funds?
If other people's errors are coming out of a pooled fund that you're contributing to, that might be different.
e.g. a boat I used to sail on had a couple of LJs pinched due to someone being careless and that came out of the racing kitty rather than argue about the blame.

 

[Bathdave]

I

Hmmm...slightly tricky. Clearly you are a decent sort, however do you normally clip a VHF on to your LJ? Did you ask or tell the skipper first?

TBH if you asked the skipper and he said "yes please do it" then that would pretty much absolve you of responsibility IMHO. And the skipper should have said "put it back below" before you went forward. If you just helped yourself to it, only clipped it on with the plastic clip (which are always rubbish) and no safety lanyard, and then went off to the bow with it where you didn't need it and then promptly dropped it over the side, as skipper I'd be a bit miffed to be honest. All the stuff about batteries and crew shortage is not really relevant IMHO, there's a number of things that could have been done that would have kept it safe and on board.

I think the relevance of the back story is that we arrive in the starting area very late, with the starting sequence in train, the skipper was trying to understand how long to go whilst avoiding other manoeuvring starters...all my actions were for his/the boats benefit, not mine..I attempted to take the initiative to provide positive assistance...whilst I recognise my mistake in not putting the handheld back in its pocket, I’m sure a racer with your experience acknowledges how frenetic a start can be

 

[jordanbasset]

Have only gone organised racing once when a friend asked me to crew for him. This nice polite man turned into Captain Bligh and although I was asked I always found an excuse not to go again. I suppose you either like that kind of thing or you don't, I don't

 

[Ohlin Karcher]

Chaotic preparations are the fault of the skipper, so it boils down to him/her.. you just used your initiative to help alleviate the situation. The skipper pays in this case. They will hopefully learn to pay more attention to getting organised next time!
Although it might be worth the price of a radio to avoid conflict etc..that's your call.

 

[Ohlin Karcher]

Have only gone organised racing once when a friend asked me to crew for him. This nice polite man turned into Captain Bligh and although I was asked I always found an excuse not to go again. I suppose you either like that kind of thing or you don't, I don't

Happened to me once, the skipper of a well-known classic yacht put her aground, then rounded on the crew and started cursing us! Racing does surely turn some skippers into d-heads..but being part of a winning crew is a great feeling as well!

 

[dom]

I

I think the relevance of the back story is that we arrive in the starting area very late, with the starting sequence in train, the skipper was trying to understand how long to go whilst avoiding other manoeuvring starters...all my actions were for his/the boats benefit, not mine..I attempted to take the initiative to provide positive assistance...whilst I recognise my mistake in not putting the handheld back in its pocket, I’m sure a racer with your experience acknowledges how frenetic a start can be

Starts, mark roundings, alongside many other close encounters can be frenetic and angst ridden, or cool headed and active. Needless to say good helms and fast boats invariably fit the latter category.

Arriving late requiring the paralleling of tasks including the ad hoc rigging of a spinnaker is dipstick skippering, plain and simple. Any ensuing small losses are entirely his fault, what if the spinnaker had ripped?

Sounds like a back of the fleet duffer with attitude to me. Defo best avoided.

And do feel free to lowball that replacement offer.

 

[Bathdave]

Just for the avoidance of doubt, the skipper is one of the nicest people you will ever meet, the complete antithesis of Captain Bligh - a true gentleman

Hence my feeling of guilt and request for guidance

Offer made, so we’ll see what happens

 

[Dutch01527]

Always best to sort out these eventualities is advance. I was a guest crew on a boat competing in the Industry Sailing Challenge race which used identical Sun Sail boats. Skipper was a newly qualified Day Skipper who put the boat aground during the race. Sun Sail charged the insurance excess of c£2,000 I think.

Skipper emailed crew and said that we should share the cost 5 ways - £400 each. I said yes because that was the usual agreement when I did that race with my usual skipper / crew. All the other crew were also adhoc and said no because they were not aware of the excess and it was the skippers fault.

Skipper then said that I should pay £1,000 because I had agreed to share the cost and it was only him and I who were willing to pay. I declined and paid the £400 as my 1/5th share. He was most upset and accused me of going back on my word to share the costs. Left a sour taste in the mouth.