Yachtmaster milage

[obmij]

. If I had managed to do the miles to qualify for Yachtmaster in a Corribee I'd almost certainly be a far better sailor than someone who'd clocked them up (at twice the speed and considerably more comfort) in a 40 footer. And, equally, I'd not be nearly as good a sailor as someone who'd managed the feat of clocking them up in a 14' Wayfarer.

Nope. There is nothing about sailing a small boat that makes you a better sailor / seaman than someone who does his time in a larger vessel, in fact the opposite is true.

Small boat sailing is much more forgiving. It is slower, granted, and therefore may take much longer to build up the miles..but that's about it. The small boat sailor may claim 'feats of seamanship' on long passages because his boat may be more likely to founder in adverse conditions - but his fate in these circumstances are out of his control.

What is great about small boat sailing (offshore, or in harbour) is that if you mess up (or suffer gear failure, or things go wrong for some other reason) you can save the day in a way that simply isn't possible in larger vessels, due to the exponentially greater forces involved.

You need to be a better seaman to sail a larger vessel, in all circumstances and I say that as a small boat sailor (Centaur, formally H22)

 

[Resolution]

O

Because the exam is there and it is a challenge and allows you to show yourself you've reached a certain standard. The exam is actually a good learning experience too, but that is beside the point.

And one day, you might not be able to sail your own boat without an external qualification.

It all boils down to the same circular argument that has been going on for a few days now.

1) There are people who sails smaller boats who want to sit the exam in that boat, or something similar, and they should be allowed to do so. They want an amateur YM cert, not a commercial ticket allowing them to skipper a millionaires yacht or a windfarm workboat or anything else like that.

2) Experience and an exam passed on a 25' boat doesn't equip the skipper to manage a 75' boat, but it does qualify him to do so. Therefore YM exams are tending to be done on 40'+ boats to produce people that can be commercially endorsed for the workboat/millionaire's yacht.

The RYA seem to have realised there is an issue and have been tinkering around the edges without solving the problem. Some people in the small category are (rightly) miffed that they're being excluded from what they want.

Much more quietly, there's probably some multi-millionaire somewhere thinking, I best check that new skipper I've employed has sailed something bigger than a Sadler 25 before.

Sounds as if there is a need for a boating equivalent of the Institute of Advanced Motorists. Then lots of us here could proudly stick our V50 badges on our transoms.........

 

[lpdsn]

O
Sounds as if there is a need for a boating equivalent of the Institute of Advanced Motorists. Then lots of us here could proudly stick our V50 badges on our transoms.........

Maybe. Giving out certs sub 10m or something like that. I think the MCA have already demonstrated that they don't think the RYA should necessarily have a monopoly on training. And it's really the MCA bit on the cert that gives it value.

However, I'm not really convinced that a strong body of opinion on here is that representative of yachtsmen in general. I suspect most people wanting an amateur YM are happy enough to go the RYA route and accept doing it on a slightly bigger boat. 40 foot or so seems to be typical.

 

[laika]

It's a fact that many charter companies require a YM for insurance purposes.

Which ones? Not wanting to get involved in this thread but I am curious: I've only chartered a handful of times but never been asked to show anything other than a dayskipper cert. Having said that the boats I've chartered have all been under 12m. The only time I've needed to flash a YM cert to sail a charter boat has been on deliveries

 

[JumbleDuck]

What I cannot understand is why you are so roused by the RYA rules. The main purpose of exams is to show third parties what your levels of knowledge or skill are. In the boating world exam qualifications might be needed to permit a charterer to charter a yacht, or a professional skipper to skipper a client's yacht. If you are exclusively sailing your own yacht then you don't need an external qualification.

I'm not particularly roused. If the RYA thought that sailing a 26' long keeled boat about Scotland then I might be tempted to have a go at Yachtmaster^TM just for the hell of it, but they don't so I am not. I do think it's a shame that they exclude a very large proportion of the yachting world from their qualifications.

 

[JumbleDuck]

Nope. There is nothing about sailing a small boat that makes you a better sailor / seaman than someone who does his time in a larger vessel, in fact the opposite is true.

What do you think would be harder to sail from, say, Shetland to Norway; your Centaur or my Hunter 490 (16' LOA)?

 

[dom]

Is there a distinction here between commercial and private sailing? I have always found my ICC qualification accepted by charter companies when I have been bareboat chartering. Are there some that require a YM and reject the ICC?
Whereas if you wish to be paid by a charter company to skipper their yachts when crewed by punters in the UK, then MCA codes come into play and you will need a commercially endorsed qualification, IIRC.

iI've chartered a couple of times in the UK and on a couple of occasions the company has requested a YM cert for boats greater than 40'. Also a friend of mine chartered a Jeanneau 49 somewhere in Lymington last year and I think that that company also asked for a YM. Prob a bit of a grey area legally as the question of commercial endorsement never came into it.

 

[lpdsn]

iI've chartered a couple of times in the UK and on a couple of occasions the company has requested a YM cert for boats greater than 40'. Also a friend of mine chartered a Jeanneau 49 somewhere in Lymington last year and I think that that company also asked for a YM. Prob a bit of a grey area legally as the question of commercial endorsement never came into it.

I chartered for years before buying my own boat. The general rule of thumb I developed was that the fussier the charter company was about competence and quals, the cheaper the charter and the better quality the boat. YM helped.

You don't need commercial endorsement to charter. Only if you're employed to skipper the boat.

 

[awol]

Until a certain porcine poster triggered the Law of Unintended Consequences the rules had been 7m LOA minimum and I and many others had felt our vanity was worth the 180 or so drinking vouchers the Yachtmaster exam cost. We didn't bother with refresher courses or the like - just wanted to see if our standards were up to it, as I said "vanity". To lumber smaller boat sailors with the choice of juggling the logistics of renting a larger boat for sufficient time to acclimatise and then for the exam, never mind the couple of crew, or paying a training establishment to join their boat seems an unnecessary burden.
Ok, so passing the exam on a Bendytoy 26 can lead to commercial endorsement and skippering a 300GT superyacht, somewhat similar to a rich 17 year old passing the driving test and driving a Bugatti Veyron the next day, but owners and insurance companies ain't that daft.
As I understand it he RYA couldn't find an examiner who wanted to do a test on a small gaff cutter on the Clyde in a Scottish spring - they offered a change of venue and when that was declined they changed the rules to exclude the boat rather than meet their obligations.

 

[dom]

You don't need commercial endorsement to charter. Only if you're employed to skipper the boat.

All true, but one must be aware that the RYA's claim that a Commercially Endorsed YM qualifies candidates to skipper a yacht up,to 200gt is widely taken with a big pinch of salt. In fact I think there's a curious asymmetry here:

I'd take a bet that most of the 20' odd skippers on here could jump into a 50' odd boat and get along just fine after an hour or so's training - there is really not that much difference. On the other hand, I very much doubt that the average YM skipper would even come close to competently skippering a 150' ultra-complex 200gt baby.

IMHO, and it's no more than that, I think the RYA makes itself look somewhat silly by serially overstating the type of prestige vessels YMs are "qualified" to sail, while being systematically sniffy to those who choose to sail smaller boats.

 

[DJE]

I'd take a bet that most of the 20' odd skippers on here could jump into a 50' odd boat and get along just fine after an hour or so's training - there is really not that much difference. On the other hand, I very much doubt that the average YM skipper would even come close to competently skippering a 150' ultra-complex 200gt baby.

But YM offshore doesn't qualify you for 150 foot boats. Maximum is 70 foot IIRC.

 

[lw395]

The YM is fairly well regarded worldwide, as the baseline for charter skippers and 'yacht managers'.
Most professional skippers start by getting YM, then work their way up, working from deckhand to captain on some rich sod's yacht.
While they've perhaps got little in common with amateur owners, they are an important user group of the YM qual, and perhaps more what the Bored of Trade or whatever they're called this week care about.
For them, the cert is a pre-condition to getting the real experience.
I don't think their employers would be too impressed with no lower size limit, but where you draw the line is always going to be a bunfight.
I suspect this, and the charter industry is the major actual need for the YM qual, most of us just do it for fun or the satisfaction of learning.

Are there really that many small yacht owners who care, or just a few on here?
If there are, why don't I see any letters in the RYA comic?
If there's a real market for small boat cruisers to get their skills rubber stamped, I'm sure it could be filled.

 

[dom]

But YM offshore doesn't qualify you for 150 foot boats. Maximum is 70 foot IIRC.

Oops I seem to remember 200gt from somewhere, but if you're right I shall be compelled to give the old reverse gear some serious thought!

 

[DJE]

Oops I seem to remember 200gt from somewhere, but if you're right I shall be compelled to give the old reverse gear some serious thought!

Hard to find chapter and verse on the RYA site but it seems to be up to 24m LOA for a standard YM offshore but up to 200gt with a commercial endorsement. But now there is a "Professional Practices and Responsibilities Course" requirement to get the endorsement you can't just send in your YM and medical ceritificate.

 

[laika]

Until a certain porcine poster triggered the Law of Unintended Consequences

If I'm thinking of the same dark porker I remember him posting about being unhappy that his boat was initially deemed too short (am I thinking of the right poster?) but you've got to admire the determination and ingenuity.

And back to my last post...still interested to know which charter companies insist on yachtmaster certificate (and would I be correct in taking "yachtmaster" to mean "yachtmaster offshore" rather than "yacht master coastal"?) and for what size boat.

 

[obmij]

What do you think would be harder to sail from, say, Shetland to Norway; your Centaur or my Hunter 490 (16' LOA)?

Out of the two, the Centaur would seem to be the more suitable vessel - having said that if you managed to complete the voyage in a Hunter 490, precisely why would that make you a better Seaman / sailor? A more patient one perhaps - certainly one more tolerant of risk.

Btw do you still have that Lewmar 6 for sale?

 

[dom]

And back to my last post...still interested to know which charter companies insist on yachtmaster certificate (and would I be correct in taking "yachtmaster" to mean "yachtmaster offshore" rather than "yacht master coastal"?) and for what size boat.

I've definitely been asked and I know others who have too (post #107) - don't know how widespread the practice is or whether exceptions are routinely made. As far as I am aware the practice is confined to boats above 40' or so.

 

[DJE]

And back to my last post...still interested to know which charter companies insist on yachtmaster certificate (and would I be correct in taking "yachtmaster" to mean "yachtmaster offshore" rather than "yacht master coastal"?) and for what size boat.

I chartered a 45 footer from a UK company in the Caribbean last year. They started asking about crew experience, but when I told them I had YM offshore they were happy - no further questions.
But I got the feeling that they would have done it without the certificate once they were happy with the experience of the skipper and crew.

 

[JumbleDuck]

Out of the two, the Centaur would seem to be the more suitable vessel - having said that if you managed to complete the voyage in a Hunter 490, precisely why would that make you a better Seaman / sailor? A more patient one perhaps - certainly one more tolerant of risk.

Doing it in the Hunter (god forbid - I'm not that daft) would require very much better passage planning, especially weather forecasting and would be in a much more vulnerable boat. Were the Dyes' trips to Iceland easier for being in a Wayfarer?

Btw do you still have that Lewmar 6 for sale?

Sure. It's being a paperweight at the moment. PM on its way.

 

[laika]

I've definitely been asked and I know others who have too (post #107) - don't know how widespread the practice is or whether exceptions are routinely made. As far as I am aware the practice is confined to boats above 40' or so.

Fair enough: wasn't disputing just curious. I suspect that there may be fewer requirements for charter fleets in the med than for individuals' "quality" pride and joys on charter with small companies in the uk (where sailing is probably a bit more "technical" than the ionian usually is in summer). I had a quick look at a couple of solent charter companies. Sunsail will rent their boats out with Dayskipper. Coastal skipper or equivalent experience required if going beyond chichester or poole. Hamble Point yacht charters want coastal or equivalent experience for over 36'. Both stated the "equivalent experience" thing.