YM Offshore mileage...

RobF

RobF

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So I'm fully aware that the RYA minimum mileage requirement for YMO is 2500NM, 5 x 60 mile passages etc.

I'm also aware that the YMO examination must be in a seaworthy boat between 7m (23ft) and 24m (78ft) LOA etc.

I'm wondering whether I'm allowed to count the 800NM that I've done in my 20foot trailer sailer as mileage towards my YMO?

And before you post, I've met a few YMEs and know they put greater emphasis on experience and competence rather than seatime.
 
I THINK you can only count mileage/days in 24 hour chunks, i.e. you are not just doing the miles but living aboard as well.

I am sure that someone will be along shortly who knows better than me.
 
The mileage is just a guide for people to know roughly what experience is expected.
Nobody will ask or look at your log book.
If you feel ready then go for it.
 
snowleopard said:
??

If you're doing the practical exam the examiner will take a very thorough look at your logbook.
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I had about 30,000 miles+, but didn't have a log book..... merely what I filled in in an RYA book I'd got the week before.

After the exam he said he could tell what experience people had from their performance during the day, and the answers to a variety of questions.
 
ridgy said:
The mileage is just a guide for people to know roughly what experience is expected.
Nobody will ask or look at your log book.
If you feel ready then go for it.
Click to expand...

Not so, Im afraid. On the reverse side of the RYA/MCA Examination Application form it clearly states in note 4 that your logbook must be shown to the examiner.

On the front page you are required to enter details of your qualifying seatime and sign.

Of course, you could choose to be dishonest.
 
Richard10002 said:
didn't have a log book..... merely what I filled in in an RYA book I'd got the week before.
Click to expand...

Exactly. The RYA log book where you enter details of all the qualifying passages. Not a ship's log, after all your experience may not have been on one vessel. You can fill in passages retrospectively but it is designed for you to get skippers' signatures where possible.
 
The minimum miles are just indicative. I suspect it'd be a pretty rare case that passes after just 2,500 miles.

You'll be more than 800 miles over the 2,500 threshold before you feel yourself ready for the exam, so put the miles down in your log book regardless as it is part of your experience.

In my experience the examiners are no fools and will soon spot whether you're good enough or not regardless of what is in your log book.

In my CS exam the examiner didn't open the log books of any of the candidates. Just looked at the miles on the form and handed the log books back saying something like "We'll soon find out if this mileage is correct or not".

YM examiner spent some time going through the log book and asking me about various trips.
 
When I did my YM Offshore practical a few years ago, I handed the examiner a record of my sea time typed on a couple of sheets of A4. All of it was truthful and accurate, but most of it was self-certified (signed by me). The examiner barely looked at it.

I have also never owned an RYA logbook or done an RYA course. If you know your stuff, that's all that seems to be necessary. Probably not the official position, though.
 
There are plenty of YME's on here and no doubt one will be along sooner or later to put us all right.

I did CS and was not asked to show my logbook (or at least I can't remember being asked for it). When I did YN Offshore the examiner spent a fair amount of time looking through each entry and asked a number of interesting and relevant questions.

As many others have noted, we should give YME's full credit for being able to assess performance on the day against a structured YM syllabus, making due allowance for all of the potential variables of the day.

There aren't many people heard saying "that was easy". My YME was searching, balanced and fair.
 
As far as I am aware having a RYA logbook is not mandatory. I believe that the RYA examine own behalf of the DfT, so I suppose it could be made mandatory, for example if too many people were to bang on about how it's OK to forge one's qualifying mileage.

As others have already posted, the examiner will soon know if the candidate's capacity is consistent with his claimed experience. In my case the examiner glanced briefly at my spreadsheet, asked one question - about the gap in my record, which went back twenty-odd years - and got on with the exam. I suspect from the things he asked me to do that he had also, sensibly, been briefed by the instructor who had run our four day training session on the strengths and weaknesses of me and the other candidate beforehand.
 
YM

From what I understand there may be a bit of flexibility in the total mileage however the core 5 passages and night hours seem to be pretty fundemental.

I had a conversation with an examiner on this subject over the last week or so.

The other thing worth considering is as to why you would want the certification if the miles had not been completed. The yachtmaster is there as a standard for a sailors ability to be marked against, okay in the leisure world it may not matter but would you really want to think that a commercial skipper has is ticket but hasn't done the milleage and therefore may perhaps not have the correct experience level.
 
I don't know what the rules say, but I don't believe for a moment that they exclude time in your 20 footer. The minimum boat size for the exam will just be a reflection of what it's sensible to put candidates plus instructor on board for the sort of voyage needed to examine the syllabus.

I don't bother logging trips in yachts any more (maybe if I ever did an ocean passage I'd make an exception) so the only hours and miles in my book in the last five or six years are in square-rigged sail training ships. I'm told they count for RYA purposes, even though the ships are several times the 78' exam maximum and the skills have very little in common.

Pete
 
dt4134 said:
In my CS exam the examiner didn't open the log books of any of the candidates. Just looked at the miles on the form and handed the log books back saying something like "We'll soon find out if this mileage is correct or not".

YM examiner spent some time going through the log book and asking me about various trips.
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If that was me we probably wouldn't have got to stage two as I would have likely chinned him if he had said that, or at the very least I would have cancelled.
He might think it but to say it is very unprofessional.
 
LadyInBed said:
If that was me we probably wouldn't have got to stage two as I would have likely chinned him if he had said that, or at the very least I would have cancelled.
He might think it but to say it is very unprofessional.
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I guess if that's your approach to life...

For my part I wasn't in the least bit offended.
 
Miles - necessary but no sufficient

As per a previous thread, miles sailed is used as a proxy for experience. It ain't perfect, but it's simple, unambiguous and easy to add up. Clearly someone with 3,000 miles in their logbook based on one transat may well be able to trim sails and manage crew, the boat and watches - but have only carried out one mooring!

Thus the examiner WILL look at your logbook at the beginning of the exam - they're used to doing it so can quickly gauge where you are. They will be looking for evidence of sufficient experience (no one will throw you off for only having 2,499 miles) and the variety and areas of your experience - a few simple examples:
  1. do you know The Solent like the back of your hand (in which case you may get different exercises to perform to a non-local sailor where the pilotage may be more challenging)
  2. have you built your miles on a few very long passages (and so may a relatively low level of pilotage and close quarter experience)
  3. plenty of Med sailing - then how good are you at blind nav using depth contours
  4. have you only just got the night hours - expect some night time passages!
It also provides an ideal ice breaker to chat about experiences either over the first cuppa in the saloon or as you head out on the first passage.

Also unexpected conditions are a good test of a skipper e.g. examiners know, certainly their local waters, very well. And may well ask you to pick up a buoy just before the tide turns (knowing full well that there is a small back eddy that is not well documented). So everything may well go well until you are 10 yards off the buoy and the tidal stream reverses! OK, you're probably not going to pick up the buoy this time round - no worries - but have you understood what is going on, revised you plan appropriately and communicated it for the second time round?

Back in the mists of time when I did my YM Offshore, I hadn't kept a formal logbook, so just stuck an Excel spreadsheet over the first page of my newly acquired logbook - no problems. All you are required to present is reasonable proof of experience - this can just be a piece of paper - making it neat always help credibility though!

As stated, any good sailor / skipper can tell within minutes if any crew member has sailed before and taken the helm and at what level. Examiners are very good sailors and skippers.

In the words of my old maths teacher - miles are necessary but not sufficient.
 
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