I was one of the lucky winners of the prize donated by Windsport for two days training at their HQ in Mylor Harbour. I arrived on Friday 9th with Wendy my other half and Lilly our Westie, we were down for the week and the plan was that I would sail every day so that I could practice my new sailing skills taught by Brian Phipps over the weekend. Brian had set up a BBQ and a few beers so that we could all get acquainted, although there were some familiar faces of sailors, we had met on the Isle of Wight at this years Nationals. Sat 9am all 6 of us met in the class room for a briefing, Brian explained a series of exercises we would be doing on the water then it was time to rig the boats. Uni-rig !!! this was a format that we in North Devon aren’t familiar with. There is always water at Mylor (how lucky is that) the wind was a good steady force 3 We were sailing a triangle course so Brian can see how much work he had to do with us! Next we followed the leader Finally tacking / Gybing We stopped for lunch and then had another briefing then back on the water. We then done the same exercises and I think its fare to say we all had improved. We finished about 4pm. We had covered so much, it had been a really good days sailing. We all met up for a curry and a beer or two in the evening and I must say what nice company it was. Sunday we started with a briefing and some tuning and sailing techniques demonstrated by Brian on his demo boat. Once we were on the water the conditions were the same as the day before but the exercises weren’t, we tried to sail the boats as slow as possible! It all became clear when you apply these techniques in race conditions. We practise starting, tacking / gybing. Finally we put all the two days practise into racing. We had several short races all the same course. At the final briefing Brain asked us all what we felt we had learnt and we all said something different. I think that is a great compliment to Brian and his teaching ability. I personally learnt lots from the weekend and Im sure my sailing will be smoother, more controlled and faster. Im really looking forward to getting back on the water. Thanks to Brain, Cookie, Katie, Matt and Alex for a great weekend. Wayne Silver 1272 NDYC |
