Cruising to the starting line: How to get started yacht racing

Many cruising sailors can’t think of anything worse than charging round the cans, but it can make you a far better cruising sailor, says Nigel Lloyd

As a committed cruiser of 30 years, I often wondered what the point of yacht racing was. There seemed to be a lot of expensive looking boats, some shouting, confusing rules and uncontrolled course alterations. I was quite content to set the sails, put the tea on and not to touch the bottom.

However, with an early retirement and the onset of Covid my cruising days were over and to get on the water I bought a small racing yacht and began racing at my local club. It was a great fix to get out on the water for a couple of hours, when we couldn’t go for longer.

Racing has changed everything I knew about sailing. It does beg the question – what can a cruising sailor learn from racing, and should they consider entering the occasional race?

The racing organisations have a huge amount of experience of sending out yachts into challenging environments. RORC has a global race series, meaning that accidents from around the world are investigated and lessons learnt. These are then fed into the World Offshore Special Regulations (https://www.rorc.org/files/downloads/2021-racing/rorc-osr-checklist-2021.pdf).

The detailed lists of the safety equipment needed are excellent and has helped us consider and practice various emergency situations. We now ensure we have a good level of emergency equipment onboard, including throw lines, horseshoe life buoy, Dan buoy, lifting straps, first aid kits and instructions, emergency saws for the rigging and a chart detailing where everything is stored.

We encourage crew members get RYA qualifications and complete an RYA Sea Survival course. Crew members know the emergency radio drills, which are now taped beside our radio. A floating handheld radio is available on deck, with a DSC capability. We upgraded to offshore life jackets and fitted AIS/DSC beacons. The stanchions, guard wires and jackstays are inspected regularly and repaired, and safety tethers are used offshore.

Maintenance

We have learnt the importance of boat maintenance, starting with monthly winch services and regular keel inspections. Keeping the hull free from weed improves performance, particularly in light airs. For cruisers, you’ll be less likely to resort to the engine to get home.

The rigging tension is measured regularly and adjusted, the running rigging is replaced when worn, the sails are repaired and maintained before problems occur. All this reduces the risk of accidents and equipment failure, which generally happens in the most difficult of circumstances.

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Sail handling

One of our biggest areas of learning has been in sail trim. Small adjustments in sail tension or traveller position can make a huge difference to sailing performance.

The power of sails is derived from twist, draft and depth. Understanding these can dramatically affect the power that the sails generate and how comfortable a yacht is in various wind and sea states.
We have come to consider jib halyard tension, jib car position, and in-hauler position as key parts to our set up.

Once the jib is set and working well, we then trim the main sail to the jib. We have markers on the halyards and backstay to determine how much tension should be used.

Cruisers may consider this over the top but in light airs minor adjustments to car position, halyard and backstay tension can transform the performance of the boat. Similarly, if we get caught out in high winds, knowing how to de-power the sails ensure that we can keep the yacht upright and sailing fast, which is more comfortable for the crew and prevents sail damage.

One sail that I missed out on cruising was the spinnaker. Once you have built confidence, this transforms the downwind experience. These often stay in the bag on many cruising boats but with a little practice it is possible to set single-handed, even on relatively windy days.

Getting the right spinnaker is important. Reaching spinnakers are cut flat and are excellent at wind angles from 90-120° though are unstable further down wind. Fractional spinnakers are more stable than mast-
head spinnakers. Code Zeros are very flat spinnakers and can reach up to 60-70° in light conditions. A Code Zero tends to be put on a furler, making handling somewhat easier.

Short-handed, it is worth considering an asymmetrical spinnaker as there is no spinnaker pole to handle, and these can be set on a top-down furler. Another useful tip is using a Bluetooth remote connection to the autopilot, so it is possible to steer the yacht from the foredeck.

Manoeuvring under spinnaker takes some practice, but when done well is safe and a cause of immense satisfaction. A key area for spinnaker use is the drop or take down. This takes some planning short-handed, especially in a blow. However, depowering the spinnaker by running down wind, and releasing the spinnaker tackline is a massive help.

Once the foot is controlled, the halyard can be run out over the stern, removing tangles and giving useful resistance as the spinnaker is dropped. The key is to monitor the foot of the spinnaker and prevent it from falling into the water and under the yacht.

One feature of racing is that it continually challenges us to improve, and we have found that writing out a race log and yacht-tuning log is useful. As a cruiser I would often skip this or make abbreviated notes. We now keep a far better record, detailing the wind and sea conditions and what settings worked on board.

The key books we have used are North U Trim, North U Tactics guides (www.northu.com) and Racing Rules of Sailing (RYA, £13.49)

Off-water learnings

In the off season, we continue to meet as a crew; spending so much time on the water together means we are good friends. We also meet up to assess how to improve what we do on the boat, with dedicated coaching sessions, reviewing the footage from the GoPro we have on the boat for every race.

We look at settings, manouevres, tactics and other scenarios so that we’ve evaluated what went well and what didn’t, as well as doing some mental preparation before the seasons starts again.

Even if you never go racing, it’s well worth thinking things through over winter: how would you handle a man overboard? Could you improve your reefing process? What are your weak spots for marina manoeuvres?

Or from a navigation point of view, could you be using your chartplotter functions better? Take time to read up and think about sail-setting theory and seamanship; it all contributes to making you a better sailor.

Crews and competitors

A lack of crew is often an issue both for racers and cruisers. However, there has been a huge growth in double-handed sailing.

Sailing clubs are super supportive, offering ‘crew finding’ websites and coffee mornings. Developing young crew members has been a feature of clubs and JOG and RORC are now taking this very seriously; it is a huge privilege to see younger crew members develop and become confident sailors. Crew do need to be looked after by the skipper, and don’t expect them to be doing boat maintenance on a cold February morning!

Competitors are largely very supportive too. This was a great surprise to me, but healthy competition stems from other yachts turning up so we look after each other. In our class we meet regularly to discuss the yacht set up, sails, and sailing plans for the year. The main aim is to enjoy being on the water together.

Extending your comfort zone

Having other yachts around us also gives confidence to go racing in unusual conditions. Yachts have a duty to rescue each other so if there is a problem, there is usually someone on hand to help you out. Some of our most memorable days have been in unusual conditions, either in winds that are rather too strong upwind, but then deliver for wonderful reaching conditions down wind or in very light conditions.

Conversely, when we hit 2 knots in one light-airs race, it brought joy to the whole crew, becoming a season highlight. We wouldn’t have cruised in these conditions, but they turned out to be a delight.

Should cruisers go racing?

Yacht racing has been huge part of our lives over the past several years now. There are formats to suit every budget and interest, with most racing yachts being adapted cruisers. Most clubs will run a local handicap class, where they assign you an approximate rating. If you get more into it, an IRC rating sees your boat get measured and assigned a precise rating. This allows you to compete on an equal footing at a huge range of events and locations.

Racing will transform your sailing but be warned – you may become addicted and find yourself upgrading!

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