Brett,

If you've never sailed a catamaran before there are a few more things you need to know:

1. When you are tacking you need to have plenty of speed then gently push the tiller and let the yacht go through the eye of the wind. Don't wildly push the tiller as it will act as a brake and you will loose speed rapidly and probably end up in irons. When you are in irons the yacht starts to reverse you will have to use the rudders to back it around.

2. When the yacht has started to go through the eye of the wind throw the tiller extension out the back of the boat climb across the trampoline then retrieve it so that you have control again.

3. When you have gone through the eye of the wind let the mainsheet go so that the mainsail ends up at quite an angle to the hulls. You will have enough to do collecting the tiller extension from the water, repositioning yourself and figuring out where you should be heading and pointing the rudders in the same direction. Once you have done all that, you can just pull the mainsheet on and the yacht will just start to go forward.

Naturally you'll need to do all this on a calm day with a gentle breeze so the learning experience can be a pleasure. The more experience you get the more natural it will seeem.

Sail settings are a bit more advanced so just have fun with one setting in the beginning. You should be able to purchase some good catamaran sailing books which will give you alot more info.

Happy sailing.

Peter

p.s. Will you sail cat rigged or sloop rigged ?