Female Skippers

Mary,

I know you had touched on this topic before, but it has been established in beachcat racing that the fat guy should really be crewing, and the lighter person on the stick. With some of the minimum weights these days on even the F-18, it would appear that a female skipper would be ideal.

Is it the male ego that prevents this combination? I recall Les from team Fully Involved used to be lethal when his wife drove and he pulled strings. He was about 225# and she was 110# (soaking wet with gear).

So how does one encourage females to drive and race?

To answer that question I would either have to write a book or say I don't know. So, I don't know.

Why should the fat guy crew? Would that not create more weight distibution problems and interupt attachment as the chubby one moves to and fro?

the fat dude could put some serious force down for a "roll-tack"

What about a 10 or 12:1 main for the skinny chick, or does the the fat dude have to pull all the strings?

Fat dude forward = good.

crew pulls all the strings anyway. Seriously, upwind in a blow, crew on F18 constantly works the main to leave the skipper able to drive smooth. I crewed for the first time in a while on an F18 last weekend and after a lap - I was surprised at how hard I was breathing.

I'm can't even really pull the main in on the 6.0 with one hand, and the tiller under the arm thing really just isn't stylish. After the RTI, my crew needed a couple weeks off to let his hands heal.

You should try 5 days of that.

At Tybee? yeah, I would need to add one more level of purchase... or have my crew use one of those hand strengthening springs for months prior. It really becomes an endurance issue- not even the hands.. just staying on the trap for any extended length of time.

The things you learn at catsailor.com. This also means that my crews's... errr... skipper's tweaked shoulder won't keep her off the boat.

Build up slowly, work on confidence and trust in the boat andn crew first. Never yell (unless REALLY necessary) Never curse (ever). Let her do things wrong for extended times while patiently mentioning the correct way of doing it. Then after some time has passed and only then slowly get more involved in learning (which you'll call showing) her the right way. For some reason a sizeable portion of women expect lots of time to get the hang of something. Give them that. Correcting her before she feels that she has had her time to find out independently seems to make many annoyed.

But when it starts working out it is fantastic !

Wouter

All right, I'll say a few things:

If a woman can drive a car at 65 miles an hour on hard pavement on a crowded freeway, she can certainly drive a sailboat at 15 mph on a relatively soft surface like water.

Both people on the boat should know how to sail and how to do all the jobs on the boat, including helming.

Who does which job at any given time is a matter of what works best for weight distribution and what needs the most strength, depending upon weather conditions and who is best at handling specific situations.

It is easier for a woman to be on the helm in long-distance races where you are on the same tack for long periods of time and there are not other boats in close proximity. Let the weaker person steer and the stronger person handle the sheets and downhaul.

Buoys racing is another matter. Most (not all) women are not as aggressive as men, and they don't like situations where there are a lot of boats in close proximity. So what you do in this case is the man does the start. After the boats spread out a little after the start, you change positions and put the woman on the helm. In heavy air the man will be better positioned to handle the mainsheet and downhaul. In light air, strength is not needed, but his weight will be better positioned forward.

If there is a windy, fast-reaching leg after the weather mark, you should change places again, prior to getting to the weather mark, so the heavier person is at the back of the boat.

On the downwind legs, job or position should be based upon best weight distribution for the conditions and where strength is most needed.

Mark roundings, again, are intimidating for some people, both men and women, so if you see a crowded leeward mark rounding coming up, you switch places if necessary to put the more aggressive or experienced sailor on the helm.

This switching of places on the boat during the race is the same thing you can do when you are training children or novice racers of either gender.

You start out doing this team-switch thing in light-air conditions and gradually work up to moderate winds. And while you are doing this training process, don't ever yell and do not ever make it feel stressful to the person in training. Once she is on the helm, she is the one who is going to get motivated to figure out how to beat those other boats. She is going to start asking questions.

But the really really best way to get a woman hooked on helming is to get her racing a singlehander in a group of other women sailors on boats like Sunfish or Waves.

THIS is how you get women on the helm.

The attachment is me on starboard and Kristin on port during our first annual Women's Day Regatta, in September, at Put-in-Bay Yacht Club, Ohio. We had eight women racing in the 12-race round-robin event on four Hobie Waves.

And here's another one from our regatta. Margot being creative with her downwind helming technique.

How about this

under way......

FWI....if you check out our fleet web site you will see many women skippers, oh yeah they own their own boats, too!!

204 home page

Hey Tom,
Is that Foxy's on Jost Van Dyke that is mentioned on your spin? Does he have his own line of Lager? I have a pen and ink over my desk here that is signed by Foxy himself dated 1990. It shows a couple of hammocks and when the going gets tough it's nice to look up and picture myself floating the day away on "Foxy's Painkillers". Good Times.

Susan & Davis recieved sponsorship from Virgin Ilsand Brewing for their Worrell campaign in 2000. There were 2 brews at that time and I believe there still are to this day. Foxy's Lager (lighter) & Blackbeard Ale (Darker)

Susan had her I20 in the VI for the winter 1999 to train for the W1000. I got to sail it down there a bit too!! Yipee!!!

Davis still lives in St Thomas

Point High & Foot Fast

Tom

Future world champion in all classes - multihulls first, the monohulls, trimarans, etc. Then she can go on to become a world famous cat designer (or doctor, etc). Not too much pressure. Colleen, the world champ in about 16 years!

If you want more women skippers, have more little girl skippers.

my kid can beat your kid.
Catamaran Dads- the next political demographic. More cultured than Nascar Dads, yet more gentle than Soccer Moms.

Future women skippers at Hobie Kenobie Regatta in Buffalo.

I don't think it's necessarily the "lack of aggression", because I've seen my wife drive! I think it may be more of intimidation with regard to the (seemingly) numerous rules of racing.

Of the female crews I've seen, most are more than aggresive enough to handle a boat in tight quarters, but perhaps lack the assertiveness to ask to skipper. Either that, or our fragile male egos won't give up the stick...

There have been times when I feel I would be better crewing to get the boat speed where I need it, but then think I should be on the helm because I think (tactically) we should be doing something different (like banging the corner or closing the door on some people creeping up the middle). Until my communication skills improve, I think I will continue to frustrate myself...

But I see the advantage to the big person being crew:
- better leverage and the ability to use two hands to pull strings (mainsheet, downhaul or spin sheet)
- mobile weight to keep boat trim optimal
- Ability to board competitors boats and slaughter crew if they get to close at a rounding (Abast ye, matie.. ARRRR!)

A big problem is interpretation of the words "skipper" and "crew." It's one of my pet peeves. For some strange reason, catamaran sailors think that skipper is synonymous with helm.

On a two-person boat, you have two crew members, a helmsperson and a foredeck person. One of those crew members is the skipper, the person who makes the final decisions and gives the orders. And it does not matter whether the skipper is helmsperson or foredeck person.

It often makes sense for the skipper to be the foredeck person, who is more free to look for wind shifts and call tactics and laylines, and tweak the sail trim, so the helmsperson can just concentrate on telltales and making the boat go fast.

So, in other words, asking to steer the boat is not the same thing as asking to skipper.

That's an interesting perspective Mary...especially with the advent of the self tacking jib the crew is left with not a whole lot to do upwind except look around and feed information to the helmsperson.

I agree on the terminology. I usually refer to the positions as "stick" and "strings". And I do think the stringer has more of an opportunity to see shifts, tactics, call laylines, and other items of importance for the stick

On the other hand, I think it is important that the stick see the wind and figure out how best to get there. If the stick spends all day chasing the telltales, I don't think that's quite as fast.

It's always good to step back and take another "big picture" look at how you're doing something to see how you can improve it....

Weight transfer is critical in light air especially when pointing. Being able to move the bulk of the crew weight where its needed to make the boat go is quite benefical.

I tried two tri-babes on my 22 with interesting results. All three of us wore trap vests but only two were on the wire at a time. I was using my roller furling spin with the Fancor furler. After working out the methodology of tacking, who does what, etc. we had some really fun times. With the standard chute it seemed very beneficial with me doing the spin chores with the help of a 110lb crew. After some practice they both tackled the spin chores but were about 1 minute slower getting it done. Theres no substitute for bulk when tugging on a spin... We sailed about four times like this and it worked well for us.

Total crew weight was 425lbs... thats 25 lbs under the max recommended crew weight. With one crew we were as low as 325lbs which is the minimum.

Toooooooooooooo Baddddddddddddd for me one is pregant and appears not interested in crewing any further and the other has transferred/moved away. I have been swamped with work since March anyway... so maybe next year I will get to go somplace where you don't run out of room before you get the boat tuned.

Neither had a problem steering the boat or handling the mainsheet chores with a 12:1 in moderate air under 15 knots.

thom

Hankin down on that downhaul can get tiring man!

Being aggressive on the race course is certainly not a problem for the women I've raced against. Have any of you raced Heather Morrison with her 200+ pound husband Stu as crew on the H20? There is no lack of aggression in the back of that boat. She was, however, the only female skipper at H20 Nationals this year, which was a bit disapointing.