Hey all,

Well I figure with this weekends predicted 25-30knots it may be an ideal opportunity to try this highly required skill. After trying to sail in these winds before uphauling is either downright knackering or just sodding impossible

I'm a relative newby on a Starboard Go 155, just got used to plaining with the harness but now figure I need to move onto carving and water starting to make the most of the stronger winds. Have 3 sails to choose from - 5.3, 5.8 and 6.6.

Just wondered if anybody had any tips on how they went about learning this, I've watched vids and guys out there doing this but after a few attempts it looks a real pain barrier. What's the best way to go about this progressively and how long did it take people to get the hang of ?

Thanks in advance !

It may cost you a couple of dollars but go and have a lesson. It is best money you will ever spend. I tried to teach my self and was hopeless but with a lesson I had it sorted in a day.

Either that or go to your local sailing spot with a carton of beer and bride one your local sailors to teach you.

My only advice would be, don't open the front edge of the sail too far. The result is a big twisting force that will throw you forward. Also, push straight up with your arms as if you are trying to get something off a high shelf.

If you can already beach start don't start trying water start in water too deep to touch. Go deep enough for your fin and try from kneeing on the sand. This way you will not get tired out swimming around all day.

Thanks for all the tips guys, some interesting variations I wouldn't have thought of.

I'll let you know how it goes !!

I've taught a few people now, and the main first thing to get into your head is how back to front it all is, normally geeting up from that sort of position the natural thing to do is pull with your hands and push with your feet.
This is EXACTLLY WRONG!!!!!!!
You have to push with your hands and pull with your feet.
As Alby said it's only when your weight is almost directly over the board that you can start pushing with the feet.
My advice is to start off a tad underpowered enough so you can pump on to the plane fairly easily.
The main thing to concentrate on at first is keeping your orientation to the wind, you can point slightly downwind when underpowered and slightly upwind when overpowered. What happens a lot as people start learning is they either go upwind or downwind when trying to get up.
Going downwind will result in getting overpowered and thrown over the fron if you don't let go quick enough, going upwind losses your power and you sink back into the water.
I'm different to a lot of people I start with my back foot in the back strap, I find this really helps me keep the board orientated correctly and lets me pull it towards me better.
Alby's 2 feet on the board is better when well powered up, when underpowered kicking with one foot against the wind drift gives you a bit more power.

And finally the best way to learn to waterstart is to start learning to carve gybe!!!!!

the cat,

nebbian raises a good point about sheeting in and out. this is very important when learning. i remember my first waterstarts. got catapulted heaps, then i learnt to sheet out just before i was standing upright. after a while you will get the feel of sheeting in and out very slightly to control the speed at which you get lifted out of the water.

sheeting in will lift you.
sheeting out will stop lifting you.

another thing is that you can control the board with the sail when you are in the water.

once the sail is flying,

sheeting in will push the nose downwind and sheeting out will pull the nose upwind.

so too do your feet as already stated.

Hey Cat,

Try beach starting in progressively deeper water. (hips, waist, chest shoulders, neck)

In the end - when you can beach start in shoulder to neck deep water you will find transition to a full deep waterstart easy.

Shoulder deep water als allows you to play with getting the board lined up correctly and getting the feeling of sheeting in/out. You can also 'cheat' that little bit and get a small kick or lift off the bottom.

Also don't try when it is too windy - no joy in having the rig ripped out of your hands when halfway up.


When you learn how to perfect this art you will never uphaul again!!!

- J

My biggest problem is getting the sail out of the water! As soon as the sail is out, I ususally succeed in getting on to the board and not catapulting over. All "guides" to waterstarting just say "start with getting the sail out of the water" and only after that they detail every step...

Any good suggestions when it comes to getting the sail out? It doesn't matter how hard I pull, the sail just won't come out!

Mineral has it right.

Tty to swim/haul the rig around so that the board and sail are at 90 deg from the wind (normal sailing line). Swim to the tip of the mast and lift it up gently, till the sail breaks the water. Then work hand over hand until you get to the boom. Provide enough lift to let the sail "just" hover in this position. (this is the long slow method that will almost always work - when you get better you can short cut this method)

The next step is probably the hardest one, try to get the board lined up in the right direction. With the sail "hovering" or "just flying" you should be able to bring one of your legs up to nudge the board either up or down wind to get the direction right. (about 90 to 100 degrees to the wind). This is crucial - get the board in the right direction (you can also use front hand/ backhand pressure on the boomn when you are in this pressure to orient the board) This is something that can be practised in shoulder lenght water.

Once you have the board in roughly the right direction (and it can take some persuading) I rest my front leg on the deck. I use my rear leg to do "water polo spike kick" (a sort of figure kick that drive s the body up" and at the same time push upwards with the rig. This provides the lift to get you out of the water.

Once up it is important not to put too much wieght on the back foot as you turn upwind, depower and flop back in the water. Extend the front arms and then pull back to complete the waterstart. Put some weight on the front foot to bear off "go downwind" sheet in and then power up.

For stronger winds you need less bear off and front foot pressure.

Anyway - this is the way I do it, and like the cat there are many ways for it to be skinned.

- J

One trick that's handy to get the sail flying is to lower the boom or move the mast track forward so that the boom can just rest on the back of the board. So when you wipe out, swim the sail around so that it's at 90 degrees to the wind, mast end facing towards the wind, drag the tail of the board under the boom and hey presto the board lifts the sail out of the water for you.

It's a bit of a controversial technique because with a modern shortboard you have to have the boom really low for it to work, compromising your normal sailing. But if your board is a little bit old and long like mine it works a treat If your board is too short for this then try using the nose of the board instead of the tail.

This is especially useful in waves where you don't have a lot of time or energy to get things lined up, and swimming to the head of the sail simply isn't an option...

Best way tofly the sail is drag the boom over the back of the board, trouble is newer boards have their mast track too far back to do this.

If the sail isn't too big (less than a 5.5 say) it's not too hard flying it from a similar position.
Grab the mast around the boom at arms length and rapidly draw it towards you, (as if you're pulling the sheets over your head).
If the clue wants to stick in the water, push downwards as you finish the action, that forces the air under the sail backwards and with any luck flys the clue. If you push the mast up the clue will go deeper. the longer the boom the more the tendency for this to happen. Under 5M shouldn't be a problem unless your way over powered. The advantge of this position is that you're in the water start position as soon as the sail flys. The other method works with any sail at any windstrength but you have to hand over hand back to the board, keeping every thing aligned while you do it.

Crikey, loads of tips & tricks, thanks guys.

Weekend's predicted weather down in Melb was a bit of a let down, saturday no wind at all (although a nice 20 degrees) and sunday gusty and wavey, hence my devoted planned waterstart weekend didn't quite get off the ground (or water).

Considering the flat water we've had down here recently I didn't fancy bobbing around in the 1-2m waves that were coming in trying to practice, although I have to admit my patience wasn't quite upto it either !

But all was not wasted, I practiced the beach starts in choppy water which going back feb/march when I was starting I wouldn't have had a hope in.

Oldie you may also have a point about waiting for the warmer weather ! I know what you mean about our Go's been quite stable but now I'm picking up speed with the harness being bucked off is one of the downsides (but pretty funny ).

One of the other points made and very true is it's pretty impossible to push the board down in the water to climb onto, too damned buoyant. With this in mind I guess I'd need a fairly strong wind to pull 75kg straight out the water.

I was also interested to hear some people use their front foot and some there back, is this just personal preference or is there good reason for choosing one over the other ?

Thanks again for all the info, hope to put them all into action soon

Because it is such a dynamic move ie sail being pushed up and sheeted in simultaneously while the board is doing it's own thing by rotating upwind, it just won't happen if one needs to think about it while doing it. So honing every automatic reflex to waves and gusts has gotta be beneficial. I have seen a bod just being pulled up straight into a plane with his feet already in the straps, now that is something.
But more educational is to watch the slow motion efforts of the speed merchants trying to mush home on their tiny boards when the wind has died.

gotta agree with racycoot. when i was learning, didn't see any mention of this in the "how to" articles. but then you develop your own style of doing things on what seems to work, and i'll always have my back hand on the back footstrap. just seems easier to line the board up, ie/ downwind in light stuff, upwind in strong stuff, somewhere in between in between stuff. once you've got the sail flying in the front hand (dosen't matter if hand is on boom or further up sail), then back hand is free to do this. and if your board is too short to rest boom on back of board to help get the wind under it, put your back hand on back footstrap and then rest boom on your arm, kick your way around 'till the wind lifts the sail. looking back on learning to waterstart, i found the hardest part was actually being able to orientate board and rig into the right position to do it. learing to water gybe the sail, and swim nose of board into the wind etc - sort of **** that once you know how to do it is easy, but totally frustrating when you're learning.

quote:

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Originally posted by MacL3an

Thanks for the tips. Yes, just as you say there seems to many way to "skin a cat" :-), but I haven't got any to work for me.

Apart from the "working yourself down the mast"-approach. People have also suggested:
- Try pulling the sail towards you, sort of "accross the water", instead of just trying to lift it straight up.
- Try having one hand on the board and one on the sail and then pushing the board down to get boyance and then lifting the sail.

Neither of these things seem to work for me. I just sink :-)

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MacL3an, Don't give up, I thought I'd never be able to do it either. To fly the sail, I don't go all the way to the head of the sail, I grab the mast maybe a metre above the boom. As I lift it clear of the water, I usually get pushed under, since I am small and therefore don't have much floatation. So I just kick my legs as hard as I can. As soon as I get some air under the sail, I kind of pump the mast up and down so that the air bubble gets forced to the end of the boom and brings it clear of the water. Another thing is that sometimes the wind is pushing you and your gear along so the sail clew (boom end) gets driven deeper in the water. To counter this, as you are trying to clear the sail from the water, try and swim up wind, (ie. by kicking your legs and using your spare arm) to help float the clew. To avoid the catapults in strong winds, I put my rear foot in the strap before holding the sail up high.

Let us all know how you progress.

Regards,
Harrow.

Well I finally did get out and crack this the weekend before last but didn't get around to posting as my partner gave birth to our gorgeous daughter last wednesday so i've been a bit busy since, sleeping, changing nappy, eat, sleeping, changing nappy etc etc.

Anyway, back to how it all went......

Wind was about 15-20-25 gusty and quite choppy, so I rigged the 6.6 for the initial lighter wind.

drjukka your suggestion about progressively deeper water was a good start, didn't have much choice anyway as due to the swells the floor just dropped as I stepped in so was upto my waist straight away.

I found holding the sail in position with board at the right angle pretty difficult, as soon as a gust came it just took the sail and threw me over the front (hmmmm maybe I should have let go ). Never really cracked this but then only gave it a few hours. I did find it helped by holding the boom with a wide grip to get more leverage though. Is it possible to control this WITHOUT having any feet on the board ?

When it calmed slightly I did manage to get rear heal on board and then by a complete fluke the wind just gradually lifted me whilst I pushed down on mast end to get up. This was a eureka moment !So far so good .

So by now I'm obviously a complete expert so thought what the hell lets try a bit deeper (nothing to do with wanting to get on the plain and go for a quick rip ). So off I go just knowing it's only a matter of seconds before I get dumped.

I was right, about 10 seconds later i'm treading water. Due to the chop the sail was being covered and just wouldn't lift so by grabbing the mast and swimming backwards it helps pull the sail ontop of the water (MacL3an this does work but you do have to give the sail time to clear the water off before you try and lift). Another tip that was in this or another thread that worked well is to lift the sail just as a swell goes under the end of the mast, this helps leave the mast in the air. I found it also helped to pop the battons while the sail is floating to get as much wind in as possible.

I then lifted the mast about 3/4 up and she was hovering straight away, result I then grabbed the boom and just hung there for a while with a big cheesey grin.

In this position the wind had a tendancy to just blow the rig around so I found getting both heels on helped prevent that. If the rig wasn't quite in the right direction though it still got blown around and was difficult to control. Exactly what the right direction is I'm still getting a feel for .

So then when I'm happy the rig isn't going to get blown around I dragged the board toward me with both heels so both knees were then well bent and i'm almost squatting whilst still in water. I then raised arms to get her to fly higher and when boom was over top of board then pushed down on mast end to effectively pull meself up. Gradually the wind pulled me up, I was lucky it didn't gust, the whole thing seemed so graceful so didn't have to worry about sheeting in/out.

I think my statement about cracking it may be a bit ambitious, couldn't manage it every time but did manage 3-4 in a few hours. Good enough result for now though

Now just need to wait until little Millie decides she'll let me out for the next session

Thanks for all the tips, it was a case of trying all and seeing what worked and adjusting slightly.

BTW - if anybody wants to know if a new born takes up a lot of time lets just say it's taken me about 6 hours to compose this !!

Thecat,

Congratulations on the new arrival!

Regarding waterstarts, I reckon you're about an hour away from the magic Eureka moment. When I was learning them I did the same thing you did, both feet on the board, wind pulls you up. The key now is to only have the back foot on the board, push forwards with the front hand, pull in on the back, bend that back knee as far as possible then put your front foot on the board once you're over the board.

Before you get up, with your body in the water, and back foot on the board, you can steer the whole lot around using sail pressure. Not sure quite how to describe this, but with practice you can go upwind, downwind, anything you like so long as your back foot is on the board (Remember, little toe and heel touches the board, don't try to get your big toe to touch).

Advanced technique:
As you start to rise, push down on the heel so the upwind rail digs into the water. This stops the board sliding downwind, and gives you more purchase as you get up onto the board. Remember to push down on the downwind rail with your front foot as you get up, this flattens out the board.

Good luck, let us know how you go