First day of sailing class, we started learning about how to rig our boats, the names of parts of the boat... TERMINOLOGY... and a few knots.
These are older sails, but we have just put on a bear insignia... all our Javelins will fly this symbol!
We have two types of boats in this class, the Oday Javelin (Oday is the name of the company that built them) and the Laser.
The Javelin is 14 ft sloop, which means it has two sails. It is sailed by 2 to 4 people, and sits on a trailer (when not in the water) because they are too heavy to carry around. Question: what are the names of the two sails?
Lasers are more like zippy little sports cars, they have one sail and are sailed by a single person. In this class, they will be sailed by the advanced sailors although we will all use them for capsize practice.
Here's our advanced sailors, rigging up their Lasers. These have more parts to assemble, even though they have only one sail and in some ways, it is a simpler boat. Question: What is the difference between how the Laser and Javelin sails are attached to the mast?
.
For the first day, a lot of progress was made. We completely rigged two boats as teams; when we go sailing we will each have to rig our own boats. However we will carry & launch them in teams. Communication on board will be simpler with only one person!
.
The Javelins are a lot of fun, too. The beginner sailors got their boats completely rigged, too.
Most of the class was spent on learning the RUNNING RIGGING (lines) and STANDING RIGGING. Question: what are the two types of lines that control the sails? (hint: starts with "H" and "S")
If you want to study further, we have lessons on this web site. Here is the Table of Contents (link) for the on-line lessons.
Here is the beginning lesson on rigging (link).... you should know everything in this lesson, after today's class! But it's ok to review!
LCDR Fry is helping the cadets learn how to rig their boats. Question: what is the next step shown in the photo?
Even at this stage, the sailing class is fun... we had to do the work to put everything away properly, but that makes it quicker and easier to get going next time.
Next time, we will cover a few more parts of geting the boats ready to sail... for example, putting on the RUDDER
We did not cover much about parts of the HULL this time, here is our on-line lesson (link). Question: what is the name of the thing that the sailors holds to steer the boat?
Hint: it's NOT the rudder, but it's connected to the rudder
None of it as simple as it seems, but that's part of the fun.... it's a challenge, and while the beginners have not yet realized the thrill of getting under way in a boat that they rigged up themselves, they are making progress.
.... Assistant Coach Douglas King
.
