Washington and California hosted two amazing regattas this past weekend, both with excellent wind and sun! My team was headed to Washington, and the race team to California. However, since it was reading break I was back visiting my family in my hometown, so I had to miss it. Luckily, I was able to see some pictures and it looked like it went great!
Instead of going to the practice of the week, since we didn’t have one, I decided to discuss in this blog my findings about how the boat maneuvers the water, as well as what I’ve learned so far about sailing and myself.
Parts of the Boat
I took this picture, which I’ve attached down below, and it showcases two major parts of our sailboats. The bottom one is a tiller, the one that has a slim stick component, and the top is the rudder board. In the image, the blue bag is a ‘sail bag’, which is pretty straight forward and it is the bag for our sails. These are called the rudder board and the tiller. In order for the boat to be steered, both of these get attached to the back of the 420. The tiller comes up to the boat, which acts as a sort of steering tool. The rudder board stays placed in the water, and is what moves to steer the boat. This board is always a flat smooth surface in order to glide the boat through the water. Without these two parts of the boat, it wouldn’t be possible to navigate the boat in any way while sailing. It is crucial that these are also set up in a correct manner, so guidance while doing it for your first time is necessary! Once on the water, the skipper can move the tiller to move the rudder board around. When the tiller moves left, the boat goes rights. When the tiller moves right, the boat goes left. This can be confusing at first, but it makes sense if you imagine water hitting the rudder board at certain angles.
What I’ve Learned So Far
If you asked me what I was learning while taking on the challenge of sailing, I would probably chatter on about some sailing terms and maneuvers I’ve learned over the last few months. Maybe I would talk about rolling tacks, or how to accelerate on a 420 sail boat, but I decided to challenge myself to think about what I’ve learned about myself.
I’ve learned how I handle certain types of stress, how my body recharges after being outside, and how important learning is to me. First off, sailing in certain weather conditions, or with intense drills can cause the risk of capsizing to increase. This in turn creates stress for both the skipper and crew, however, this stress is good stress. It pushes me to learn how to do certain maneuvers better, while managing the stressed feeling. Sailing also gave my body an outlet to get outside for a period of time, which has proven to be super important to my recharge. After sailing, I may feel exhausted, but it’s a good exhausted! Finally, sailing has made me realize how much I enjoy learning things I feel passionate about, and like doing. In the last little while, I’ve felt detached to a lot of my studies, and felt as if I don’t feel passionate or excited about materials I am learning. However, sailing reminded me how much I desire to learn, especially on the water!
Sailing may take time, patience, and a lot of courage, but it’s given me so many skills that can translate to my personal life.
Hi Allie
Again such a cool inquiry topic! It’s awesome that you got to explore a new passion of yours and learn so much along the way.
I can understand where you are coming from about not being super engaged in the material we have been doing recently. School can be a lot sometimes and having to do a lot of the same assignments every week can feel pretty repetitive. I’m glad that you still have sailing to engage you in learning and get a nice little break from the everyday routine. Hopefully your school work/content becomes more interesting soon!
Thanks for sharing Allie!