What attributes should a high-performance dinghy crew have?
All the crewing stuff breaks down into three things: boatspeed, boathandling, and tactics. The attributes are different for each. To develop speed, you need to be able to feel the boat. There s a technical side to it—of having an image in your brain about what the rig should look like—but in high-performance boats, a big part is how the boat feels, and a lot of that comes from driving. At any 505 regatta, the boats that are fastest downwind have crews who are good drivers. You ve got to be able to feel whether the boat is slow, sticky, or not accelerating well in the puffs. In general, I think crews don t focus enough on making sure they get out and learn how to just sail the boat fast. So, to become a better crew one must become a better driver? You need to build a shared vocabulary, and that s easier if both people know how to drive; that s why teams that have been together longer will be faster than teams with lots of raw talent, but lacking in hours. One thing Zach and I did last y
