Helping with waterstart/clearing the sail

[PeconicPuffin]

You're missing the point (and trimmed my comment). The board is "jibed" (turned to the opposite direction if wanted) as part of the waterstart. Hence "push mast hand towards uni to turn the board and flip the sail. Or waterstart clew first. "

Getting the sail flying early is key to faster waterstarting. And per Novaan, learning the clew first waterstart is a nice addition to the skill set for the same reason.

[isobars]

[cgoudie1]

But less cold and painful ;*) I never fall in either..............on edited video
;*) ;*)

-Craig

[cgoudie1]

"But we're never gonna survive, unless,..we get a little crazy"
-Seal Henry Olusegun Olumide Adeola Samuel

-Craig

[isobars]

I almost always trim post parts not relevant to my response. Who wants to see every last word ANYONE posted repeated unnecessarily? I'm not missing your point, I'm simply focusing my and the readers' attention on a relevant tangential implication of it. (The fact that I don't comprehend how to "push the mast hand towards the uni" isn't relevant to my response.)

[grantmac017]

Who said anything about gybing after the waterstart? PP is saying to gybe the board after flying the sail, not after the waterstart.

[PeconicPuffin]

[dmilovich]

Often, those of us who have been sailing many years don't know exactly what we do to get the rig up and flying. It's done instinctively and quickly because we want to be sailing NOW and it's hard to examine how we got there. Sometimes we need to just get into a situation, slow down and watch what we do. I had to do this last month in the big swells and chop in La Ventana with my 4.5/85 liter combo. My g/f had been struggling out there and asked "how do you get the sail and mast back up when it's sunk?" So I went out, let the worst happen and then watched what I did.

When my mast and sail have sunk down below, say, 30-45 degrees to the surface, usually clew first, I do this:
-swim to where the mast disappears into the water. This is right by the board.
-grab the mast right there or just below the surface
-push it, using a hand to hand passing motion, towards the board. The board moves away from me as this occurs.
-Repeat, and as the board moves away from me, the tip comes closer.

This does two things: it pretty soon brings me to near the mast tip and it brings the sail back up on the surface with the clew much closer to parallel with the surface.

Now I can pop the tip of the sail and begin the water start process as normal, working down back to the boom by pulling the rig the other way, etc. Might need some eggbeater/twisting kicking, might not. Anyway, I've used it with 4.5-5.8 and it works reliably and isn't fatiguing. The surprising thing was that until I slowed down and watched myself, I couldn't have answered this question with certainty.

It would be lovely to assume that since there may some little bit of positive buoyancy in the mast/rig that one could just wait and everything would float to the surface. Doesn't happen soon enough, if at all, in conditions like that, as we all know.

To the OP: give it a try, hope it helps.

[isobars]

[manuel]

If the sail is sunk, I pull down on the board's rail. Basically the opposite of sinking the sail to protect it against breaking waves !

We can also pull out on the board, or the straps, to play with the current so it helps rising it up just like the wind would.