Coaching from the back of the boat

by Gary Jobson, Sailing World
Over the past several months I spent an afternoon each week with the U.S. Naval Academy Offshore Sailing Team aboard their fleet of 44-foot sloops. Each crew consists of nine midshipmen and a volunteer coach. There is a full roster of volunteer coaches who participate during the fall and spring sailing seasons. The midshipmen are wonderful to work with; everyone is polite, they welcome advice, they show up for practice on time and have a strong appetite to improve their sailing skills.

A good percentage of the offshore sailing team members only started sailing when they arrived in Annapolis, in contrast to the intercollegiate dinghy team, which includes midshipmen who have been racing since their youth. The weekly coaching routine was an opportunity for me to learn what coaching techniques are effective. There were many lessons I learned and I believe they can be useful when self-coaching or when helping new sailors in your fleet get up to speed. – Full report