If the Water is Frozen, Race in Your Mind

This is the time of year to make a concerted effort to upgrade your rules knowledge. So I’d like to pass on a few ideas about how to make it easiest to understand and remember the details of the Racing Rules of Sailing.

To maximize your learning efficiency it helps to know what your learning style is, if you don’t know then think about how you most like to learn. Do you prefer to read new information, have it verbally explained, see it or just do it? Usually we have a primary method that we build our learning around. For instance, I can learn in many ways, but I really seem to latch on to information when I can see representations of what’s being explained.

Find your style and then create as many iterations of the process as you can. Learning is a process of repetitions moving toward a deeper understanding and the ability to apply the information in a wider and wider variety of situations.

I read a rules book with pictures of rules’ situations and then I take some little two-dimensional Laser sailboat models and slowly “sail” the rules. When I think I have it, then I start picturing and sailing variations in my head. E.g., so if I am inside at a mark and a boat comes in from abeam yelling “Room!” what do I need to do?

Later, when I confront a situation on a course full of Lasers, I hope I have stored a template that matches what’s happening. A template is one of a series of unconscious, fundamental, experiential understandings. Intuitively comparing the situation to my stored templates allows me to make a quick, decision.  

Expert decisions, especially those made under pressure, are made intuitively, based on comparison to templates. Templates are created from our experiences. We can develop experience from sailing races of course, but also from thinking through “case studies” and visualizing races.

Visualizations of races is a good substitute for actually sailing races when snow banks block the launch area as they occasionally do in New England in the wintertime. These visualizations create tiny electrical impulses that strengthen our neuropathways. Visualize situations and the correct responses; picture them in your venue; repeat until you can bring up the picture easily.

Learn a rule. Really understand it. Sail it in your head or with models. Finally get it out on the course and deepen your experience with it. And then, when you need to know a rule your experiential template will guide you.

Jay Livingston