In sailing, hiking (stacking or stacking out in New Zealand; leaning out or sitting out in United Kingdom) is the action of moving the crew's body weight as far to windward (upwind) as possible, in order to decrease the extent the boat heels (leans away from the wind). By moving the crew's weight to windward, the moment of that force around the boat's center of buoyancy is increased. This opposes the heeling movement of the wind pushing sideways against the boat's sails. It is usually done by leaning over the edge of the boat as it heels. Some boats are fitted with equipment such as hiking straps (or toe straps) and trapezes to make hiking more effective.
Hiking is most integral to catamaran and dinghy sailing, where the lightweight boat can be easily capsized or turtled by the wind unless the sailor counteracts the wind's pressure by hiking, or eases the sails to reduce it. The heavy keel on larger keelboats means that it is rare to capsize them due to wind alone, but keelboat racers will still hike to prevent unnecessary heeling, or leaning sideways to leeward, because the more vertical in the water the keel is, the more effective it is at keeping the boat moving in a forward direction and preventing it from drifting to leeward, slowing the boat due to drag, and potentially increasing the distance the boat must sail when beating. Improper heel creates a tendency for the boat to turn off course, necessitating a correction with the rudder, which also increases drag. Sails use wind most efficiently when they are at a proper heel, another reason for controlling heel.
Hiking equipment
Many boats, especially dinghies, have equipment that facilitates effective hiking. Hiking straps (toe straps) made from rope or webbing hold the sailor's feet down, allowing them to lean back over the gunwale of the boat while sitting facing in. These simple devices are almost universal on dinghies that do not have more complex hiking systems. Some sailors wear special shorts fitted with pads or stiff battens to help them hike more effectively and without tiring.
Some dinghies and catamarans, such as the 505, 420, International 14, or Hobie 16, have a trapeze to allow the crew to increase their righting moment on the boat. These are wires attached high up on the mast, and fitted with a bracket that fits into a hook on a harness worn by the crew. This wire and harness then supports the crew as they stand and lean back over the water, pulling against the mast. On some boats, such as the Laser 2, the skipper uses hiking straps, and the crew uses a trapeze. On high-performance skiffs, such as the International 14 or 49er, both the skipper and the crew use trapezes.
Hiking boards are long boards fitted perpendicular to the boat's hull, and sometimes stretching several feet over the water. These allow the crew to move their weight far out to windward. They are commonly designed to slide from side to side, so they are moved to the windward side whenever the boat tacks. They are most often used on sailing canoes, but can be installed on many kinds of dinghy. there are also two racing classes that use planks and they are the VJ, and the bigger Skate (dinghy).
Some racing keelboats are fitted with elastic lifelines running down the sides of the boat. These allow the crew to lean into the lifeline to get further out on the windward rail. Many kinds of racing keelboat are raced with more crew aboard than is strictly necessary to operate the boat in order to increase the amount of weight on the upwind side of the boat, keeping the boat flatter.
A few high performance keelboats, such as the Moore 30 and the Kiwi 35, have structural hiking "wings" built into their hull, which allows a lower displacementhull and increased leverage for hiking.[1][2][3][4][5][6] See Turtling.
On most dinghies the tiller is fitted with a tiller extension or hiking stick, which allows the skipper to steer the boat while hiked out.
Dinghy sailing is the activity of sailing small boats by using five essential controls:
A point of sail is a sailing craft's direction of travel under sail in relation to the true wind direction over the surface.
A jibe (US) or gybe (Britain) is a sailing maneuver whereby a sailing vessel reaching downwind turns its stern through the wind, which then exerts its force from the opposite side of the vessel. Because the mainsail boom can swing across the cockpit quickly, jibes are potentially dangerous to person and rigging compared to tacking. Therefore, accidental jibes are to be avoided while the proper technique must be applied so as to control the maneuver. For square-rigged ships, this maneuver is called wearing ship.
Paul Bert Elvstrøm was a Danish yachtsman. He won four Olympic gold medals and twenty world titles in a range of classes including Snipe, Soling, Star, Flying Dutchman, Finn, 505, and 5.5 Metre. For his achievements, Elvstrøm was chosen as "Danish Sportsman of the Century."
Dinghy racing is a competitive sport using dinghies, which are small boats which may be rowboats, have an outboard motor, or be sailing dinghies. Dinghy racing has affected aspects of the modern sailing dinghy, including hull design, sail materials and sailplan, and techniques such as planing and trapezing.
A centreboard or centerboard (US) is a retractable hull appendage which pivots out of a slot in the hull of a sailboat, known as a centreboard trunk (UK) or centerboard case (US). The retractability allows the centreboard to be raised to operate in shallow waters, to move the centre of lateral resistance, to reduce drag when the full area of the centreboard is not needed, or when removing the boat from the water, as when trailering. A centreboard which consists of solely a pivoting metal plate is called a centerplate. A daggerboard is similar but slides vertically rather than pivoting.
The Chicago Yacht Club Race to Mackinac is a 333-mile annual yacht race starting in Lake Michigan off Chicago, Illinois, and ending in Lake Huron off Mackinac Island, Michigan. It is hosted and managed by the Chicago Yacht Club. The "Mac" was first run in 1898 and is the oldest annual freshwater distance race in the world. The race hosts several hundred competitors each year and over 3,000 sailors.
Tacking or coming about is a sailing maneuver by which a sailing craft, whose next destination is into the wind, turns its bow toward and through the wind so that the direction from which the wind blows changes from one side of the boat to the other, allowing progress in the desired direction. Sailing vessels are unable to sail higher than a certain angle towards the wind, so "beating to windward" in a zig-zag fashion with a series of tacking maneuvers, allows a vessel to sail towards a destination that is closer to the wind that the vessel can sail directly.
Capsizing or keeling over occurs when a boat or ship is rolled on its side or further by wave action, instability or wind force beyond the angle of positive static stability or it is upside down in the water. The act of recovering a vessel from a capsize is called righting. Capsize may result from broaching, knockdown, loss of stability due to cargo shifting or flooding, or in high speed boats, from turning too fast.
In a keel boat, a death roll is the act of broaching to windward, putting the spinnaker pole into the water and causing a crash-jibe of the boom and mainsail, which sweep across the deck and plunge down into the water. The death roll often results in the destruction of the spinnaker pole and sometimes even the dismasting of the boat. Serious injury to crew is possible due to the swift and uncontrolled action of the boom and associated gear sweeping across the boat and crashing to the (now) leeward side.
The Laser 4000(now "4000") is a racing dinghy designed by Phil Morrison crewed by two persons. Its one-design weight-equalised system enables physically differing sailors to compete on a level playing field. It is most popular in Europe, particularly the UK, France and Italy.
The International Offshore Rule (IOR) was a measurement rule for racing sailboats. The IOR evolved from the Cruising Club of America (CCA) rule for racer/cruisers and the Royal Ocean Racing Club (RORC) rule.
In sailing, the trapeze is a wire that comes from a point high on the mast, usually where the shrouds are fixed, to a hook on the crew member's harness at approximately waist level. The position when extended on the trapeze is outside the hull, braced against it with the soles of the feet, facing the masthead, and clipped on by a hook on the trapeze harness. This gives the crew member more leverage to keep the boat flat by allowing the crew member's centre of gravity to balance the force of the wind in the sails.
In dinghy sailing, a boat is said to be turtling or to turn turtle when the boat is fully inverted with the mast pointing down to the lake bottom, riverbed, or seabed. The name stems from the appearance of the upside-down boat, similar to the carapace of a sea turtle. The term can be applied to any vessel; turning turtle is less frequent but more dangerous on ships than on smaller boats. It is rarer but more hazardous for multihulls than for monohulls, because of multihulls are harder to flip in both directions. Measures can be taken to prevent a capsize from becoming a turtle.
Sail Canada is Canada's governing body for the sport of sailing. Sail Canada is a "Member National Authority" of World Sailing. Organization of sailing in Canada is divided into four groups: yacht clubs, Provincial Sailing Associations, class associations, and Sail Canada itself.
The Corsair is a class of sixteen foot, three handed sailing dinghy. The boat was designed by Australian designer Alan Payne who is famous for designing Sir Frank Packer's America's Cup challenge yachts Gretel and Gretel II.
In sailing, the limit of positive stability (LPS) or angle of vanishing stability (AVS) is the angle from the vertical at which a boat will no longer stay upright but will capsize, becoming inverted, or turtled.
The term sportsboat first appeared in the late 1980s and early 1990s to describe trailer sailers that were optimised for high performance at the expense of accommodation and ballast. The very definition of the term "sportsboat" is evolving.
The Farr 3.7 is a one-person sailing dinghy designed by Bruce Farr in 1971. The design plans are sold by the 3.7 Class Owners Association and they are built by a mix of professionals and home built by amateurs. The 3.7 Class is recognised by Yachting New Zealand as a national class and yachts are sailed in New Zealand, Australia and Great Britain. Full sets of plans have been sold worldwide to a number of individuals with greatest numbers in Germany, Japan, USA, South Korea, Poland, France, Belgium, Russia, Spain, Uruguay.
The B&R 23 is a sailing boat designed in the early 1990s. It has an ultralight construction with a very large sail plane. Typical crew is a helmsman and two deck hands in trapezes. The boat is predominantly used for racing.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
