Search the site
Tell Friends about SailJuice
Share/Save/Bookmark

Follow me on Twitter
Sailing News
You are here: Home » Teamwork
Download Print Send a summary of this page to someone via email.
Teamwork...

Teamwork is a critical component of racing boats fast. There have been some great individuals that have been rubbish sailing together, and some merely good sailors that have combined to achieve great things. This is the section where we look at this fascinating and sometimes mystical subject. Definitely an art more than science, but worth studying all the more for that very reason...

Terry Hutchinson high-fiving after a Melges victory
Terry Hutchinson and team high-fiving after a Melges 24 victory


Featured Articles

  MP3: Being shouted at? Should you stay or should you go? ***
Adam BowersTop coach and former Fireball World Champion crew Adam Bowers has been through his good and bad sailing partnerships. Most of us have endured being shouted at, and I doubt many of us get much pleasure out of it. So we asked Adam about how to make sure you're in the right team, and if you're going through a rough patch, when to work through your 'marriage problems', and when to walk away...
  MP3: The right ingredients for winning teamwork with Etchells World Champ Nik Pearson ***
Nik Pearson won the Etchells World Championships doing the bow for skipper Stuart Childerley and Simon Russell working the mainsheet. Every team is different in its make-up of skills, but there are some good general principles of communication here that will work for any sailor looking to improve teamwork in the boat.
  MP3: Teambuilding in sportsboats with Justin Chisholm ***
The Melges 24 class is so tough, the demands on team work and good communication are very high. Justin Chisholm made some radical recommendations to improve his team's performance, and luckily he wasn't thrown overboard...
  Tough Team Talk from Terry Hutchinson ***
Tough team talk from Terry Hutchinson, after a couple of unusually bad days from the Quantum Racing team. A big insight into the professionalism and focus of a top racing team. These post-race debriefs are critical to making improvements the next day, especially when things are going badly...
  Communications Loops: essential speed & tactical processes with Robert Hopkins
How a crew talks to each other is one of the things that determines success or failure. Efficient, to-the-point communication is vital if you've got any hope of beating your rivals. Robert Hopkins explains the two essential communication loops that feed through all the top professional racing keelboats these days. This is hot stuff, and relevant to any team boat from two people upwards...
  Why shouting gets you nowhere fast ***
A quiet boat is a fast boat, according to Tom Burnham, the pitman on top TP52 Quantum Racing. Which is why it's good to have a team where everyone knows what's going on tactically - even the musclemen on the grinding pedestals. And a shouty boat is nearly always a slow one. Tom offers some tips for how to reduce the noise - and stress level - on your boat...
  MP3: Robert Hopkins explains the secrets of Efficient Communication... ***
MP3 (4:30 min): Robert Hopkins has done his career all the 'wrong way' round. In his early 20s he found himself coaching the British America's Cup team Victory 83 through to the finals of the Louis Vuitton Cup where they came up against the mighty Australia II. A year later, aged 24, he was head coach of the USA Sailing Team at the Los Angeles Olympics, where the Americans grabbed four gold and three silvers from all seven medal disciplines. More recently he has moved back on to racing teams as a sailor, including winning the TP52 World Championships with Quantum Racing in 2008. SailJuice asked Robert what he has learned about good team communication through his 25 years of coaching and sailing with the very best in the business...
  MP3: Terry Hutchinson on how a team should communicate in a crisis ***
Audio (4 minutes): Terry Hutchinson says you've got to talk about when things go wrong, but not WHEN things go wrong... Er, not quite clear, well listen in and see what this multiple keelboat world champion has to say about communicating with your team mates in a constructive way...
  MP3: Quantum Theory - Terry Hutchinson reveals team chemistry that led to TP52 domination ***
Audio (8 minutes): Terry Hutchinson says that opposites may not necessarily attract, but putting different personalities together was still a vital part of creating a Quantum Racing team that was strong enough to dominate the TP52 circuit in 2008 ...
  Shut up and Drive! ***
Having done the tactical job for a few years, Terry Hutchinson found it hard to relinquish control of the decision-making habit when he started steering the TP52.
 
more articles >>