Advanced instructors course

 A Cherub - over here - surely not.......I suggest the Merrydown Two day racing "fest" off Ryde - good selection of dinghies and cats, good blasting course but more importantly as much Merrydown cider as you can drink - I left last year with a case in the front of my boat - if you don't like cider it's good for removing old varnish.

Normally first weekend in Sept with attendance from local clubs and some "Alverstockracy" attendees - it is said in hushed tones that one year a Dart sailor was so wasted he went back to Stokes Bay and sailed straight up the beach with no efforts to stop due to being semi conscious - happy days!

Relax - I'm sure you are all very butch

Actually I would love a Cherub and keep trying to get one but they are a bit thin on the ground here (except for the gorgeous green one in Bloodaxe boats front garden)

Spiny Norman

Yes, I agree

My 'manor' is (luckily) quite safe - no 'mockneys' or Guy Ritchie types to be seen except in high season when the rhyming slang starts.....

"Extremely whingey" - Sailing Dinghy

"Mick the Miller" - Tiller

"Brokeback Mountain" - Cherub Sailors

Having read these various posts I would like to comment, as an Senior Instructor, on the Advanced and DI situation.  The DI certificate is awarded to a wide range of abilities and some are quite poor in my experience.  However please remember that they are simply teaching light wind basic skills and little more.  There are skilled instructors who are total posers and poorly skilled instructors who are simply magnificent at putting people at ease but may not sail much themselves.  The SI task is managing a diverse team to achieve the final desired result.

The advanced endorsement is somewhat different and other posts have summed it up well - you should be able to sail a variety of different high performance dinghies - not just one type, have a good grasp of the controls involved on dinghies rigged to open meeting standards and be able to pass this information on to students who have liitle grasp of the theory of the airflow, low pressure areas etc etc.

Young instructors who fly round like little 'minkeys' and sail the pants of us oldies are often the holders of the Advanced but they cannot pass the information across particularly well - once again a balancing act is needed from the SI view but the over-riding aspect is that if you want to take the Advanced then go out and have a few days blasting in anything you can get your hands on - conventional or asymetric!!!!!

Carry on everybody

they have now removed the rudderless sailing! when i did my DI course 6 months ago, i spent a bit of time learning how to do that confidently, and it makes you really understand the boat handling a lot more. Taking that off the syllabus really is not a good move. How can you teach someone a technique if you yourself cannot do the manoevre.