Lee-Bow..... Windsurfers...etc (Dons tin hat)

Originally posted by Rupert Page 8 and we get to the realisation that GRF has never seen a book with decent tidal tactics in it.

I think half the problem is he's never seen a book with really bad tidal tactics in it, like the full on lee bow myth.

Funnily enough I have a number of old books, but I've not actually come across the lee bow myth in any of them. In my edition of Proctor's wind and current, for example, the only mention of pinching in tide I can find is the suggestion that if tide cheating along the bank it may be better to pinch along the bank and go slowly, rather than to sail faster and have to tack out into the current.

We mythbusters happily deride the myth, which is fair enough, but it would probably be useful to list where its recorded in order to further warn the unwary.

If you want to de-bunk the myth you probably need to go frequent the bars at many sailing clubs which would require unplugging yourself and going out into the real world :-0

In truth I probably haven't seen a book with really good or bad tidal tactics. I came to sail racing via windsurfing indeed my first seemingly insurmountable problem in the first actual race I ever participated in was how one could possibly sail to a buoy several hundred yards up in the direction from which the wind was coming.

So, I read pretty much everything that was around during the period which was 1976 to 1978 including Start to Win and a book called Advanced racing tactics which was about four inches thick and catered more for offshore yachts than dinghies. I knew nothing about wind shifts and couldn't understand how big heavy guys from inland venues, that usually fell off in the sea, would be almost impossible to beat on the still waters of Lake Conistion at my first national championships. In fact it was true to say I knew more about currents, wave (anyone remember Jeffreys sheltering theory)& tide and how to avoid or use it to my benefit than ever I knew about wind shifts and wind bends.
So I asked him and others what's going on and they told me, back then we used to share all knowledge, it was a new sport and constantly developing we would train together (all through the winter of 1978 at Grafham for example).
I say the next bit not for self aggrandising purpose but as an illustration of experience, but in 1979, that earlier picture in fact, I began to win and win pretty much everything, Windsurfer One Design, Open Class, event after event in all manner of locations, even showing very good folk in tidal locations different ways to approach their own water. This then attracted those that either wanted to exploit or share in the good fortune , not of me the person, but with the British Windsurfing Champion who I became for the next three or four years, then on and off until 1985.

So I then had to write the books, the articles, give the lectures, face the questions, tour different locations become an authority in fact, which was how I came into contact with the absolute legend that was Eric Twiname and it was he who coined the phrase to me 'tidal lee bow effect'. So when I hear these forty years later that his 'myth' has been debunked and everything I know, not from books but from extremely hard won experience, then you are going to have to forgive me for being defensive in extreme and just as I may have not given hard evidence of my 'truths', I've yet to see hard evidence to the contrary. I've seen lots of statements here that are just plain wrong and could be put demonstrably to test and would fail, but nothing yet that will ever convince me that a favourable tide on the lee bow of my craft isn't exactly that, favorable, just as the tide on the weather bow is not.

And to the people back there whining that all this is wrong or misleading, I'd say it's a discussion on a forum that has been inactive of late, you take from it what you will, you either agree or disagree and comment accordingly. If I were a dinghy sailing British Champion I doubt there would be half the discord and I'm so pleased not to be, it is far more interesting and even now I'm still learning (had never heard the term ferry gliding).

So I'll end this by thanking all of you for your input right or wrong and hope you appreciate now where I'm coming from, I may have been a little too rude and offensive in some of those earlier threads, I've never been a chap who takes foolish youth too seriously and often fail to recognise that written 'banter' can be offensive and hurtful especially if I forget the essential emojis .

But then would the information be taken seriously?

Probably not, he's only a windsurfer after all and can't sail a dinghy for a toffee.


Edited by iGRF - 19 Sep 19 at 11:04am

I wish I could find one of the books that contains the lee bow myth so I could try and accurately explain what's different about that from what you are saying. To the best of my knowledge everything you are saying about tide is perfectly correct, but its not what is generally described as the lee bow myth.

Its certainly notoriously difficult to set lines in a cross tide situation.