Tarpezing a dart 18

Glad you've finally got there. You cant beat the feeling of trapezing of a flying hull. You suddenly realise how bit a boat it is! At 6'2" I start feeling pretty high up!

Find your local aluminium stockist and buy a 2.4m length of 6082 tube, it may not be class legal but it worked for me.

Thanks for the advice. Im hoping to give it a go at he weekend if i can make my self a temperay longer extension.

I went out on a Tornado Catamaran last year, and the way I was told to trapeze off of it was to hook on, slide backwards off of the hull and then push yourself out once the ring was taking your whole weight. It took a few goes for me but it seemed to work well. You should use the side of the hull to put your feet on, don't try and put them on the deck normally. Make sure the harness is tight enough to stop the hook moving about too much, but not so tight it squashes your gonads. You'll know when it's not windy enough to trapeze when you don't have to go out on the wire to keep the boat from heeling over too much, although you won't get pitched in and have to boat capsize on top of you if you misjudge this, catamarans are very stable.

I'd leave the spike - if you are in and out a lot in mixed conditions it should prevent the ring from falling off the hook and also helps you feel that the ring is on the hook when you are not looking.

Be careful though, if you are sailing solo on the coast, your boat can end up out of swimming distance from you if you fall off - even if it does capsize the wind can catch the tramp and push it faster than you can swim.

For this reason - ALWAYS take a phone out with you, it won't be the first time the RNLI have re-introduced a cat sailor to his craft... (a member of my sailing club has done it twice in the past couple of years and has paid handsomely each time with crates of beers for the crews!). As long as you do this it's perfectly safe ;-)

Matt