How To Sail In Big Waves

Toby Heppell finds out about the best rough weather tactics to keep you Sailing for speed, comfort, safety and enjoyment

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Sailing in waves can be a jarring, juddering experience, making for a long and uncomfortable passage, a thrilling surfing ride to your destination or, at worst, a dangerous, boat-rolling hazard.

Understanding how to set up your boat for differing wave conditions, to take advantage of them or ameliorate their worst traits is a skill that it is well worth understanding and practising in order to make your sailing more enjoyable, and to give you the confidence to sail in a wider range of conditions.

DOWNWIND

‘Fairly obviously, the bigger the boat you sail the less of a problem waves generally are, say Merfyn Owen of Owen Clark Yacht Design, himself a double Cape Horner and former BT Global Challenge skipper with over 250,000 miles under his belt. ‘To take that to an extreme, if you think about an oil tanker in the middle of an ocean, a wave that would barely wet the deck for her would be something big enough to roll a cruising yacht. It’s really all about the wave energy transfer and the object that the energy is being transferred through, in this case, the boat. So although size is key, when sailing with waves, speed is very much your friend, too, as the energy transfer will be reduced when you are travelling at pace.’

Once surfing, don’t steer straight down the wave: you'll hit the one in front. If you stop, the wave will roll past and, significantly, your apparent wind angle will suddenly change. Instead, turn so the boat slides along the face of the wave, upwind or downwind of the wave perpendicular; this extends the time surfing but also keeps the boat ata constant speed.

‘When the wave hits, something has to happen to that energy, which is a function of the wave’s weight and speed. The energy is transferred into the vessel and if the vessel is going relatively slowly and is relatively small then there is sufficient energy in the wave to