HEY GOOD LOOKING!

Of all the technique tips, how you hold your head and where you look are as powerful as any. Harty unpacks this crucially important topic.

- Peter Hart

"They're still on the end of your legs." "Let me save you trouble of looking - you've still got two!" I admit that neither riposte was that hilarious but I was running out of ways to stop Geoff looking at his feet at the beginning, middle and end (if he got that far) of every gybe. A bit of sarcastic humour was my last recourse.

"But does it really matter where I look?" He said getting ever more disgruntled. "You can look wherever you like... but when you stare at your feet, you can't see where you're going, your gybes grind to a halt and your stance looks like Quasimodo."

THE GOLDEN NUGGET

In our quest to improve we're always looking for that one nugget of golden advice that eradicates our deeply engrained habits and opens the door to the next level. Keep your distance from the rig; bend the knees; make sure your wetsuit matches your sail - they're all good. However, getting your head in order sits at the top of the pile. The secret has been out for a while in a variety of sports. Gymnasts are told to spot the landing. Ice skaters start their spins with the head. Motorcyclists are advised to turn by doing nothing more than looking into the bend.

And our shores ring out with cries of 'keep your head up' and 'look out of the turn' from enthusiastic windsurfing instructors. But if it were as simple as lifting the head and looking, everyone would surely be doing it. It's not only mentally challenging but exactly where, when and why you look depends on the individual manoeuvre. Ignoring for now all the stuff that goes on inside the head - positive vs negative mindsets, anxiety etc (because that's a series of articles in itself), there are two ways the head influences performance.