Uphauling tips&tricks

[marek]

Hi,

Just wanted to share an uphauling trick I've started to use recently (found it somewhere on the web, maybe even here). Allows to pull up even large (10.0) sails with very little efort.
If you have a wide board (such as an F-type), you can just stand on the very edge of it, with the sail in the water on the opposite side and use your weight to lift the sail up as much as you can (basicaly, the board and the mast become a lever, you just need to keep the balance). Once the sail is partially out of the water, use your uphaul in a normal way (but with less much force as the most difficult part was done by the donuts you had before the session ;)).

Even if the sail is on the wrong side (upwind), you can keep standing on the edge and the wind will eventually rotate you.
I recommend using a mast protector on the bottom part of your mast (I actually use two and cover like 60cm from the mast foot). If you have an integrated mast/boom protector, just cut the mast part off and install it lower - on a very short board the boom won't hit the nose anyway - but the bottom part of the mast will.

Anyway, this method is easier to your back and leaves more energy for riding.
If anybody has more please share it.

HTH,

-marek

[Madis]

hehe, nice one i learned the trick when i began windsurfing help
s ALOT

;)

[gary]

Hi Marek
I tried this trick on the weekend and it makes uphauling so much easier! It also left me thinking "how did I not figure this out myself, after all the uphauling I've done?" LOL. Thanks for sharing.
Gary

[marek]

Hey, cool.
Yet another related trick - if you are really tired, and _severely_ overpowered and your sail is in the water on the wrong side, you can just sit on the edge of your board (with legs in the water) and the wind will slowly rotate you around.

Then you can stand up, press the edge with your feet and uphaul normally.

-marek

[Jay]

Marek and Gary,

Great tips. Here'a another tip you may or may not have tried that can be helpul in repositioning your board when overpowered in prepartion for an uphaul - if you need to rotate your board 180 degrees (ie, in order to change direction to get back to shore when overpowered in bigger waves which makes balancing harder, if you don't want to uphaul and then either tack, gybe, or rotate the board with your feet) it can be much easier to flip your board upside down and rotate it 180 degrees over the sail and then flip it back rightside up rather than trying to sink the tail and push it under the sail, particularly if your're on a big or floaty board.

[gary]

Hi Jay
Yes that's another good one that I've been doing for while. As you say very helpfull when the wind goes way up and your trying to make it back home with way too much sail.

Hi Marek
I had some good wind on saturday and gave the sit method a try. Not bad at all. It's a slow turn but it gives you a nice break to have a bit of a rest before another run.

Good stuff guys
Gary