Meet Ant Howard, Laser.

Have you sailed before? if so when?

Yep, I have sailed my whole life, with the typical breaks in racing of early adulthood to drink beer and chase girls. Once I got a mortgage under control, it was time to get back into racing dinghy’s.

What got you interested in sailing?

My Family has been around the water a lot, and my Grandfather was a keen keel-boat crewman and active club member at the Geelong Yacht Squadron but in a strange twist it was my brother and Sister, who did sailing school (in the 80’s). Ironically I was too young to participate, and was jealously stuck on the bank. My Mum says I had “big tanties”, as I was desperate to sail. It must have been FOMO. I’m the only one who kept on with it as it turns out.

What do you love about it?

The feeling of the wind pressure driving the boat through the water. There’s nothing like it. I also like the physical nature of the small sporty hiking dinghies like Laser/Aero (my 2nd boat).

How long have you had your boat?

My laser? Six years this month! (March 2022)

What made you buy a Laser?

A shoulder injury… I thought a laser radial would be easy to rig and not as physically demanding on an injured shoulder as my previous boat, which was a Paper Tiger. Turns out Lasers are a really nice boat to sail and I love it.

When you’re not sailing, what do you like to do with your time?

Currently I ‘m building a caravan 🙂

If you’d like to join Ant Howard sailing at Lysterfield, we’d love to have you and can cater for any Dinghy up to 16ft and Cat up to 14.5ft. Get in touch if you’d like to be part of it!

This post is the first of a (hopefully) series to get to know a bit more about our newer members and what they sail and encourage people to share what boats they are interested in or have recently acquired.

Meet Lachlan Byrne, Sailing School Graduate 2021.

Have you sailed before? if so when?

No never before joining LSC, I did the sailing school last year and have been hanging around ever since.

What got you interested in sailing?

I’ve always been into water sports, mostly surfing and diving so it was always on my list. It’s mildly technical and physical which are the criteria for my enjoyment. 

What do you love about it?

Hiking when it’s really blowing of course. You really can’t beat that. Stacking it is also great fun, so long as no one gets hurt. 

How long have you had your boat?

Roughly 3 or 4 months. She still needs a bit of work but that’s what boats are, floating problems.

What made you buy a 420?

I wanted a boat with a trapeze to hang off, that was basically it. The goal is to sail it single handled. 

When you’re not sailing, what do you like to do with your time?

Hang out with the fam and eat curries. Do a bit of diving, go surfing when the waves are decent, go on overnight hikes when I have the time. Mostly I like learning new things and getting uncomfortable, that’s golden. 

If you’d like to join Lachlan sailing at Lysterfield, we’d love to have you and can cater for any Dinghy up to 16ft and Cat up to 14.5ft. Get in touch if you’d like to be part of it!

It is with great sadness that Lysterfield sailing club passes on our condolences to Brian Girling’s family upon news of his death.

Brian was a much loved life member of Lysterfield sailing club. As one of Lysterfield’s earliest members Brian had been actively involved with the club since it’s beginning, only recently slowing down. Brian’s contribution to Lysterfield Sailing Club throughout his life was enormous and the news of Brian’s death has saddened us all.

Brian came to Lysterfield sailing a Heron, before taking a keen interest in club administration and sailing programs for others that saw his focus sharpen to off the water activities designed to help others enjoy sailing as much as he did.

During Brian’s time with Lysterfield, he had served as Commodore, secretary as well as many other committee roles before moving in later life into the position of Sailability Coordinator. This may perhaps be where Brian was most passionate and he excelled in bringing accessible sailing to all people regardless of any constaints. Brian was honored for this work with a nomination in 2021 for the Australian Sailing Volunteer of the year award, where he reached the final three candidates.

The club extends their deepest sympathies to Brian’s family and sends its best wishes during this time.

Brian will be missed at Lysterfield Sailing Club.

Our Aggregate Series is now rated on a personal handicap. To those members who are just starting out, this means that improvement is rewarded in results. Your “rating” is calculated for each race relative to your last few races. If you have any questions, get in touch with Antony via the usual channels.

here’s a quick and dirty explanation that will hopefully put it in to context.

The VYC yardstick

A Normal VYC yardstick compares two boats to determine how long each one should take to do a race. It then corrects the time that we measure with a clock to say: All factors being equal, boat A ought to have taken 50% of the imaginary “normal” minutes to do that race and boat b should have taken 150% of that time. Or, boat A and B both took 10 minutes to do the race. Boat A should have only taken 5 minutes, boat B should have taken 15 minutes. therefore, boat B went super fast. Boat A: not so much. Now think about boat A taking 9 minutes, and Boat B taking 10 minutes. Who won? Still boat B. They may have had a good tussle on he course, but boat A should have been miles away as it is a much faster boat.

The personal handicap (a back calculated yardstick)

Next is personal handicaps. they compare your performance to what we would expect from the boat and adjust the handicap to reflect where you ARE finishing, not where you ought to be finishing.
Now consider your next race. If you are effectively in a slower boat (your PHS) you are closer to boat B than boat A above, so when you go faster, your results are better overall.

There is a catch though. We recalculate the handicap after each aggregate race. So if you go better, your “new” yardstick for next time goes down a little bit.

Long and the short of it, if you are improving heaps every race of the aggregate series ,you’ll do a lot of winning!

Your handicap can be found in the NHC1 and BCR columns of the results

If you scroll through the races, you can see your handicap changing race to race, this is the system in action.

If anyone is interested in a bit of coaching before the short course event, read on. To make this work, we need at least 5 boats (not five people, a 2-hander needs two people, but is one boat).

-Rigged and Ready at 9:00am, meet on the lawn.

I’m proposing a session to run through the main phases of a race, then move on to the water for some really useful drills in boat handling that will help you successfully start and sail a race.

Lesson plan:

9:00->10:00 (in the rooms depending on the sailing school)
-The port starboard rule (rule 10), and a little bit of rule 11.
-the start sequence, and what you need to know about being “on the line” in order to get a race in (the sequence, what the flags mean, where you need to be and what you should do)

10:00->12:00
-On water drills.
–A figure of eight across a start line (square to the wind, that is tight i.e. you will be close to other boats. This will be about reinforcing the port starboard rules in close quarters, and getting you used to changing tacks quickly and comfortably.

–Racking up (sailing up to a line and holding your boat still)

–Practice starts

–Pointing high

–(time permitting) a bit of downwind practice to get speeds up downwind.

You can then practice this stuff during the short-course races. As it is a few races close together, it is a great chance to get a big step in learning in a short time for getting better if that’s something people are looking to do.

guys, Let me know, we need at least five boats to make the drills worthwhile, and no more than 10.

There will be some pre-reading to do (not much) and you need to be ready to give the sessions a red hot go, by coming in with a keen desire to have a go and try again if you don’t pick it up straight away.

RSVP to the club email by Wednesday please. I’ll keep you posted via whatsapp as to RSVP progress.

If we don’t get five boats, we can postpone until another time.

Hi Everyone, Mordialloc has invited us to their round of the VDC. All welcome to go if the mood takes you!

Good evening Lysterfield Sailing Club

The 2021 Victorian Dinghy Championships (VDC) are officially up and running at Mordialloc Sailing Club!

Saturday 20th and Sunday 21st of November.
The VDC is the first heat of the Victorian Sailing Cup, which is conducted over 7 races. (The August to October 2021 events were cancelled due to COVID-19)

Schedule of VDC events;
Saturday  20^th November 2021          0900-1030    Registration
Saturday           20^th November 2021           1030-1100     Talk – Protest Processes
Saturday           20^th November 2021           1100              Information Session
Saturday           21^st November 2021           1200              Warning Signal
Sunday21^st November 2021           1000             Warning Signal   There will be a maximum of eight races scheduled, the start times for the second and succeeding races on each day will be held as soon as practicable after the conclusion of the preceding race, at the discretion of the Principal Race Officer.
All mono hull classes are invited and can enter through the link found on the Mordialloc Sailing Club website.
Entries can be accessed (using ClubOps) from the MSC web site and Sign On and Sign Off will be available through the Sailor App – IOS and ANDROID

Darren Eger, from Australian Sailing,  will give a talk on the Saturday morning, 10:30 – 11:00, on the process of a Protest Hearing. Such questions as, “What steps are taken in the protest room to come to a fair decision?”, will be covered. Participants and interested people from all clubs and classes are invited to attend this talk at no charge.

An informal BBQ will be held after racing on the Saturday for all participants, support crews and volunteers to enjoy at no cost. 

It is encouraged that all members are double vaxed for the safety of all participants, with all current restrictions to apply. A COVID Marshall will be present to answer any questions.

Good news! Sailing is back – as of this Saturday. Let’s hope we never need to write another lock down notice ever again 🙂

Members and Visitors welcome, get there early. There has been a lot of people using the park, so trailer parking can be challenging, which is simply something to keep in mind.

For details, check the calendar.

See you then!

Due to the logistics associated with managing the AGM within the confines of latest lock down in Melbourne, the AGM has been postponed. We’ll provide an update on new arrangements when we can.

We hope to be back sailing as soon as the lock-down lifts, hopefully for Winter 6 on the 14th of August.

Stay safe!

LSC looks forward to continuing our winter series this Saturday 31-07 for the next race in our winter series, Winter Race 5!

See all who wish to join us (including visitors) for a 1:00 start.

Well, once again we find ourselves confined. This means we have to cancel the racing planned for the 17th.

We hop to be back on deck as soon as we can, restrictions permitting.