Tactics to Win

Unless you have unbeatable boatspeed, tactics are vital to winning sailboat races. Multi-champion, Nick Craig, shows you how to develop a strategy and what tactics to adopt on every leg and at every mark of the course.

His first book, Helming to Win, was described as "original, thought provoking... like no other that has gone before it". He now turns his highly analytical mind to the subject of tactics. He discusses the inputs into strategy, starting and the race plan (going through each leg in turn). Nick then tackles mark tactics, covering every different type of mark, and fleet tactics on every leg of the course. He finally focusses on boat-to-boat tactics, again on every leg of the course. In each situation he covers attacking and defensive tactics, either to get ahead or make sure you stay ahead.

Non-spinnaker, symmetrical spinnaker and asymmetric dinghies are all covered because Nick has won world or national championships in each of these types of boats.

Having read Nick’s first book many said that it had transformed the way they sailed. This book will have the same effect on your tactics and should see you moving up the leaderboard.

17 colour photos, 191 diagrams

About the Author

Nick Craig is the 'Champion of Champions', having won the Endeavour Trophy six times. He has also won 35 National Championships, 5 European Championships and 12 World championships to date, in a variety of classes including the B14, D-One, Enterprise, Finn, Merlin Rocket, OK and Phantom. Remarkably he is not a professional sailor - all of this has been achieved alongside a full-time job.

Nick was awarded the YJA Yachtsman of the Year in 2011 and the Yachts & Yachting Amateur Sailor of the Year in 2013. In the last 12 months he has won the OK World Championships for a record breaking fifth time after many years out of the class and the B14 World Championships (in the home of the class, Australia). His first book, Helming to Win (also part of the Sail to Win series) was described "a highly personal and radical, fresh view of the subject area".