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In teams racing starting is one of the most important parts of the race. A team with a strong advantage at the start can quickly turn this into a stable combination, effectually winning the race off the start line.
It can be hard to have an effective starting drill. Doing some rolling starts can work, but there are a few issues, there are no consequences for getting a bad start, as they just roll straight into the next one. This is a problem as one of the main points about teams race starting is consistency.
Among the drills I have found that work well is sectored starting…
Lay a normal course but have two more marks in the start line breaking the line into three sectors. Each boat must start in their assigned sector. Run a normal team’s race with six boats- I would often stop the race up at mark three (which I lay next to the start line), and then restart again. So in effect you are also working on first beats and a short run.
This does a few things; it forces the boats to have a geographical split, which they should be aiming for anyway (one boat at the pin, middle, and boat end). Each boat will have to think about setting up for their assigned position, it is no good to end up at the pin when you are assigned the boat end! It also creates a match race between the two boats of opposite teams fighting for the same sector.
Another variation of this is, instead of a having a team race have three separate match races. This helps with match racing and hunting before the starts and tacking duels and covering around the course, all the time having to manage having six boats on the course. Another advantage is it gets the sailors to focus more on their sailing their own boat well, rather than worrying about the team’s results.
A third variation is to have a first to score two points, but to get a point the team has to be in a 1, 2, 3 at mark 1 or 2, or be in stable combination at mark three. This forces the team to really think about converting into a stable combination early in the race.
