Build Your Winter: What should you actually work on?
Updated: Sep 13
The end of the season is a chance to look beyond results and work out what is actually holding your sailing back.
The end of the summer racing season is a really useful time to think about what comes next.
It is easy to finish one season and immediately start filling the calendar with winter training weekends. But before doing that, there is one important question to answer:
What do you actually need to get better at?
Rather than simply aiming to “get better at racing” or trying to improve everything at once, your summer season should give you clues about where your biggest gains might be.
Think back across your racing.
Where did you regularly gain boats?
Where did you regularly lose them?
Which conditions felt comfortable?
Which conditions seemed much harder?
Those patterns can help you decide where your winter training should start.
Start at the bottom of the pyramid
The Apex Development Pyramid is a simple way of looking at how the different parts of sailing fit together.
From the bottom upwards:
Preparation
Goals, equipment, fitness and understanding the conditions.
Boat Handling
Tacks, gybes, hoists, drops and mark roundings.
Boat Speed
Technique, trim, balance, different modes and acceleration.
Starting
Time and distance, positioning and getting the boat moving at the right moment.
Strategy + Tactics
Wind shifts, pressure, positioning, other boats and choosing where to race.
Performance
Putting everything together consistently when the racing matters.
The important bit is that the higher parts of the pyramid rely on the levels underneath them. You can have a great tactical idea, but if every tack loses a lot of distance, it becomes much harder to use that idea. Likewise, you might understand exactly where you want to start, but if you cannot accelerate the boat when you need to, the plan becomes difficult to execute.
Your tactical problem might not actually be tactical
This is one of the most useful ways to use the pyramid. A sailor might say: “I need to improve my tactics.”
Maybe.
But first, look a little deeper:
Are they actually struggling to make good decisions?
Or are they struggling because they lose speed every time they tack?
Are they getting forced the wrong way because they cannot hold their lane?
Are they arriving at the first shift behind because their acceleration off the start line is poor?
Sometimes the problem you notice during a race actually starts much further down the pyramid. That is why winter training should not always start with the most complicated part of racing. Quite often, improving one simple skill lower down gives you much more freedom higher up.
So what should you work on this winter?
Before your next winter session, try this. Write down three situations from the summer where you regularly lost boats.
For example:
Losing distance through tacks
Arriving late to the start line
Atruggling to keep the boat moving in waves
Now ask yourself what caused each one. Was it:
Preparation?
Boat handling?
Boat speed?
Starting?
Or was it genuinely the decision itself? You will often find that the answer is more specific than simply saying:
“I need better tactics.”
And once you know what the real problem is, it becomes much easier to train it.
Make your winter count
You do not need to improve everything this winter. You just need to understand what is currently limiting your racing and start working on the right things.
Build from the bottom of the pyramid. Make the simple skills more reliable. Then gradually give yourself more time and freedom to make better racing decisions.
By spring, what do you want to be noticeably better at?
Build your winter Apex
Apex members can complete the Apex Winter Planner, and join the live coaching classroom and workshop session to turn their summer racing into clear winter priorities. Join The Apex Brief to hear about it.
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