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Hitech hiking

Article · December 2014

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 HIKING A FINN
Better Finn Hiking
By Mikko Brummer, WB-Sails
J ukka Partinen, Finn Master FIN-226 takes his sailing
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decided he needed a hiking bench. But not just any
hiking bench - he wanted to make his own, that would
not only strain his muscles but also learn him how to
become to be a better hiker.
It should not be static, but dynamic, like the boat on the water. So
he took an IKEA warehouse shelf and his old Reebook core board -
a device you balance on that tilts, rocks and swivels in all directions
- and built a mockup of the partial Finn cockpit over the balance
board. To measure how hard he was working, he put an electronic
scale on the “leeward” side of the bench, to put numbers on his
LɈVY[Z>P[OHSP[[SLIP[VMJVUZ\S[PUNMYVTOPZZHPSTHRLYOLTH[JOLK
the scale and tilt joint of the Reebook board so that the scale would
measure his exact righting moment while hiking out. To add reality
and make the training more versatile, he also added a sheet with a
realistic pull against shock chords running beneath the bench.
What righting moment?
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OPRPUNWVZP[PVUPZPU[LYTZVMYPNO[PUNTVTLU[>OH[»Z[OLYPNO[PUN
moment? The wind on the sail creates a heeling moment on the
boat, opposed by the righting moment of the sailor hiking out. Your
righting moment depends but on your weight, also on the position
you are hiking in, or how far from the centre of buoyancy of the
underwater hull you manage to place your centre of gravity. The
centre of buoyancy is more or less on the centreline of the boat,
or a tad to leeward of it, while the centre of gravity of the sailor is
somewhere around his navel. The heeling moment of the sail is
determined by the heeling arm, which is the distance between the
side force on the sail and the side force on the underwater hull,
centerboard & rubber (see sketch). The righting moment and the
OLLSPUNTVTLU[T\Z[IHSHUJLLHJOV[OLY^OLU[OL`KVU»[`V\
capsize. The righting moment Jukka is measuring while doing his
exercise is fundamental to sailing performance, like the hull drag,
or the sail driving force. Nice information for the sailmaker, too,
who bases all his simulation on the estimated righting moment. The
bigger your righting moment, the more sail power you can carry.
The series of pictures shows how hiking
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The typical maximum moment achieved
by a 100 kg/185 cm Finn sailor would
be 105 kg/m. Jukka shows that in an
old style knees bent-position he only
achieves 80 kg/m. Another downside of
this position is that the sailor, with his
knees at a more acute angle, cannot
give an extra boost when needed. In a
position with the legs straighter, more
Laser-style hiking, the Jukka can rise
his moment to 105 kg/m, by leaning his
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FINN MASTERS MAGAZINE & YEARBOOK 2015
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more important, in the position with his 80 kg/m
knees straighter, he can boost his righting
moment instantaneously to more than 115,
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then up in a violent stroke. This has the
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raising the righting moment momentarily 85 kg/m
by some 20%. All this he can read directly
in his electronic scale while exercising. One
thing Jukka already has learnt is that the
[PNO[ULZZVM[OLZ[YHWOHZHIPNPUÅ\LUJL
on the hiking force - a tight strap allows a
stronger jerk for momentarily increasing
90 kg/m
the force than a more loose strap.
Practicing pumping
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the hiking bench suits itself for training
downwind agility too: Going from sitting
90 kg/m
on the deck to standing up and sheeting
in, and back on the deck again. As such,
the Reebook platform was a bit too lively,
so Jukka placed some soft footballs
underneath, adding some stability.
90 kg/m
In a future implementation, Jukka plans to
install a wireless scale that can record the
whole training session into his Coach4Pro
software, to provide an average righting
moment during the training session, and
plot a nice curve about the variation of it
over time. By adding a scale to his hiking
93 kg/m
straps on the boat, he could monitor his
hiking while sailing… hmmm.
Hiking in waves
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bow is pitching up and down. This has 95 kg/m
HJVUZPKLYHISLLɈLJ[VU[OLOLLSPUN
TVTLU[>OLU[OLIV^WP[JOLZ\WHUK
the mast pitches back, the top of the
sail is loaded and the instantaneous
heeling moment increases by some 40%.
Likewise, when the bow pitches down, 99 kg/m
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heeling moment is down. The helmsman
compensates partly by steering, but as all
this happens in a cycle of 2-3 seconds, he
also resist the increasing heeling moment
I`NP]PUNHQLYRVU[OLN\U^OHSL^P[OOPZSLNZ;OPZPZTVYLLɉJPLU[
than merely steering the boat around the wave, the way you are
forced to do in a larger keelboat.
You will learn that a more acute angle in your knees is bad for your
joints, potentially even very bad, while easier on your muscles.
Also, even the angle of your ankles matters - with your ankles
straight, hiking from your toes, your muscles are relieved.
A corporate coach by profession, Jukka is coaching sailing as
his hobby. He got involved with Coach for Pro, a startup focusing
on coaching and training diaries on your mobile phone. The
system features tracking your sailing with a GPS for later analysis,
automatically sending all the data via your mobile to a cloud service,
where it can be viewed in realtime by your coach, for instance, or
your training partners. For more see www.mycoach4sailing.com
For more reading about hiking:
Sailing and sports medicine: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2653898/
http://www.roostersailing.com/merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=hikestyle&Store_Code=1
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