Ruling the waves

Have you ever stood in the sea and felt the action of the waves on your legs? The surge as the waves push you forward towards the beach and then the sucking action pulling you back out to sea. That is correct: the waves don’t simply ‘go one way’ and the way we steer in waves can have a huge effect on our Velocity Made Good (VMG). This is why we often see bigger speed differences in wavy conditions than in flat water racing.

You have probably noticed the wave effect many times before, especially when you are trying to hold a boat by the beach when launching or waiting for your trolley to recover your boat, but have you really thought about the current between waves which at one point is pushing and another point pulling?

On a local scale we know that water always likes to run downhill.