How to handle your Asymmetric Spinnaker - Practical Sailing Tips !!! 

19 people who disliked this video don't have a clew!

We loved the tweaked and use of ratchet block for the sock downhaul. Will incorporate, thanks!

I took my first sailing lesson a couple of years ago, set off on an extended voyage one year ago. Decided to take on the Atlantic last November and desperately wanted/needed to fly the asymmetric that came with the boat, but don't know how. I've watched numerous videos but this is the only one that's explained it in such detail that I will now fly the chute the next opportunity. Thanks guys.

Very informative, well presented and calm !! Thanks for doing this.

One point worth mentioning for boats that don't have a pole. Easing the tack line is a great way to get the spinnaker out of the shadow of the main.

That sock & ratchet block!! OMG !! This could be a real game changer for our boat! Both for basic safety and racing!

Thanks. Block on the sock line is a great move.

Matt & Amy, you two are awesome! Loved the video!!!

Love your tech and tip! Awesome 👏👍👍👍. Looking forward of more !

Thank you for all the tips on flying the asymmetric spinnaker!

Wonderfull instruction video and great tip with the rachet block.

Great video, thanks guys!

A load more content like this would be ace

So thankful for this! You guys helped us use ours more often😊

Thanks for showing all aspects from start to finish. Most videos take for granted that we know the small details. As a intermediate sailor but Spi beginner I learned and understood a lot more. Cheers from 🇨🇦

very well done, very informative.

Great content, Super ambassadors!!

Such a great, helpful video. Thank you!

Great video Amy and Matt!

Good job ,super awesome

Wow, gr8 tips on handling spinnaker sail. Thx 4 sharing on Utube.

Watched you guys for sometime, but somehow missed this one. We are in the process of learning our new boat that has an asymmetrical spinnaker. So happy your video was the first one i saw on it's use. You guys are so very good at explaining things!

I believe this may be the GREATEST Asym Video Ever. Just... Ever... LOL 🙂

Great tips… going to save this for the future 😊

Nice tips, thanks!

Great video.

thanks for the ideas looking forward to trying them out. bit more sailing fun coming up.

Great info presented well. Thx.

First time I have watched any of your videos, loved it and subscribed, look forward to watching more. Thank you 😀

ive been sailing offshore solo since 1985 ,ive always used a pole

Great I found that a really helpful clip and will add some of your recommendations.👍

great video. thank you

Very, very good tips! :)

We love you guys. We've followed you since the beginning and this was a very informative, helpful video. We have the same set-up but didn't quite understand the intricacies. It has always worked by intuition alone but you two nailed the pro tips to being safer and having more fun. The step-by-step, was very professional. Thank you, have fun and be safe! Jeff & Sue

Awesome video, lots of great tips. Thanks guys!

The tweaker and ratchet block are great tips. I think you both could do this task single handed if needed....thank you for the tips.

Great tutorial. Makes 5 mast squareriggers look easy.

Good video and tips! Well done!

I realize by seeing your video that I underestimede the right use of a spinnaker, a really very instructive vid Thank you so much from Belgium! Fare and safe winds!

Great tips thank you

Just started learning sailing in a 47' Samson CQuinn ferrocement staysail cutter. I have a gennaker, asymmetrical spinnaker, and this is the absolute bees knees of an instructional video on it's use. Brilliant! I have a couple of snatch blocks, so I'll be making a 'tweaker', or Barber hauler, and I LOVE the ratchet block idea, so sensible! Got a ratchet block on board as well, so...Thank you!

Great tips, I have always wanted to use my pole to bring the tack around but have never seen it done. I may be trying this out tomorrow.

Nice to see someone else poling the tack out, used to race a 1/2 tonner and did this, way more stable.

As a solo sailor (most of the time) I luv my "cruising chute" and it's sock. I first rig the pole. then I hoist the sock, from out the fore hatch. Then I hoist a few feet of the sock and run the dedicated lines. then fully hoist the sock and make off the line to a mast cleat. Then back to the cockpit, bring the chute out of the shadow of the main and adjust the lines that are all led back, accordingly. To bring it down, I've rigged a piston shackle with a long tether, and let the tack fly, and repeat the hoisting in reverse order. BUT PLEASE NOTE !!! this works for ME, on my 11.3 (36ft) bilge keeled 13 ton Bermudan sloop. Barnacle Bern SW Wales

I much better understand the setup of my boat now... excellent video!

Best ever❤

That rachet block is a great tip. I wonder you could include a prusik abutting the block so it holds the spinnaker if the line slips from your hand. Much like an ascender in a rock climbing setup.

Inspiring, thx

We love your channel and just discovered this very helpful video, thank you. Our Passport 47 came with an asymmetric spinnaker but we have not used it yet. That's about to change!!

Thank you so much!

Very good idea the ratchet block for sock downhaul. Much safer.

Brillant Aussies!

thank you!

Really lovely video making... Congrats. Keep it up... You guys are great at this.. Produce more. Love it! Stef Juncker Cape Town Parapax tandem paragliding

I was surprised to see you guys on this video other than your own channel.

Thank you for the tips on setting the Asymmetrical spinnaker. Very well presented in a clear and uncluttered format.

Great video thanks

Thanks!

Ratchet block.... great idea.

I'm basically using the same technique. But using a ratchetblock for downhauling the sock will certainly add safety. I will use it too !

Where we sail in the Baltic, we've found that once the sail is up, either we have to change direction or the wind has changed. Rarely are we going in the same direction with the same wind for long enough to bother with it. Would love to sail longer passages with flying sails more often.

Hi Guys. My wife and I have enjoyed your videos for years, when we have both time and access to good WiFi. Thank you for producing such informative and pleasurable works of AV art. We are full-time cruisers, too, presently in Ireland, leaving for the UK in late April or early May, and hoping our paths will cross when you return to Portsmouth. With respect to this video, in particular, I returned to it today as we recently bought an almost new asymmetric spinnaker that we will use to fill the void of our beloved reacher/drifter that finally succumbed to years of use. My question is, you provided a great tip in this video for using the spinnaker pole to enable you to bear off the wind to a deeper reach or run; do you have any tips for how to eek out a few more degrees into the wind to sail higher than a beam reach? With our old drifter, we could get to about 60-70° off the wind, and we could also pole it out like a genoa and goose wing it opposite the mainsail to go dead downwind. Thanks for any suggestions. Safe travels for your upcoming Atlantic crossing. David Lane S/V AT FIRST SIGHT

Great tipps, thanks! Could you please do a new video to address Catamarans.

Great Video. Looks like you know what you are talking about. I am a singlehanded cruiser on a 31 ft (HR 31 Monsun) boat and my asymmetrical is the sail I enjoy most. As I single hand I installed a top down furler and I am really happy with it. BUT ;-) .... Once I sail 150 deg or deeper I either have to take the mainsail down or put it on the other side. Which requires then at least a 160-165 deg angle to not backwind the mainsail which I of course have on a preventer. Sometime when the wind is a bit fickle I just take the mainsail down as it can get too stressful keeping an eye on it. Now I am thinking if I could use the method you do with the tack on the pole, that would be great and give me much better options and stability at least up to lets say 160. That would be awesome. But my tack of course is fixed on the furler disc on the bowsprit. Anybody, any idea of how I could still do this ?

What a great video. Particularly the bit about using the pole low down on the tack to give a deeper wind angle. Do you guys have your own channel?

All very sensible and reasonable technique, well presented. Showing how to do this so clearly is very valuable to the sailing community. Thanks for sharing! Having a racing background definitely helps in making it second nature and well-practiced, which in turn makes it easier to use the asymmetrical for cruising. I think non-racers may be a bit intimidated by the relative complexity compared to a roller furled headsail and lazy-jacked main. Good focus on using appropriate wind angles to haul, douse and fly the sail. Like others, really liked the ratchet block idea for converting the dousing with sock motion to a downward force. Much safer this way and smart. Using the pole to go deep downwind is the same as symmetrical spinnaker technique, and a good idea. Using the tweaker is like a movable jib fairlead to adjust sail shape and also a good idea. CORRECTION: for the port tack shown in the video and diagrams, the launch and douse angles should have been 200 and the flying angle 240, respectively, not 160 and 120. (Presumably the script was written for a starboard tack.)

Very educative video, clear explanation. The support of visual aids makes it very easy to follow. The hubby and I had a few times when it went wrong with the spinnaker. Thanks to this video that is history now. Just a quick question though; we have a symmetrical spinnaker, do these tips also apply for a symmetrical spinnaker?

ATN recommends blowing the tack for the takedown- tack blown makes easy work for the shut….

Excellent you two! I'm in El Salvador on a mooring ball getting some work done and want to add a spinnaker set up for my 1989 Island packet 35. It doesn't have a halyard for a spinnaker. working on an external block at the mast head???

Really good better than the North sails version esp mentioning block for snuffer lines which we have ! Would be embarrassing to let go of the snuffer lines when hoisting and see them float away to windward out of reach .

wow second channel! are new videos coming?

Very nice video & love the ratchet block & tweaker tips. I only saw one sheet being attached, so do you drop rather than gybe?

I stopped using markers for putting position marks on lines. They never last. Instead I'll just whip a section of the line about 1-1.5cm (1/2") in a contrasting color. For my headsail furling line for example I have 1 whipped marker at "first reef" and two with a 1cm gap at "second reef". My spinnaker halyard (I'm using a top down furler) has one mark that sits right at the rope clutch for the proper initial tension. The whipping lasts forever and doesn't jam in clutches, runs smoothly through blocks.

Mornin’, I volunteer to help deliver Friday if we can work out return transport. Please forward your favorite applicable spinnaker handling videos. S.

Did you attach the guy to the clew, to the tack line shackle, or does the tack line run through the guy's shackle?

Did you mean to say you jaw the pole onto the tack line and attach a sheet to the jaw, or are you looping the sheet through the jaw, clipping onto the tack, and then unclipping the tack line from the tack and then onto the jaw? I suppose each way has its benefits or have you found the latter to be best? Love your videos.

Thanks for the tips, what about sailing just with the gennaker and close the main sail in order to sail with a wind angle of 160 without using the pole? Have you ever tried?

What weight is your spin? A lot of cruisers get 1.5oz but I prefer 0.75oz because it's my light weather sail

Just wondering why you change to the Genoa to go wing to wing and not go wing to wing with the asymmetric?

Can you expound on the type and size of the pole you use? It appears to be a telescoping whisker pole with storage on a track on the mast. The loads from controlling the tack on your asymmetric are obviously ok for this set-up or am I wrong and the pole is a fixed regular spin pole? Do you have some apparent wind limits on polling the tack of your asymmetric? We want to have just one pole for both a wing on wing main-Genoa and to sail deeper like you show with the asymmetric but have heard conflicting opinions. Thanks and love your tips and tricks!!

Love the ratchet block for the spinnaker sock. WHat model and make block did you use? I can find a snatch block or a ratchet block, but not a ratchet snatch block.

Do you have two lines on the snuffer? IE one for uphaul and one for downhaul? Or just one continuous line? If just one, how do you get the ratcheting block onto the line (or is it installed permanently?)

Can you explain the ratchet block you used. Is it some sort of snatch ratchet block or did you remove the cheeks to allow the continuous loop to run through the block

Do you ever fly it without the mainsail up? When downwind, we are often short-handed just fly the one sail, a foresail. It needs to be rather big in light airs. The boat is a Union Polaris 36, long-keeled, and close to 11 tons all-up.

Que pena. Podríais poner los subtítulos en Español. Buen video. Gracias

If I sail deep angles with my asymmetric I dont fly white sails. Asym is 100m, full whites are 75. For the drop unfurl genny for wind shadow.

Why not just run with the spinnaker wing on wing? It's has worked well for me

Not clear to me how you are raising the pole. I guess you have another line aloft. I have a halyard for spinnaker, main and Genoa. They are all in use. Do I need to hold the pole up?

Could I ask for type an dimensions of blocks you use, and dimension and type of ropes ?

Your pole is a standard spin pole? Longer than your J length? Any issues with it being long enough to pole out your Genoa wing on wing? No dedicated whisker for that I reckon? Thanks!

Thanks good video, one remark: using a pole adds complexity to handling. Gennakers were invented for easier handling than spinakers… adding the pole adds up the complexity and for a couple sailing the two of them is not a very good solution… i guess we would be sailing on gennaker only if going really deep downwind without the main. The speed difference will be marginal…

I'd like a demo of how to hoist and drop an asymm kite for solo cruisers. I have a feeling that the only way to fly a asymm kite safely and efficiently is to have it on a (removable) furler (like Sailing Uma) instead of in a sock. Is that correct?

What about gybing?

Can you explain the angles that they mentioned? The angles seemed opposite of the degree they were describing.

pole jaws up or down? I have read rationals for both

"Rolly Tasker sails come with the corners labelled". I'm sorry lol but all brand of sails do too. Looks like a great sail though.

The drop - how about blowing the tack, then pull the shut down with little resistance….

what about gybing though :)

You may have just saved my marriage.

No second (lazy) sheet attached to the clew? How do you gybe then….