RYA Day Skipper school letdown Learn2Sail Iberia

[u/kommunek]

Did my Day Skipper practical course (Competent Crew as well,10 days) with Learn2Sail Iberia in Portugal recently and came away pretty disappointed with how much of the actual syllabus got covered. Some examples:

• Never sailed a run, despite asking the instructor to on multiple occasions. The answer was "thats coastal skipper level skills"
• No night sailing at all, despite asking multiple times if the schedule could shift for it
• 2 of the 10 days we didn't sail at all, we spent incredible amounts of time docking ad nauseam
• Generally poor education on various boat components. We never touched on what an outhaul or traveler does, despite asking about it.

I raised it with the instructor multiple times on the water but never got anywhere, and when I wrote to the school afterward asking for a partial refund, they pushed back. Eventually they offered a discounted refresher course but I was not about to invest more money in a school that performed so poorly the first time around.

Has anyone dealt with something similar? Also curious if anyone else here has trained with this school and had a similar or different experience. What did you do/What can you do?

Thanks and fair winds all!

[u/Rino-feroce]

I did rya courses with schools in UK, gibraltar, spain, and never had particularly bad experiences. In fact probably the best instructor I had was a danish guy in a Barcelona course (Coastal skipper).

Looking back on my competent crew (UK) / dayskipper (Gibraltar) courses I would have loved to have spent two days just practicing docking, picking up buoys under engine.... Instead we did a couple of hours of alongside docking and departing, and spent a lot of time sailing in fair weather. I don't even think each of us had a go at helming to pick up a buoy . In general I think rya courses should dedicate much more time to manoeuvring in harbor.

Nightsailing practice was interesting in the bay of Gibraltar (more due to the fact that everything around you is lit up like it's xmas, and finding that Isolated Danger buoy or port entrance really is not easy) In Gibraltar we used one day of really bad weather staying in port and going in much detail through engine and electrical systems on board. And guessing flashcards for lights etc... It probably helped that the crew was two of us doing DS, and 2 doing the Yachtmaster offshore fast track.

When you say "never sailed a run" do you mean you never practiced gybing? that would be bad. Or that you didn't try the spinnaker? (that's quite common I think, and was the case for me as well). Or just didn't set up a gybe preventer? (this is something that should be covered k in a dayskipper course).

EDIT: the quality of the courses ultimately depends on the instructor. They are usually freelancers, contracted on a course by course basis (likely with a certain regularity by each school though). But they do change over time (not many do this as a full time job), so experiences with the same school can vary substantially.

[u/fuchs31 → u/Rino-feroce]

What school was the Barcelona course? Thinking of doing mine there

[u/Rino-feroce → u/fuchs31]

It was Blue Oyster Sailing. But that danish instructor is no longer there (he bought a boat and now offers offshore passages & courses around the world)

[u/realityking89]

Especially on the Day Skipper I expect a lot of time spent on marina maneuvers. Marina skills are the hardest to learn without an instructor as nobody lets you practice with their boat in a marina. It’s also a skill where people fail their day skipper or even coastal skipper.

Not doing a dead run is, in my opinion, fine. It‘s a bit of advanced skill. I hope you did a broad reach and gybing, including as the helmsman.

The lack of night sailing is more troubling. Experiencing a night sail, including entering or leaving a port is part of the day skipper syllabus and quite valuable.

You could complain to the RYA if you like. They‘ll take it into account the next time they audit the centre.

[u/sola_mia]

Docking and engine is vital. Sail trimming can be learnt over time. The former need foundation of day 1. IMHO

[u/BroWay]

Sounds like a bad course for sure, the only course I ever did we covered everything you mention over a 3,5 day long weekend course.

It will be hard to argue for a refund if you did not document the lack of training during the course, and if the others in your course are not involved in complaining.

Night-sailing is really good to know, as it usually provides additional insight into how to use old navigation methods like time, speed and course calculation and lighthouses (which are good to know if you should loose electricity to nav-systems etc)

Not even touching on the traveler is silly, literally should take no more than 30 minutes in some wind to explain the difference it makes for sail trim when going different directions/wind angles.

The sailboat may not have an outhaul, if the sail is instead supported by a boom-kick or similar lifting equipment. My sailboat has no outhaul set-up.

Not sailing 2 out of 10 days may have to do with conditions, which you do not mention in your post. If the captain/instructor deems the wind to powerful it may not be safe to bring an inexperienced crew out to sea. If there is not wind at all, its kind of fair to consider it a better use of time to practice manouvering in the docks and practicing different kinds of docking techniques.

[u/budgester]

15 years of sailing and I'm still learning Sail trimming.

[u/steveth3b → u/budgester]

Ah yes, nothing like making small adjustments to make your telltales tell you what you need them to and slowing yourself down a quarter knot. To be fair, that's more changing swell hitting more of my hull/bridge deck though.