The foggiest so far

QingDao is certainly a foggy place at this time of year. Here is the Greek Yngling being towed just 15 metres behind the motorboat. This huge city - 8 million people and the 8th largest in China - is warm and humid right now, and we have been getting a lot of fog. We've been getting lot of weed too but the many workers from the Chinese Army and local populace have been doing a really good job to clear it. It looked for a few days as if they had nearly cleared it all away but we came across some really big patches today so it must still be growing.

Things are in the final countdown here to the Olympics. Security is getting tighter and the final tidy up is under way. Everyone is friendly and helpful.

China Olympics and beyond

With Beijing soon to start, I know all the teams are in the final stages of preparation. One of my friends from the circuit, Sofia Bekatorou - the Greek gold medallist from 2004 in the 470 Class - has asked me to give her a last minute boost to her programme. So I'm off to Qingdao soon, and will get to experience for myself the fog and the tides that everyone has been talking about.

While so much sporting interest is zeroing into this Aug/Sept, I've had occasion to help find advice for a couple of youngsters in long distance running and Triathalon - best coaching, study-sport balance etc. With 2012 coming, it is really encouraging to talk to some excellent people in UK Athletics with an approachable yet practical commonsense attitude. This is especially important as I note that parents are encouraging of their very talented youngsters to consider a sports career, whereas normally I think academia and business would take precedence. Its great to have such a good infrastructure in Sport in this country - very uplifting!

MOCRA and double-handed racing

I’ve been racing a Dragonfly a few times recently www.multihullsolutions.co.uk and have thoroughly enjoyed myself. In particular, the racing in the Royal Southampton YC www.rsyc.org.uk double-handed series.

I love the speed we travel, the tactics and strategy of sailing coastal races and the constant action of sailing short-handed. The social life is good too. A few weekends ago we went for dinner in the Weymouth curry house. Six people from three boats made a lot of experiences to talk about, with highs and lows to be shared. So very different from having one big crew around one table and in a similar state of mind from that day’s racing.

Prince2

Whey hey! Just found our that I have passed my Prince 2 Project Management exams. I’m very pleased, not least that it has been some time since I have taken exams. Good course too - it really helped to straighten out my ideas on structure and processes. Thinking back over past projects, it is now much clearer why what went right and wrong.

Now my plan of putting my two strengths of project management and coaching together as one offering is coming together.

It was interesting how resourceful my NLP training was when those old exam nerves kicked in. NLP really is good stuff!

A head for heights

I went climbing recently and was delighted to find that I have finally overcome my totally irrational fear of heights.

I am so pleased,especially since I used to take such pleasure in climbing in trees as a kid, yet that got eroded in adulthood to the stage where I came out of one experience as a gibbering wreck. I’ve been working up to this for some time using NLP techniques and high ropes courses. This time was on the cliffs at Swannage.

We were under the very expert tuition of Chris Barratt. I fully recommend him to others who want a very safe, reassuring yet fun experience. Visit his very nice website at www.chrisbarratt.co.uk

Time wasting or mind stretching?

Try this:

http://spaceplace.nasa.gov/en/kids/games.shtml

The Possibility Virus

I subscribe to ‘Outside the Lines’ - a newsletter by Canadian Michael Bungay Stanier. This month’s is SO wide-ranging and certainly thought provoking. He’s posted it on his ‘Possibility Virus’ website www.possibilityvirus.com/blog/2008/04/07/do-you-want-to-cheat-death/ Some of its a bit gruesome or eerie but keep going and it’ll get you thinking about change.

Creativity and Education

Go have a look at this talk by Sir Ken Robinson on TED www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/66 . This very entertaining talk is about the serious subject of how we educate people out of creativity. Very much food for thought.

Ken Robinson was the Chairman, of a committee that produced a report for the british Government in 1999 called ‘All our Futures’ www.dfes.gov.uk/naccce/index1.shtml . I was given some statistics out of this report on the measure of genius level of creativity by age:
Age 3-5 98% have Genius level creativity
8-10 32%
13-15 10%
25+ 2%

How disturbing is this!

I was asked the question recently - ‘how creative are you in your life?’ and I find myself making surprising discoveries of instances today, especially having released myself from the definition of creative = art. However, I have also discovered how often I constrict myself from achieving and richer life, usually by allowing time pressure to get to me. More action required!

What I do know is that I find sailing well a creative experience. I was helming a beautiful 50’ yacht ‘Atlantis’ down the channel to Dover the other day and had a lot of fun steering precisely right in the waves. I was just watching the waves with total concentration, no other thoughts or self-talk. Beautiful.

RORC Easter Regatta

I’ve just finished coaching at the RORC Red Funnel Easter Regatta in Cowes - wet and windy this year. It was such a shame two days were blown off. It was a pleasure to see the big boats in action today - fast, furious and fun!

I’ve been to a lot of prizegivings in my life but this one is one of the best. The prizes are Easter Eggs,and the way it’s conducted by Janet Grosvenor is just fun.

The coaching came from an alliance of the RORC with the RYA and is getting better year on year. It's providing real added value to the regatta. Jim Saltonstall led the way with, as usual, an exemplary demonstration of peppering education with entertainment in the Regatta Centre in the West Cowes Marina. While walking down the High Street Jim came across a passer-by with a real live ferret, and a photo was duely taken. In recognition of Jim’s relationship with all his ‘ferrets’ I hope it gets put up on the RORC website www.rorc.org when the staff transfer from the Disrespect back up to St. James.

French Lighthouses in BIG waves

Just have a look at this!

www.kimhollamby.com/blog/

TED

One of the nice things about the power of blogging is the ability to share. I take great pleasure in sharing this latest find - TED

www.ted.com

Have fun!

small actions X lots of people = big change

I was with a group of friends in Devon the other day, where I heard about a website described to me as ‘a global movement for random acts of kindness’. With a description like that I just had to go and look.

www.wearewhatwedo.org is fascinating. A lovely resource for practical ways of making a difference. Have fun!

Improvement through review

I’ve been looking at new ways of improving my diction recently in light of the work done while gaining my Masters in NLP at the end of last year. To that end I’ve just bought a nifty little voice recorder, and have been using it this last four days in my role as trainer on the RYA Keelboat Coaches Course, where we were looking at how to coach rather than what to coach.

It has proved a very good feedback tool, and has enabled me to start to making improvements to my speech, so I’m very pleased. We had the RYA’s Keelboat Manager with us observing, which proved very useful as I was able to obtain feedback from him too which opened a window into a potential improvement in session planning which will prove of great benefit in future.

The course is not run on a frequent basis, so we always request the filling out of feedback forms, and run a de-brief for ourselves to generate improvements for next year. We are reassured this time that last year’s changes have been for the better, and hope that next year’s will be even better.

I used to be afraid of feedback. Now I welcome it

Word play

Here's a nice piece of software - www.visualthesaurus.com .

I enjoy words and this has to be the ultimate word exploration tool. Lots of fun to play with, as well as fulfilling a serious function.

ooops - retract that!

From Neil Gladwell: I'm afraid that you, like many others, have picked up on the petition about UK tidal data copyright without knowing that one of the basic statements of the petition is wrong. I publish tide tables here in the UK, I have a licence from the United Kingdom Hydrographic Office (UKHO) to do it and as of last year that licence cost me nothing at all. Its not true when Mr Bartholomew states Currently Her Majesty's Government is requiring payment by any who wish to use and publish this data. Sure I used to have to pay but it was a tiny amount, around 1p sterling for each copy of my main publication, and that was only because I wanted to use the data for commercial ends. I hope you have the chance to mention the petition isn't correct or amend your report.

Ah well. Still - the No.10 website still makes interesting reading.

Petitions

Scuttlebutt, the sailing news via the web, www.scuttlebutt.com, publicised a request to sign a petition for allow all British tidal data to be available to users free of charge.

In signing up I found myself on the 10 Downing Street website www.pm.gov.uk/output/Page1.asp where the petitions page houses all sorts of wonders. The top (!) petition is a request to allow the Red Arrow to fly over the 2012 Olympics (244909 signatures). Another in the top 5 is ‘Make Jeremy Clarkson Prime Minister (38876 signatures).

The Tide Table petition has gone a log way to go (1481 signatures) but very little time - the deadline in 11th January, so get signing! www.petitions.pm.gov.uk/Tidetable-data

Winchester Cathedral

Winchester has got a HUGE cathedral. It costs in excess of £2 million a year to keep it in good condition, so the fundraising activities to do this are extensive. For the second year running there has been an Ice Rink in the Catherdral Close, and a lot of fun being had by all.

A trawl around the website www.winchester-cathedral.co.uk turns up many other interesting facts. There are over 600 volunteers working for the Cathedral, and if you want, you can volunteer to become a ‘Holy Duster’. The crypt, which currently houses a sculpture by Anthony Gormely floods so the water laps the sculpture’s toes. The latest ‘News’ includes an interesting discussion of the use and make-up of incense http://www.winchester-cathedral.org.uk/new/community/1/

There is a major choral tradition here, and the music is beautiful. I recently attended one of the carol concerts and it was fantastic. One of the plus points of being a resident is that I can get a year’s pass into the building to explore at will without paying the tourist entry rates, or to sometimes just stop and sit.

NLP Master

I’ve just completed my Master’s qualification in NLP with Pegasus www.nlp-now.co.uk - whey-hey! I’m really pleased. A tough course which has added immeasurably to my skills and techniques tool-kit.

Part of the qualification is a modelling project, and I chose how to dock a motorboat. In common with many racing sailors, my seamanship skills are not so sharp and I really admire the skill and panache shown by people who often make their living the water.

The Boatmen from the Royal Lymington Yacht Club www.rlymyc.co.uk and Mike Morgan, a self-employed powerboat trainer along with his son Tom all gave me the benefit of their awesome skills and experience. I learnt so much, and they helped me to prepare a great project. My thanks to them all.

MOCRA sailing

Went sailing yesterday. What a great day for it. Sunny and wind without being damp or freezing.

I sailed with a friend on his Dragonfly - a trimaran that has fold-in in the outriggers for docking/storage. We were racing in a Royal Southampton Sailing Club (RSYC) club race and had loads of fun. Beer, food and good company in the bar afterwards rounded off a good day. Well worth getting out of bed for.

Multihull sailing (racing and cruising) is run by MOCRA http://mocra-cruising.org.uk . While there are all sorts of events through the year, all the south coast multihulls come together for the winter to race together in the RSYC winter series http://www.rsyc.org.uk.

What’s so fun is that you can sail with many fewer crew than most monohulls, are more involved by being shorter-handed and you go faster!

ISAF Conference

I’ve just come back from the International Sailing Federation Conference (ISAF) in Lisbon. Tough year – we had to vote to drop an event at the Olympics. Its never fun being part of the decision–making process, but one thing is for sure. We do our best to represent sailors’ interests both those competing now and those who will compete in the future, and none of us take this responsibility lightly - whatever commentators in the press say.