Short, sharp and sweet

by John Curnow on 4 Oct 2016 It was a ‘short’ night on Saturday as some States crossed over to daylight savings. Been a little bit GABO of late, so it only added to the trance like state that goes with sleep deprivation. As you can see above, Ingrid Abery’s image of the prodder gate crashing the party at Les Voiles de St Tropez France certainly takes care of the ‘sharp’ aspect.

So then ‘sweet’ would have to come from the fact that many clubs had their respective Open Days on the weekend, and so the new season now officially gets underway. Sweet – oh yeah, said that, so anyway, let’s just go for a yacht….

Probably also means it is time to remind everyone to have their Publicity Officer, club, association, Race Committee or gathering to ensure they get their material in to Sail-World.com via the ‘Submit News’ button right up the top of the home page, next to ‘Contact’.

You do not have to write your own thesis into the modern yachty. Indeed your own dissertation can be, and you guessed it, short, sharp and sweet! (Aargh, Aargh, Aargh!) Sail-World's readers are hungry for sailing news and Sail-World welcomes your contributions, especially National titles. Stories, pictures and or results can be uploaded via the submit news page.

Open Day also marks the start of the time of year that Australian Championships are sailed in an enormous number of Classes of dinghies, cats and yachts. Sail-World is happy to review and publish appropriate articles and pictures, be they reports from events, profiles of people and boats, techniques, safety or seamanship, cruising destinations, tuning, tactics, safety and seamanship, tales of your adventures on the water, or indeed just about anything to do with sailing. There is always a story waiting to be told.

Material can also cover rally news, new innovations, clever discoveries, previews, mid-event reports, any kind of news and pictures that the racing and cruising sailor would love to read. Just follow the instructions and don't forget the URL of your website or event, as we provide a live hyperlink back to your site. Send this story to your Class Publicity Officer and the President as well, so they can see just how easy it is. ??

And don't forget, Sail-World.com, and its companion titles, Sail-WorldCruising.com, Powerboat-World, FishingBoating-World and MarineBusiness-World have a large worldwide audience in more than sixty countries.

Ideally, Sail-World needs you to submit both copy and pictures via the special upload system, which ensures your contribution is received with correct titles, image captions etc. The reason for using the upload system and forms is that reduces the editing time dramatically (by a factor of 10), so your chances of being published quickly are very high.

In the same vein, don't just leave it until the finish of the regatta to do a report - do a preview, and a report each day. Mention your sponsors in each and they will get many times the exposure they would have, had you done just a single report. They'll be keen to sponsor you again, if you can show them the value you deliver. Also you'll build a following for your class, club and events, which will help bring new sailors into your fold. Look upon your reports as free marketing.

Finally, you don't need a $30,000 camera and a 100ft lens to take great shots. Remember, the iPhone is the largest selling camera in the world. Just make sure you get close enough to your subject to fill the frame - a shot from the start boat or finish by one of the race committee is fine, or from a mark boat at a rounding mark. Most of the professionals take their shots at these points on the course, where the action is coming to them, so they don't have to chase it.

Sail-World.com has heaps more information for submitting an article, including commercial ones, if the information is of value to our readers in the full set of contributors guidelines Anyway, need to finish now, so that this little ditty remains short, sharp and hopefully, pretty sweet!

Now if you would like to receive the Sail-World newsletter each week, then please go to the 'Newsletter' button at the top of the Sail-World home page and enter your details. Simples...