The Rattleboard

I took my first (actually my only) sailing lessons when I was 7 in Coconut Grove, Florida. A couple of kids from Peacock Park were also doing classes with me. The boats they were using were some form of messed up old junk but I was very lucky that my grandmother had a pristine Sunfish for me to use. I was the most popular kid in class, everyone wanted to sail with me for some odd reason.

But that's not the point of this story. I read a blog called Proper Course by a very active Laser sailor who also dabbles in Sunfishes. Every time he mentions the daggerboard, I have to do a quick translation in my head because my Sunfish's daggerboard rattled so badly that we took to calling it a rattleboard and that's stuck with me for 30 years.

And it's not just dinghies either. Mari Cha IV just installed daggerboards to help her upwind sailing. My off the cuff initial reaction was that the rattling would produce drag, not even considering that MC4's engineers might have just possibly made a tight fit for their rattle, umm, daggerboards.

My daughter is soon to be starting sailing lessons (3 summers from now) and my only goal is to provide her with a sturdy boat that won't cause lifelong scarring like my Grandmother's Sunfish.