Wow Tony, what an amazing story. Thanks for sharing with the forum. I'm so happy that all 6 of Incisor's crew made it out alive. Bravo to you and your crew. Will we see you racing at some other Lower Mainland events this year?
Lee side approach is also what we taught our volunteers at the small boat rescue program that I used to run at the Jericho Sailing Centre during my University summers. The reasons are the same. Wind and wave action is less likely to push the rescue boat over the rescuee.
The technique that I ended up using and teaching for hauling in heavy people (again much easier from a rigid hull inflatable than a sailboat) was to bring arms up first, then reach down to the belt area and pivot the body up to haul in a leg then the rest. The idea is to get the weight supported in chunks instead of one big dead lift. I am a small guy (135 lbs now and less when I was performing that training) and I was able to get a 200+ lb man wearing only a thin recreational grade wetsuit (no other floatation) into the rescue boat on several occasions. More often than not he ended up on top of me. I doubt that I could make this happen on my J/30 though. With this kind of thing practice makes perfect. Sounds like something we should arrange in July or August when the water in English Bay actually gets warm.
