Clear your air — pinned, foot off
Stuck in bad air but boxed in — boats on your tail mean a tack would land on them. Put the bow down, foot for speed, and slide into the clean lane to leeward.
You're in the dirty air of the boat ahead, but you can't escape the usual way: there are boats right on your tail, and the gap is too small to tack and cross them. So you do the next best thing — foot off. Bear away a few degrees, trade a little height for speed, and slide forward and to leeward until your bow noses out of the shadow into a clean lane. You haven't gained on the leaders, but you've stopped the bleeding and you're sailing fast again. When you can't tack, footing for a lane keeps you in the race.
Opens the animation on the boat-length grid — scrub it, edit it, or use it as a starting point. Free, no account needed.
How it interacts with other rules
- Rule Tactics — Clear your air — tack and cross · see also
Same trap, but with room to tack and cross instead.
- Rule Tactics — Clear your air — tack out · see also
The clear-behind case where you simply tack out.