Episode #179: Cal Sailing Club on Volunteer-Run Community Sailing

This week we welcome aboard Cal Sailing Club’s executive committee aka ExComm to chat about providing safe, cheap, and fun sailing and windsurfing for all! In this jam-packed episode you’ll meet Commodore Nicho Waton, Vice Commodore Isha Mishra, Third Vice Commodore Shreyas Chand, and Secretary Sara Zimmerman.

Tune in as the ExComm chats with host Ryan Foland about the moments that made them fall in love with sailing in the Bay Area, their unique membership and volunteering model, why you don’t need to have your own boat, how to learn to windsurf, and the famous alumni of the club.

Here’s a sample of what you’ll hear in this episode: 

• What does community mean to you?
• How to become a member or get involved with Cal Sailing Club?
• Are there any surprising facts or crazy historical stories about the club?
• Do many members have their own boat? Is there a formal structure?
• Are newbies taught how to sail by certified instructors?
• New things on the horizon for Cal Sailing Club

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and your other favorite podcast spots — follow and leave a 5-star review if you’re feeling the Good Jibes!

Learn more about the Cal Sailing Club at Cal-Sailing.org and on Instagram @CalSailingClub, and connect with Ryan at Ryan.Online

Check out the show notes and transcript below for much more detail.

Show Notes

• Cal Sailing Club on Volunteer-Run Community Sailing
  • [0:21] Welcome to Good Jibes with Latitude 38
  • [1:50] What’s Sara’s cat’s name?
  • [2:25] Nicho’s standalone sailing story that shaped them
  • [4:10] Is there something about not sailing for 30 years that makes you want to get on the water as much as possible?
  • [5:20] Isha’s sailing story
  • [8:05] Is confidence a given after working through capsize fear by immersion?
  • [10:03] Shreyas’ sailing story
  • [13:20] Do any of the guests own a boat or on the path to boat ownership?
  • [15:09] Sara’s sailing story
  • [18:24] Have you looked in our classy Classifieds lately? To find a copy of Latitude 38 near you, go to Latitude38.com 
  • Cal Sailing Club
  • [19:18] A virtual open house of Cal Sailing Club
  • [21:01] How to become a member or get involved with the mission?
  • [23:58] Are they always looking for members?
  • [26:19] What is the leadership structure of Cal Sailing Club?
  • [28:20] Do many members have their own boat? Is there a formal structure?
  • [30:58] How integrated is windsurfing?
  • [33:52] More information on the sailing instruction at Cal Sailing Club
  • [36:10] Are there any surprising facts or crazy historical stories?
  • [37:31] Any exciting or new things that they have coming up on the radar? 
  • [38:46] How can we make sure that folks from all different experiences have a good experience at the club?
  • [39:50] Email [email protected] if you want to sponsor a future episode of Good Jibes with Latitude 38
  • Community
  • [40:32] What does community look like at the club?
  • [46:29] Connect with Cal Sailing Club
  • [49:15] Show up even when you’re scared
  • [50:13] Make sure to follow Good Jibes with Latitude 38 on your favorite podcast spot and leave us a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts
  • Theme Song: “Pineapple Dream” by Solxis

Episode Transcript:
Please note: transcript not 100% accurate.

00:02

Everything is focused on just getting people out on the water and enjoying that sports experience as quickly as we can.

00:21

Ahoy everyone and welcome aboard this vessel, which is the Good Jibes podcast. And today we’ve got the biggest boat ever because we have four guests plus me, which is about the maximum capacity in my 1977 Cal 34, luxurious cockpit. So we’re welcoming them all aboard. We’ve got Nicho Waton, we’ve got Shreyas Chand, we’ve got Sara Zimmerman, and we’ve got Isha Mishra.

00:50

Wait, is that really rhyme like that Isha? Is that how it works? Isha Mishra. Isha Mishra. Okay, still got a little bit of flavor to it.

00:59

Now we will learn that the California Sailing Club is a bit informal and not as official as you’d think. So we never really talk about it as the California Sailing Club, though technically, according to Sarah, that might be the technical. But we go with Cal Sailing Club, just like we don’t use last names. So we’ve got Nicho, Shreyas, Sara, and Isha. Welcome aboard.

01:27

Good Jibes podcast. It’s a community where we get together, talk about sailing, racing, all things in between, cruising, and yacht clubs are a great fodder to talk about that kind of stuff. Part of our goal is to engage existing community and build new communities. So there’s people who might not have heard about you, and there’s people who might listen to this and be like, no, no, I’m part of the CalSailing Club. So it’s all part of the same, and we’ve also got a cat. Sarah’s got a cat. Sarah, what’s your cat’s name? You just joined the Zoom.

01:57

or she, I don’t know. This is Leo. He’s a kitten. Leo. Oh, is Leo a sailor? Because I know a lot of sailing cats. Does Leo sail? He’d probably love to sail. He hasn’t turned it out yet. He’s a newbie. He’s a newbie. He’s not allowed out of the house yet. All right. Well, we got cats, we got people, we got lots of conversations to go. So let’s kick this thing off. And we always start our podcast with storytelling. And you can learn a lot about salty sailors from the stories that shape them. So we’re going to go around little round Robin.

02:25

and we want to know a single standalone sailing story that shaped you and why it shaped you and how you’re a different person because of it. Nico, you’re up first, buddy. Sounds good. Yeah, thanks a lot for having us. It’s really nice. We’re always excited to talk about community and community sailing. It’s a good match with the sailing club. So in my case, I took a class when I was like nine or 10 years old, it was an

02:55

Opti. It was back in France where I’m from in Normandy. And I just remember that class being really fun. And fast forward in 2017, different events led me to think about sailing again. And I’ve not done it since. So more than 30 years, and I signed up to a class. It was in Richmond. And I just went the first day and

03:25

It was pretty windy, like it was 20, 25 knots, maybe gusts and the boat was healing a lot. The other student was actually getting very, very nervous and was not enjoying the class. And I was just having so much fun. And we, it was just a one day, well, it was multiple days, but I went back in the evening and I just remember leaving, just feeling so, so pumped and so excited about this. And it

03:54

completely changed me since because I really became a big part of my life. And on average I’ve sailed once or twice a week in those now seven years. That was a turning point for me. Was there something about not having done it for 30 years that made you just want to make up for lost time and get out in the water as much as possible? Was there sort of a self-imposed FOMO and you’re just like, I’m not going to let this happen again.

04:24

Oh, for sure. I think, yeah, in some ways it was a bit of a homo I was catching up to. And since then, I’ve been wanting to do a bit of everything like I’ve signed up to some oceanic trips, sailing from like Vancouver to SF or going to French Polynesia, or just locally like doing some racing and then eventually in 2019 joining the Cal Sailing Club.

04:51

looking to find a community of like-minded people who are just obsessed with sailing and with connecting and having fun and also teaching others. I think that’s also something that is a great component of this community we have here and that we’re going to talk about is I enjoy the sailing because it’s not just something you do for yourself but you do it with others.

05:20

very easy to get back and to connect with others through sailing. The wind that keeps on giving. I like it. All right, Isha, how about you? What’s something that stands out, a story that shaped you on the water? My first lesson, I was super afraid, to be honest. Wait, wait, were you in the boat with Nico? Nico, was that her? No, I was not in the boat with Nico. I don’t actually remember who my instructor was at that time. It was my first lesson at Cal Sailing Club.

05:45

I knew I wanted to learn to sail for a ton of reasons and found CalSailing Club on Yelp and it was affordable. It was a great option. I went to my first sailing lesson. It was a Saturday morning and it was a ton of wind and I was really afraid that we were going to capsize and I was scared the entire time and I was thinking like, there’s no way that I’m going to be able to learn to do this. And then a few weeks later, I continued to go to lessons because I was like, I should.

06:12

I should keep trying. I was like, what am I, like, I know I’m afraid of capsizing. At this point, I hadn’t capsized before at all. And I think that’s what I really was afraid of. And so there was a women’s sailing workshop that was all about capsize recovery because we have, you know, part of Cal Sailing Club is we have a women’s sailing group too, that sometimes runs their own events. And the chair was organizing a women’s capsize workshop where all we did was capsize over and over and over again, closer to the Marina. So it was like a controlled.

06:41

environment. And I went to that and we did like, you know, I probably did like five or six dry cap sizes on a JY and learned, you know, that actually it’s not that scary. And like, you know, what the worst that could happen from a cap size, obviously, like there’s a lot of, you know, there’s a lot of risks and failing and everything, but I was realizing that I had the confidence, you know, to actually be able to recover from the cap size and the resources from CSE to continue to learn and gain confidence. So I think that

07:09

moment like after going to that workshop I wouldn’t my next lessons I was way less afraid because the thing that I was afraid of Happening I just did it over and over again and realize oh, it’s not that bad So I think that was where I think Cal Sailing Club really encouraged me to you know gain confidence in something that I felt a little bit fearful of before yeah, and then I got my junior rating and it was awesome and now I’ve been on plenty of boats that have capsized and it’s actually when I am teaching it’s one of the things I like to teach because

07:37

I feel like it’s a good nice step process to recover. And it’s something that I think a lot of newer students are afraid of. Yeah, it makes me think of like a small, medium, and large capsize, right? There’s the one that’s like almost close and scary enough and it’s kind of small. And then it’s medium if you can step over. And then it’s like, you know, when you just get thrown from the boat, it’s large. Do you feel like you’ve since working through the capsize fear by immersion, has it changed your approach and how you approach other things on land that

08:05

you might be technically afraid of capsizing, whether it’s taking a risk in business or putting yourself out there socially. Do you think it’s given you that confidence or did you just always have it? It was just the water was another manifestation of working through it, which you did. I think it probably did. I think a lot of times, I personally need to try things before I’m confident that I could do it. And I think sailing has helped me realize that you can look at the

08:35

the worst case scenario and then recognize if that’s actually as bad as you think it is. It is probably true in like work and all these other scenarios or maybe you’re not on the water but your decision making is really crucial and it’s good to look at you know here are all the things that can happen and here where can I reduce the risk and increase the safety across different decisions. So I think so. I think that it’s definitely increased my confidence.

09:00

I get all these spam emails because I’m notorious for like getting excited and signing up for things and then I can just never get rid of them. They just, however many times I unsubscribe, they just continue to come in. And so every once in a while, I’ll just click to see, you know, what’s going on. And one came through this morning with a quote that seems pertinent here, which is, anything worth doing well is worth doing poorly at first. So to make this a saline, any type of saline…

09:29

well starts with poor sailing first. You know you have to get out there and it’s one of those things if you’ve never done it before. Nico you were like describing Isha on the boat and Isha there might have been another Nico on the boat like it’s both sides but it’s the glutton for punishment to come back and then you once you realize you know you’re not on a motorcycle going 30 to 60 miles an hour hitting concrete you’re in the water and sometimes it’s refreshing if you’re on a small boat and it’s like ah.

09:56

But at first it can seem super crazy scary. So I think the small dingy approach to life is a good one. Shreyas, how about you? So my story is about moving away from the Bay Area and coming back. During the pandemic, my wife and I packed up our things and we took a road trip, spent a few months with our family and decided to say goodbye to the Bay Area. I lived here for about, at that point, I wanna say about eight years or so.

10:26

And my wife is a native of the Bay Area. And we left. We didn’t have as many friends around here by that point. They’d all spread around. And we spent about two years in the Seattle area, which was phenomenal. We loved it. And then a job opportunity for my wife brought us back. And I honestly was not looking forward to being back. It felt like a step backwards in time. I’ve been here. This is a phase of my life that I’d moved past through.

10:54

the magic of therapy and just self reflection. You know, I resolved to do something different, something I hadn’t done before in the bay to make it feel not like a step back, but you know, a step into something new. I was looking around and I found CalSailing online, really thought there was a typo in the pricing because it was cheaper than any opportunity to sail that I’d ever seen before. And I just went for it. I didn’t do too much research. I just needed to just dive into something new and.

11:22

went into my first Saturday morning sailing lesson. I don’t know if it was blind confidence or just a complete unawareness of what sailing involved. Probably combination, yeah. Yeah, probably a combination. I did not have a scary experience like you should have. That came later. But that first day just getting out on the water and being able to see Berkeley and Alcatraz and Golden Gate Bridge and San Francisco and being on the water and feeling the spray and the wind, it just was…

11:50

Like a moment of transformation. I was like, oh my god, why did I leave this place ever? This is incredible. This is magical. And why have I not been sailing my whole life? This is phenomenal. I’m on the water. I’ve got these views. It’s just it just was all of these things hitting me all at once. And yeah, I was just immediately hooked. I like I need to be here every weekend. This is what I’m doing now.

12:14

That is awesome. I always tell people the ocean is my potion and there’s so many people who just don’t know it until they can get out there and experience it. And to Niko what you’re saying, it’s not always about just you sailing, it’s about sharing the experience. And every time you do, I love taking people out sailing because you feel that regenerative that first time, that first, all the things that they experience, you experience through them. Sailing is something that can completely freshen up.

12:42

what could be a mundane land life of landlocked, of things like that. Because you get out there and you don’t control the wind and can be scary. As soon as you think that you’re safe, maybe you’re not. And then it’s like kind of hairy and crazy and then it’s no wind and it’s like everything in between. So it’s also just a test in patience. Now you had never been on a boat before this. You just sort of jumped in literally. Pretty much. I mean, I’d done one of these like, you know, little cruise kind of things where you- Nothing under your own control. This was- No, never. Yeah, this was it.

13:12

Now I know that what’s cool about this club in particular is you don’t have to have a boat. So does anybody own a boat or is this the gateway to boat ownership? Nico, do you have a boat and or would you like to have a boat or because CalSailing has so many boats you already have a bunch of boats? So I actually co-own a boat with two other members of CalSailing, but that’s a recent thing. Like technically I wouldn’t need to own a boat but

13:41

Because you have a fleet, right? Yeah, like there is a fleet at CalSavingClub of both thingies and keelboats. I think it’s, I was interested in just doing a little bit of cruising on the bay. From time to time, I have a growing family and so having a boat that’s a little larger than what we have, where we can sleep on it was something that was interesting to me. Nice. Isha, how about you? Are you looking to own your own boat at some point?

14:11

Maybe. I’ve been taking advantage of CalSailings. Right. Again, you have a fleet. And the thing is, having a boat comes with a whole new fear of capsizing in a number of different ways. It comes with maintenance and expenses and responsibility and liability and all that stuff. So no judgment here, but this is something for our listeners. What’s so cool is you don’t have to own a boat. You can get involved at a low price point and you can have a fleet of boats. Shreya, how about you? You want to own a boat or are you happy with the fleet that you got?

14:40

I’m very happy with the fleet that we have at Cal Sailing. I’m part of the, or executive, I think we all are actually part of the executive team and my position is to help with some of the maintenance. Okay, so you already get a taste of it. You already get a taste of it. I’ve got plenty. I’ve got my fill. I enjoy sailing at Cal Sailing. I love the community aspect. I love the working together with a bunch of people to help maintain the boats and it’s not my sole responsibility. Okay, good, good, fair enough. Sarah, last but not least, tell me about a story that shaped you.

15:09

I don’t own a boat and I honestly have no desire to own a boat. I really appreciate that at Cal Sailing, we get all these boats. We don’t have to, I don’t have to know how to repair them, but I can. That’s because Shreya does it. We all have a responsibility to learn it, but I can learn it slowly over time with assistance from other people while I’m also learning all the other skills of sailing and don’t have to, you know, jump in and have all that responsibility. So, and as a nonprofit.

15:35

lawyer, I don’t think I could afford to vote. So it’s, I’m delighted to have this opportunity. Unless you can turn it into part of your business and then make it a write-off or something. But, you know, anyways. All right. So on one of the fleet that you already co-manage, what was a story that sticks out in your mind that shaped you? So my story of how I found CalSailing came out of the pandemic. During the pandemic, my three kids and I all spent a lot of time down at the marina.

16:05

One of my kids was doing some city programming down there. We would ride our bikes down there. We would walk around. We would look at the boats. We would look at birds. It was a way to get out of the house and stop all going crazy. And we actually went by Cowsailing all the time, but I tried to look it up online at one point, but hadn’t found it.

16:28

But we’d all gotten kind of inspired by, we would talk all the time about like, oh, what if we had a boat and sailing around on the bay and all kinds of things like that. And as a big reading family, we had also read lots of stories about sailing and the high seas, all the stories, from like swells in Amazon, that’s all about kids sailing around on a lake to the Master and Commander series where they’re sailing around shooting each other in the British Navy.

16:57

It came about that I was looking for a birthday present for my oldest kid who is in college. And so I was like, oh, get them a sailing lesson. This will be fun. And I found some sailing lessons that were, you know, like $200 for a couple hours. And then I found Cal Sailing Club, where the price of a membership for three months was less than the cost of a single sailing lesson anywhere else. So then I thought to myself, maybe it would be more fun for them if I got myself a sailing membership too.

17:26

The birthday present was the sailing membership for me and them. And we went down the before I made the extremely expensive financial commitment to do this. There was an open house actually the very next day as I was looking into this. So we like came down to the open house to try it out. And this is one of the wonderful things that Cal Sailing offers. And Isha can tell you more about it because she is very much in charge of those. But

17:52

we have open houses where we take anybody who wants to out for a short ride on the bay. And so we did that. And just that experience of being on the water and feeling the wind pushing us and moving us around and being able to reach down and touch the water right there, I feel it spray up on our faces and looking out and seeing the Golden Gate Bridge right across from us was so exhilarating that.

18:18

that I knew I wouldn’t go back. So I’ve been, you know, I’ve been sailing ever since.

18:24

Hey good Jibes listeners and Latitude 38 readers. Have you looked in our classy classifieds lately? It would be impossible for us to know how many boats have sold to new owners over the last 45 plus years of publishing Latitude 38. But we’re sure they have helped countless people realize their sailing dreams. Every month there are new boats listed that will fill someone’s sailing adventures. If you have a boat you wanna sail or are looking for that next boat in your life, the pages of Latitude 38 will surely have something to suit your fancy.

18:54

Pick up a magazine at a local marine business or visit our classy classified pages at latitude38.com to find boats, gear, job opportunities and more. Then tell us your next sailing story. You should tell us about the club, about this open house. We now all want to know more about it. So like for those like paint the picture. Is it a big facility, small facility, medium facility? Give us a little virtual open house here.

19:21

Yeah, so our open houses are actually events that we host in the summertime to help the public get on the water. So we usually host once a month on Sun. It’s usually Sundays, but it’ll also coincide with the Berkeley Bay Festival on April 26th. And then we can send you the dates after of which dates will be for April through October once a month. We invite anybody in the public who’s interested in sailing a chance to get on the water, whether that’s on our dinghies or our keel boats.

19:47

So usually every year we have around 1500 folks from around the entire Bay Area and sometimes visitors You know who come and try it out. It’s completely free. It’s a volunteer all of our Cal sailing volunteers We come and join to help organize it So we usually have around 50 members of Cal sailing club there helping to you know, get folks on boats safely Whether they’re skipper in the boats whether they’re cooking in the kitchen to help the other volunteers have meals

20:13

We have a lot of volunteers that make this happen and it’s definitely a big effort. And you know, folks come and then they get to learn not only about about sailing, but also about Cal Sailing Club and what we offer and their opportunities. So we find that a lot of people, you know, they’ve never had the chance to get on the water. They’ve always, you know, looked at maybe the small boats or looked at the bay and saw sailboats and wanted to do it. But the cost of sailing is prohibitive for a lot of people. It’s so expensive.

20:40

And you might not know folks in the sailing community of how to get on the water. And it’s a hard sport to get into, but Cal Sailing Club has broken those barriers because we offer these opportunities. This is an opportunity, you don’t have to be a member. You can come, you go on a sailboat ride. It’s a great experience. You get to be on the water. We find people, like when they come off the dock and they have their life jackets on and then they get off the dock and they are glowing and so excited that they got the opportunity to do this. And they ask, how can we get involved? Or they say, oh, we’re gonna come back every month.

21:09

to come join for this experience. So it’s really exciting. It’s, you know, for kids, it’s five and up. So a lot of times people will bring their kids. We have, you know, people of all ages, you know, come and check it out. And usually there’s a band playing, so it’s a nice high energy experience. And when the weather’s great, everyone’s like super happy to be there. And yeah, I love it. I got involved in it because I was actually just volunteering at open houses every month.

21:34

And I was like, this is so fun to be able to bring, you know, this sport and this experience to so many people. And then slowly it made my way up into actually being the vice-commander where I run these events now. So you’ll see me there alongside with my co-vice, Dennis. All right. We just came up with a new word. It’s sports experience because it is an experience, but it is a sport and it can be very sporty. I love sailing my laser. I know it’s an ILCA and legal purposes. I’m sorry, Sarah, for the legality of it. But

22:02

I call her a laser because that’s what she’s like from the 1980s. So she is a laser, but it’s super sporty. And then it’s also an experience. And so it’s sports experience. We just trademark that right here. Traeus, tell me about the facility itself. Is it big, small, medium? Like what is the actual, do you guys have a clubhouse? I think all things considered, it’s a fairly small facility in terms of the clubhouse. It’s a very cozy.

22:31

Clubhouse, there’s a desk for our day leader who helps supervise the activities for the day. That’s our one paid staff member who is responsible for safety. They’re sitting there with their binoculars making sure no one’s capsized for too long. Okay, so they got eyes on the water too, nice. That’s right, yeah. So that’s specifically for kind of our dinghy program and for folks who are first learning so that they have that safety net. And then joining that we have our big yard where the dinghies are stored and some of the windsurfing equipment is stored as well.

23:01

And then our keelboat fleet is berthed at the J dock in the marina. And there we have six keelboats. The actual dinghy sailing happens in the South sailing basin. That’s a public dock. We just use that shared facility. Yeah. I mean, in the kitchen, for instance, for the, for the open houses that Isha mentioned, that’s a bunch of tents that we use to cover the cooking that we do outdoors. So there’s a little barbecue that we’ll wheel out and we’ll, um, stoves and so on. So.

23:29

I would say I think if you’re picturing like a yacht club, you should erase most of that imagery. This is much more of a scrappy outdoor, like this is everything is focused on just getting people out on the water and, you know, enjoying that sports experience as quickly as we can. Which makes sense why it’s Cal and not California and why you don’t use last names. It’s like you’re basically just taking the first part, which is bringing people together. And then the whole like yachty yacht club thing is sort of there. But you still have the community piece.

23:58

Nico, give me an idea of how many members you have. Like just I’m trying to visualize in this cool little small, quaint, cozy area with a membership. It can be huge, but like, do you have a certain amount now? Are you always looking for members? Is there a cap? The club is a community. So we have people who stay for a very long time. There’s members there, I know that are there since the 80s, maybe even the 70s. And then there’s…

24:26

new people who join and it really depends on their journey, how long they stay. I would say every year we have about 1500 members. Wow, that’s a lot. Yes, there’s no cap. Everyone is welcome. All ages. Three months at a time, Sarah’s mentioned. Yeah, so you can’t sign up for like just one class. But the good news is that the price for a three month membership is cheaper than any any class you might take on the bay.

24:55

and you can literally show up every single day, you will not be paying anything else. Use of equipment, lessons are taught by other members, and all of that is included in your membership. So it’s really a steal. And if you cannot come up with the money, that’s not a problem. You can spend 10 hours of volunteering, 10 extra hours. It does come with some volunteering, hours of volunteering requirement. The minimum requirement is two hours.

25:24

over a period of three months, so that’s not bad. But if you volunteer 10 hours, we waive the membership fee. So you can literally sail for free. And I would say about 20% of our membership, they do that they just, you end up spending time at the club, it just, it’s one of those places, like, that is talked about, like a third place that sometimes are hard to come by.

25:51

I go off into the club even if I’m not going to go sailing. I just go and hang out and you’ve got people hanging out. There’s a famous bench where people sit to watch others sailing and making mistakes. And there’s kind of a peanut gallery. Watching Isha capsize and having fun with it. And Sarah out there and the peduncle, there’s like, what’s this black little black thing running around? She’s like, it’s just my cat. No worries.

26:19

Sarah, tell me about the leadership structure. Is there a board, a traditional board of directors? Is it a one-year commitment? Is it a three-year commitment? Is it a three-month commitment? How is that structured? We have a body called the executive committee and it’s our traditional board of directors by a different name. The leadership includes a Commodore and that’s Nico and his co-commodore Maria.

26:47

And then there’s another maybe nine positions. Maybe someone can help me remember. So many we don’t know yet. So many. Vice Commodores, Rear Commodores, First and Second and Third Vice Commodores, Secretary, that I am, Treasurer, Port Captain, all of these different roles. And most of those roles are filled by two or three people.

27:12

So it’s technically one role in terms of the official leadership structure, but as part of our volunteer, everybody pitch in, make it all work kind of model, we work collaboratively to make sure all that gets done. That’s super interesting. And do you have a certain time that you commit to that? Or because there’s so many that it’s just sort of an ebb and flow, you just do it because you enjoy the role? Or do people move up through the ranks each year or?

27:40

It’s more of an ebb and flow. There’s not a, you don’t have to commit to a certain amount of time that you’re gonna be on the executive committee. I think most people try and stay at least a year and some people much longer than that. People are bringing in new people who are involved and interested and seem like that they would have a lot to commit and the amount of time it takes on a monthly basis really also ebbs and flows. Some months there’s a lot going on and a lot to do and everyone needs to pitch in.

28:09

And other months we’re just sending a few emails and messages here and there, but not a lot beyond that. Are there many of your members who have their own boats and like to get access to the dinghies and smaller boats or maybe with their children and then they have their own boat on top of that? And the question after that is, do you have any organized cruises? Like Niko, I know you aspire to go off coast. Do you just get together informally? Is there any formal structure with that as well?

28:37

Yeah, so I would say the vast majority of members do not own their own boat. There are some, we’ve actually tracked down about 100, 120 members who have their own boat just in the Berkeley Marina. That’s still a lot. That’s, that’s a lot. So I am part of the Blue Water Cruising Club and we’ve got like 33 members total. And, you know, they all have boats and we go to big Geiger Cove and Catalina Island, but those are still, that’s still large numbers.

29:04

One thing we’ve seen with that is that, you know, many people start at CalSailing and learn to sail. Some people stay at CalSailing, some people wander off and go, you know, somewhere else. But a certain number of people kind of move through. They come to CalSailing, they get the skills, and then they go on to buy their own equipment. You’re like the gateway drug for sailors. We are. Oh, absolutely. One cool thing that the club does, actually, one of the activities is cruises on the bay. We don’t go beyond, but…

29:34

It’s most often kind of spring, summer, fall. We have a section on our website where skippers who have the right rating, we have a rating system that gives you different privileges. They organize cruises on the bay to different destinations or sometimes we’ve sailed around different islands we have on the bay, like one.

30:02

particular cruise I really like is when we sail around the island of Alameda, going through the different, under the different bridges. And yeah, any member can sign up because it’s pretty popular, there’s a lot of lottery system. But sometimes it’s a group flotilla of four of our keel boats that go around the bay together. And it’s a full day activity.

30:29

and it’s really fun. It’s also a great way to connect with other members and to meet people. I should also mention we do some dinghy cruising as well every now and then. I was going to ask, like is it just the keel boats or like do the dinghies get out there a little packed lunch or something and get crazy? Yeah we’ve taken a little flotilla of dinghies from where we are in the South Sailing Basin in Berkeley over to Richmond and Tradewinds and we had a nice lunch

30:58

sail back. Nice. Now I also saw that you have windsurfing. Are any of you windsurfers or is that something that it’s just kind of, you know, how integrated is the windsurfing? And I saw on your website or on your Instagram, I forget which, which you had a couple of wing foil or foiled boards and stuff. So tell me about that as I’ve, you know, when I’ve been out in the bay, there’s just so many people, you know, doing kite surfing and windsurfing, but you guys have the windsurfing and is that?

31:28

just sort of the popular sporty part and how much do people take advantage of that? Yeah, I can talk more about it. I’m actually also a windsurfer. It’s something I’ve picked up at the club because it’s such a great opportunity. You have all the gear you need to learn and to progress and we and if you become very advanced, we also have all the gear for that. So yeah, there’s a bit two sides to the club, the sailing side and the windsurfing side. Some people

31:58

just do it exclusively at one side of the other. But I would say it’s pretty well integrated. There are definitely many members who do both. Windsurfing, yeah, we started offering that back in the 80s and it’s a vibrant program. People who start to windsurf, like it’s a drug. A lot of them tend to come like every day that is windy. It’s, yeah, we’ve got beginner boards all the way to foils.

32:26

And we share the South Sailing Basin with other water sports users. So there’s also wingers and kitesurfers sometimes, but we don’t offer those because it’s a little less practical for our club’s purpose. Nice. Isha, have you gone windsurfing yet? Not yet, but I actually was thinking about doing it this summer for the first time. I’ve gone like on my own one time. I took like a week long windsurfing morning class.

32:55

once a different place. Um, but it was many years ago and I’ve been wanting to learn to do it. Cause I think it’d be really fun. I think it seems like a great workout, which is awesome. I was also thinking of a good balance and you know, more time on the water at some variety. So I was thinking this summer, uh, once when surfing season really picks up the winds are up. I was thinking about going to a beginner’s class, which we offer I think on Saturday mornings. Yeah, it’s a Saturday and Sunday. Sheree, are you going to join?

33:23

I have my novice windsurf rating, which requires you to prove that you can self-rescue, so I can swim. Yeah, I struggled a lot when I tried out windsurfing. It’s not easy. It’s not easy at all. No, I think I need to find someone at the club who is willing to give me some of their time and is someone who won’t judge me for the embarrassment that’s going to be me on a windsurf. Sarah’s there for you. Sarah’s ready to go for sure. You guys can both go out there together.

33:52

Now the sailing instructing, I’m curious, are these just sailors who know how to sail or do you have an official partnership with, I see you have all kinds of supporters, by the way, which is great. I’d like to give them a shout out as well. Just the fact that you are not just community, but you’ve got outside businesses and the city and all these people that are getting together. Are you like a do people get ASA because I know that’s even expensive or are all the instructors actually?

34:18

certified instructors or is it just like me taking people out? How does that work? Because I’m I’ve been sailing for a long time and part of my long-term goal is to get licensed up. So is the club a pathway to that or is it you go you get to learn how to sail and then getting those actual licenses would be additional or something? Tell me how that all works. Yeah so our instruction program is led by our rear Commodore, Commodore’s actually.

34:45

We have both the windsurfing side and the sailing side. So there’s John, Randy, and David. Several of them, I mean, all of them, all the rear commenters got certified in their respective sports. And there are members who are certified, but the vast majority of instructors are not. You basically learn at the club. You learn about our specific approach. You earn a rating. So we have…

35:13

different ratings. We have like Novus, junior, senior, and then beyond there’s cruising. Once you have a rating, you can teach the next person the things you know. So you don’t need the certification to teach. But on a regular basis, like once a year, once every couple years, we do invite some members to get certified and the club pays for that. And it’s done through US Sailing on the sailing side.

35:43

Okay, and we do have run by the rear Commodore, you know, programs to try to help folks get better at teaching. So we’ll run workshops as well. And I think you heard Isha talk also about sort of specialized kind of workshops we run for capsize recovery or for specifically for folks who are maybe smaller, what are some strategies to help you recover a capsize, you know, if you don’t have weight on your side to help you do that, that kind of thing as well.

36:10

Now I forgot to ask, but do you have any lasers slash Ilkas? We do. Good, I just want to make sure. Now I am curious if there are any fun or surprising facts about the club that most people wouldn’t know. Maybe even people within your club wouldn’t know. Anything that comes to mind? Any craziest historical stories or surprising facts? Or is it just all pretty straightforward and it’s like, no, we got the little thing, we get this, that’s it.

36:36

Some of these stories wouldn’t surprise like old timers, but there’s some like famous alumni, I guess who came through the club. There’s a rumor that Larry Allison was a member of the club when he was around like 17 or 18. Oh wow. Back in the 70s, I think. There’s a famous naval architect also that was a member back in the 50s. It’s a club that has roots from a really long time ago.

37:04

It’s actually like we don’t have a very precise story of the club. There’s there’s a story on our website, a club history on our website, but a little foggy, a little bit of that San Francisco fog in there. And he’s not really sure exactly. Yeah. A lot of oral history past, you know, one person on a boat telling another person what happened, changing a little as it goes. And as the secretary documenting it and putting out there.

37:31

Are there any exciting plans or new things that you guys have coming up on the radar? Or again, is it just the rinse and repeat is the powerful program that you’ve just always had? Is there anything that’s coming new or different activities that you’re looking to do this summer? Isha, I don’t know if it’s bigger and better open houses, but are there things you guys are planning or building or growing? I think every year we kind of focus on.

37:56

continuous improvement and growth. I think it also depends on like which volunteers we have. Like it’s really, you know, grassroots. It’s like, you know, somebody will come up with an idea and then, you know, they’ll have time and be able to implement it. So for example, like we had a Pride Day Sailing community group last year, which was awesome. And that wasn’t something I’d seen before. So like, I think that’s an example of something that was new, that was volunteer run. But I think in general, like when, you know, when new folks take on positions or, you know, get more involved, we’re constantly changing the way we do things and improving.

38:26

and just trying out new stuff. So it might not be like major, major changes, but over the years you’ll see a lot of changes and how we structure events or new events that we do, or how are we teaching? We’re always constantly thinking about the overall teaching principles and how can we improve them and how can we make instructors feel more confident? How can we make sure that folks from all different experiences have a good experience at the club? So.

38:52

Yeah, it sounds like there’s an opportunity for always something new, especially if you have three or four leadership roles at each position and have it be like, well, if you can come up with it and you can also help facilitate it, then that could be the case. That is exactly the motto of the club in many ways. Like, if you can make it happen, here’s a place to keep it. That’s a very sailor thing to do. Like, if you can rig it, go for it, right? Oh, exactly.

39:19

everything you see at the club, even the clubhouse has been something that has been contributed by a club member at some point. So that’s the exciting thing about the club is you can come in and with some fresh ideas and pose an improvement and and more than likely someone will be like, yes, and then let’s do it together. Yeah, then you have all the people that are volunteering their hours to get their dues done and you have a whole army of people to facilitate it.

39:50

Hey, listen up. We hope everyone is enjoying listening to the stories of West Coast sailors on our Good Jives podcast. We’ve heard lots of great feedback from the 150,000 listeners who’ve tuned in over the last couple of years. And if you have a marine business, we’d like to give you an opportunity to connect with them during upcoming podcasts. If you’d like to be a sponsor of future podcasts, you can email Nicky, N-I-C-K-I, nicky at latatoo38.com to learn more about how your company can benefit.

40:20

from sponsoring Good Jibes. Well, this is all way more information than I ever knew before I hopped on and more context than I could get online. And I wanna finish just talking about community because we’ve all mentioned it. And so we kind of do a round table, but what does community look like? Because the buzzword is just very buzzy, like community. Oh, it’s community, I come for the community. But what does that maybe mean to each of you? And maybe you can give an example, like just go a little bit deeper.

40:49

Like what does that community mean? And maybe we’ll go in reverse order. So Sarah, maybe you can start us off. What does community look like at the club? Maybe an example, but again, just trying to get specifics to paint the picture for people. What I think is wonderful about the club is that it’s a place where community and the sailing community has really expanded its definition. So, you know, historically for decades and decades in the United States, a lot of sailors have been

41:17

more likely to be male, more likely to be white, more likely to be well-off. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. And at the club, it’s a place where, you know, there’s some of that is embedded in the membership, but every year we’re seeing more and more young people, more and more people of color, more and more women joining the club. And we are working to do educational programs and to craft learning experience, especially for some groups, but also inclusively with everybody

41:46

so that we’re integrating all these groups together and creating an environment that, you know, step by step, it’s not a simple, you know, it doesn’t just happen that it’s suddenly a place of, you know, perfect belonging, but where more and more people are feeling really welcome and like they can develop their skills, they can make mistakes, they can learn, they can make friends. And we have that intergenerationally too. We have a lot of retired folks who are able to spend a lot of time at the club. And then…

42:14

a lot of young people, middle-aged people like me, like just all of these different ages. And it’s a wonderful thing to get to slowly and through shared experiences and sometimes a little shared trauma, get to know people and really form friendships. Yeah, you know, the wind and the ocean does not discriminate. And so it’s nice to have a club that follows and goes where the wind blows, whatever that is. Anybody else want to chirp in on what community looks like at the club or an example?

42:43

That was a great Sarah took like, you know, a two or three of the points and you might be like, I was gonna say that. I have one I’ll share, which was sort of how I got my junior rating at the club, which is I think the rating that most folks at the club have. We run a program in the summers called the fast track program. Really, the focus is to get a lot better at dinghy sailing, but the outcome often is to earn your junior dinghy rating. And it’s a one week program.

43:10

five days, every weekday from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. You rush out of work as quickly as you can, try to sneak out a little bit early, get there, get on a boat. Hopefully someone else, one of the volunteers has been able to be there, rig the boat. That’s usually the case, because we’ve got our army of volunteers who’ve helped to get the boats rigged up and ready to drop in the water. You hop on the boat, there’s maybe one, two other students who are similarly.

43:36

slightly gluttons for punishment, just really driven, wanna get better, and you’ve got an instructor who says, let’s go, maybe that instructor for that day is just a hall pass for you to go and capsize 50 times, maybe they’re helping you fine tune your attacking and jibing, whatever it is. And then you come off the water, having bashed around for about three hours, you’re cold, it’s wet, and you go into the yard and a couple of someones have cooked up a nice hot meal and you sit down.

44:04

and you eat, warm up, and just spend another couple hours debriefing, talking about sailing and just learning about kind of what could be done better. And man, that was a phenomenal experience. I met so many people, folks that I am really, really good friends with now. And it just was like a super concentrated burst of I think what community means. All these volunteers coming in to help rig the boats so that you can get on the water immediately. All these volunteers helping to maintain the boats the next morning so that that evening’s class…

44:34

isn’t hampered because, oh no, quest seven’s down because we broke the vang bale or something like that. No, the boat’s ready to go. Bunch of people have been cooking while they’re out there sailing. And, you know, someone set up the yard so that the boats have been moved so we can put down round tables so we can all sit down and eat immediately after coming off the water. So just that collaborative spirit of just working together. And the goal’s really just, let’s go out there and sail. Let’s go enjoy the nature and enjoy this resource altogether.

45:03

The way you described that made me think like your entire club is just one big pirate ship. It’s like the club is maybe the main and just like the yard is part of it. So you have all these like little mini ships that are going off this big ship and everybody’s the crew and they’re all doing their parts and scrubbing the deck and waiting to make sure that the places and parts and pieces are there. So it’s almost like you’re one big boat, like a big, I don’t know, partner ship altogether, something like that.

45:33

That’s definitely how it feels. It all kind of comes together. It really feels like a living organism. And I think I also want to just mention to Sarah’s point about kind of the evolving kind of makeup of the membership. This past year, we also had our very first women’s only fast track program, which was, I hear, very, very successful. I think that was very well received too. So kind of continual and now also connecting to Isha’s point of sort of that continuous improvement, right? Like coming up with these small little changes, still the same fast track program that we’ve always had, but.

46:02

trying to come up with some different angles to get more folks involved in this sport. All right. Well, we’re going to jive and head back into the slip. And as we do, I bet you we have a bunch of people that are cooking a bunch of yummy breakfast, lunch or dinner, depending on when you are watching or hearing this. So who wants to take the directional, who wants to navigate those who want to learn more? Is it go to Yelp? Is it?

46:29

find online? Is it follow the Instagram? Is it all the above? Is it wait until open house? Is it, I want to come and volunteer? Who wants to take the navigational role of sharing with our listeners and viewers of how they can get connected to this partnership? You can join the club anytime. Sailing lessons, they continue during the winter. To connect with us, the easiest way is to find our website, cal-sailing.org.

46:58

or type Cal Sailing Club on Google. We have an Instagram, probably our most active social channel if you want to follow us. And real quick, your Instagram I see is just Cal Sailing Club. All one word, no funny business. Exactly. And also the best way is to just show up. Go to the Berkeley Marina. It’s beautiful out there. There’s the Bay Trail. On certain days, there’s a little coffee.

47:27

where you should definitely grab coffee. It’s really good. They should grab two coffees, one for themselves and one for the first person they see walking in the door and be like, hey, I heard this podcast on good jibes and like I was told that, you know, and then it’ll be like, oh, welcome aboard. I’m just trying to hook you guys up with some free coffee. Yeah. Nice. And yeah, there’s during opening hours, there’s always people to talk to and give you the rundown.

47:55

Look for the person with the binoculars. If there’s nobody on the water, they’re just gonna be looking for you, right? I can just see them like looking towards the parking lot, like looking for new people. Exactly. And we’re open every day of the year, even the holidays, weekdays, it’s between noon and sunset, and Saturdays, nine to sunset. We’re just affected by tides. So on our website, we have a page where there’s…

48:22

automatically calculates the hours we can open based on how much water we have. So yes, there are sometimes some restrictions, but overall, most days we have people at the club. Any business that is open until sunset every day of the week and is dependent on the tide sounds like a place I want to hang out with. Again, just sort of ebb and flow. Again, it makes me think like it’s just a big ship.

48:46

Well, Nico, Isha, Shreyas and Sarah, this has been fun. I feel like we could continue to talk, but we’re back at the dock. So we got to go get to the rest of our workday. And I’m hoping that all 1500 folks can listen to this and then, you know, share this and help to get you guys to a spot where you’re like, damn that Ryan and good jives, we have so many people showing up now we need a bigger boat. Great problem. It’s so much great to be here.

49:15

Yeah, totally. And let’s see. The final thing we’ll say is, well. Show up. That’s it, right? I mean, the whole theme of everything is to show up because there might be 25 knots of wind and you might be scared. You might not have been on a boat for 30 years. You might have moved out of the area and come back. I mean, what the hell? Maybe you have a new cat, whatever excuse that you need, whether it’s for you or selfishly for you to get.

49:44

other people with you per Sarah’s interesting approach, just show up because you never know. And we know that once you get out on the boat, you’ll know. And so it’s been great to see you guys. I’m not up there enough, but if you’re ever in Long Beach, let me know and we’ll get you on a boat down here. And now I know when I’m up there, I’m going to come say hi and test out to see if the lasers up there are just as fast as they are down here. Thanks so much for having us. Thank you so much.

50:13

Thank you. All right, everybody. This has been another episode of Good Jives, the biggest, I think, in the history of the world until the next one. And if this is the first time that you’re in this podcast, welcome aboard. We have them every Tuesday where you get to hear about West Coast sailing experiences, not only from the yacht club experience, not only from the not club, you’re not a yacht club. You’re kind of like a not like a not club because it has a vibe to it. And we hear all kinds of crazy stories. But at the end of the day.

50:43

sailing stories shape us. They make us who we are. They make us better. They make us patient. They make us get out there for some sports experience and we would love to hear your stories. Follow the Cal Sailing Club online. You can follow me on Instagram. You can find me @Ryan.Foland If you want to find me online, my website is Ryan.Online I’ve even got a sailing tab if you want to find and connect with me when you’re in Long Beach. Follow Latitude 38 and

51:12

We’ve been around since 1977. So if you ever need a good story or if the wind is low, get a hand, your grubby hands on the Latitude 38 magazine. They are everywhere. It’s one of the only print publications that have been around so long supporting these types of communities. All right, that’s it. Let’s make sure the dock lines are nice and coiled up. We’ll leave the boat all ship shaped for the next crew that’s coming on board. That’s a wrap. We’ll see everybody later. Have a great rest of your day wherever it is. Adios!