We’re now in early March and we’ve had a fabulous set of exam passes. Do we expect this? Well yes we do. We have a great team of instructors who share our passion for teaching sailing and we take each person’s course development personally. What you’ll never know is how many hours the team have deliberated over the next best stage for a group or an individual, the best instructor pairing to bring out the best for a person and the exact balance between ‘it’s time to go on a distance cruise vs let’s focus on some skills’. This is all the behind the scenes that you’ll never see and never truly appreciate until you get out into the industry and realize the standard you’ve received for yourselves.

Yachtmaster Offshore Pass February 2017

Wallis Yachtmaster Pass Feb 2017

 

So this year we’ve had the wonderful Wallis pass her Yachtmaster Offshore Sail and is now doing her motor conversion (anther exam due next weekend). She will be our third dual qualified female Yachtmaster Sail & Motor. There are not so many of you out there but jobs specifically ask for female qualified Yachtmasters. Portia who qualified back in 2007 now works as a VTS operator in the Gibraltar Port & Ellie sucesfully followed the Superyacht career path after passing both sail & motor with us in 2008.

"I thoroughly enjoyed doing my Yachtmaster Offshore Sail & Power, it is by far the best thing I've done with my life so far! I learnt so much, met so many awesome people, made friends for life and have obtained an extremely useful qualification that I can't wait to start using. 
 
The sail instructors at ASA are excellent, with lots of experience and many wise words to help you along the way to becoming a Yachtmaster and learning from them really added to my experience. Even those that didn't teach me were always friendly and happy to help with any queries and I always felt very at home.
 
Alex, the course advisor at ASA, is also extremely welcoming and always happy to help with any queries. The course is intense and it is a long time to be away from family and friends, so I feel it is extremely important to feel comfortable in order to perform well during training and they all contribute massively to making clients feel at home.
 
The STCW'95 course is also very good, taught in a very professional manner, as well as being an awesome experience that has really changed my perspective on safety. The classroom facilities are good, it was very useful to have an area with more space to study and also to chill out away from the boats." Wallis February 2017 Sail & March 2017 Power 

Yachtmaster Offshore Passes March 2017

We’ve had Kristien, Harrison and Luis Achieve after a mixture of 8, 14 and 18 weeks – everyone is truly different. On Saturday 11th March 2017 Andy, Will and Dan all passed first time with a combination 7 weeks and 15 weeks training with Allabroad. Andy was limited on tidal experience so did a bespoke half course with us to get his tidal miles and theory up to scratch. Taught in the majority by our full Yachtmaster Instructor team under the careful and watchful eye of Clare and Dave to ensure all were mapping at the right time and getting the training focus they needed in order to succeed.

"Thanks a lot for everything, my feedback couldn't be better: I've to thank you all for making it possible, turning me from zero experience into an Yachtmaster in 18 weeks! The instructors were all great, and I was able to pick the best out of every single one and adapt their own techniques to my own style. I think the instructor's quality was the secret for my success, but also having the opportunity to share my time with different ones."  Luis March 2017

"Cheers Allabroad, Ive had a great time here and met a lot of unforgettable people and have a number of amazing memories. Thank you very much Allabroad you have a lot of great instructors to whom I owe my ticket to. Harrison March 2017

"Many thanks to the incredibly dedicated Yachtmaster Instructors who prepared us for the exam, and all the wonderful fellow crew I had the pleasure to share this journey with!" Kristien March 2017

"I also wanted to drop a quick email to say a few thanks as it's been a couple of weeks since I passed and it's now finally sunk in, even though I'm still getting used to telling people I'm a Yachtmaster Offshore. 
 
As you know I joined the course Dayskipper qualified with a couple of thousand miles under my belt. It was suggested that I have a bespoke 7 week course joining a team of Fasttrackers who had completed 8 weeks of their 15 weeks training.
 
I have to say before I arrived I had read on internet forums etc some negative comments of fastracker courses in general, such as 'how can you produce a Yachtmaster in just 15 weeks?' And that 'instructors don't care' so I was a little unsure about the quality of training I was due to get  over the next 7 weeks.
 
I can't speak for other fasttrack companies but those comments couldn't be further from the truth at Allabroad. I wasn't instructed by all the instructors, however they all made a point of stopping and chatting with not just me but all the candidates, taking an interest and putting minds at rest when the nerves started to kick in or they'd just had a bad day. The instructors I did have where excellent, mixed backgrounds, great depth and breadth of knowledge and many years of experience which was important to me, someone who is 'Professionally curious' as it was politely put 🙂
 
If anyone is considering either the full course or even joining part way through like I did, I would certainly recommend it. The absolute worst that will happen is they'll be a far more confident and more importantly competent sailor! 
 
As for someone who is partway through their course who feels maybe that they're not ready or are feeling nervous, I'd say that's normal, if they where ready then they'd be at the end of their course taking the final exam! What will happen is when they're are at the end of the course they'll probably still feel slightly nervous but at the same time they'll also feel ready!
 
Thanks again and please pass on a huge thanks to the instructors who humoured my professional curiosity and took me from a Day Skipper to Yachtmaster Offshore, Johno, Dave, Ian & Nick.
 
And a special mention to Alex who fed us with chocolates and always had a big greeting smile when you met her.
 
All the best for the future" Andy March 2017