Blog | upffront.com

The world of modern sailing ropes is bright and bountiful. But from the plethora of brands, colours, materials and styles, Gottifredi Maffioli’s Superswift perpetually stands out. The family run Italian firm pioneered the ‘Swift’ style of lines more than 2 decades ago which have since been imitated by so many other manufacturers. Superswift features that iconic grippy, durable cover with a compact braid DSK78 Dyneema core. In this blog we explore why this material lends itself so well to light weight spinnaker sheets. 

It’s long been the view of many cruisers that an all-chain anchor rode (the rope or line that connects the anchor to the boat) is superior to a rope rode. However, most racers would disagree, opting for as little chain as possible to save weight and maximise speed. The reality is, for most sailors the perfect ratio is somewhere in the middle.  

Image credit: James Tomlinson 

With interest in doublehanded racing still on the rise and showing no signs of letting up, we wanted to know what the ingredients are for a doublehanded boat to stay safe and sail fast. To gain some insights we conducted a survey of the UK Doublehanded Offshore fleet. We asked about everything from food to sleep to equipment. These are the results. 

Image credit: RORC 

Reducing mainsail area effectively is an essential aspect of depowering the boat as the wind strength increases. For offshore racing or cruising it is particularly important to be able to do so quickly and safely and this becomes even more critical when sailing shorthanded. Without weight on the rail, the need to reef comes earlier and the ability to deal with a situation is reduced. A mainsail reefing system should be reliable, quick to operate and produce an adequate sail shape once reefed. In this blog we discuss 4 options for taking a slab in the main. 

Replacing your halyards is a great opportunity to upgrade the halyard shackles. In this blog we give a detailed rundown of the options available. 

All sailing boats need ropes. But what is required of a rope varies greatly depending on the application. A vang purchase system demands different characteristics to a sheet, just as a halyard on a cruising boat can differ greatly to that on a grand prix racing yacht. Typically we don’t need to worry about the details too much as manufacturers tend to target their product lines: ‘cruising sheet’, ‘performance halyard’ etc. But what really differentiates these ropes on a technical level and which materials are responsible for providing the various characteristics? In this blog with give a brief overview of some of the fibres most commonly found in modern rope covers.