Author: John_RailMeets.com

Safety at Sea

Posted on by John_RailMeets.com

If you have taken a Safety at Sea course we have added greater refinement to the course options available. In addition to the US Sailing 1/2 day, 1 day and 2 day courses we have added Storm Trysail Foundation Junior and for those of you outside the US, the World Sailing Offshore (1 day) and World Sailing International Offshore (2 day with hands on). To change your selection Click on the Silhouette (or your picture) in the upper right corner, select My Info. Scroll down to Crew Finder Profile and select Update Profile. Scroll down a bit for the Safety at Sea Course and select the course that you have taken. While you are at it update the date that you took the course. Don’t forget to hit Update when you are done.

Making lemonade…

Posted on by John_RailMeets.com

Lemons – First the COVID-19 statement. All RailMeets personnel are currently happy and healthy. We are Chicago based but we do work with vendors around the globe. Everyone is currently working from home and we are working hard. All of our suppliers have shared with us and assured us with their business continuity plans. RailMeets is in great shape, ready for use now and when this is over.


Lemonade – What are we working on? A healthy refresh of the site, you may have noticed some changes in the crew and boat finders, the signup pages, and general readability of the site, you will notice a cleaner crisper look. We are also freshening up the crew confirmation pages and most aspects of the mobile interface. This should make RailMeets faster and easier to use. We will be rolling out the new pages over the next 30 days.

Wondering how to do something in RailMeets? See our help pages (bottom of every page) or contact us at info@RailMeets.com
Pic by PhotoMIX

The Road to Ensenada

Posted on by John_RailMeets.com

RailMeets is proud to announce that we have been selected as the official crew and boat finder for the 73rd annual Newport to Ensenada race on April 24-28 2020. This is the 73rd running of the 125 mile classic that starts in Newport Beach California. The Race continues south along the coast to the finish at Ensenada in Baja Mexico.

In the coming days we will be posting more on the race and how to find crew or a boat on all the destination races that we are featuring. For more information about the race or to enter please visit https://nosa.org/

mmmmm cookies!

Posted on by John_RailMeets.com

It you have logged into RailMeets in 2020 you will have seen the cookie policy notice. If you click accept it will go away and you will not see it again. If you ignore it you will see it the next time you log in. You probably noticed these things popping up all over the web and if you read things like website privacy policies and terms and conditions you would have noticed a few changes in ours. We are now compliant with the new California, European Union and European Economic Area data policies. Before you laugh those laws make your data more secure and includes stuff like “right to be forgotten”. If you have any questions or concerns please feel free to contact us at info@railmeets.com

Match Racing Anyone?

Posted on by John_RailMeets.com

Match racing is one of the many areas of this sport that has been growing and in Chicago it has some very devoted sailors, Chicago Corinthian Yacht Club’s Windy City Team Race, Chicago Yacht Club’s Match Race Program or the Chicago Match Race Center, not to mention several programs on the east coast. RailMeets is happy to help you match racers get connected. Go to your crew profile and in the Sailing Types section be sure to check Match Racing. Also there is a Match Racing option for boats. Are you a Skipper for one of these Match Race programs? Set up a boat just for your match racing activities. Check the Show in Boat Finder box and make sure that you select Match Racing for sailing types. You can now use RailMeets to connect with your fellow match racers.

Official crew finder for the 2020 Newport to Bermuda Race

Posted on by John_RailMeets.com

RailMeets is proud to announce that we have been selected as the official North American crew finder for the 2020 Newport to Bermuda race. With RailMeets you can add to your profile that you are available for the race. Go to My Info, then Crew Finder Profile, update, check Newport Bermuda Race and click on update. That’s it, ready to go.

Prospective skippers can search for crew that would like to do the race by using the filters. They can also search on specific skill sets needed to round out the crew.

See the official announcement here…
https://bermudarace.com/race-links-to-online-platforms-to-match-boats-and-crews/

For more information about the race see https://bermudarace.com/

Chicago NOOD or Don’t tell me tell RailMeets

Posted on by John_RailMeets.com

It was great seeing many of you at this past weekends Chicago NOOD regatta. Thank you for your comments suggestions, complements and of course how can I forget sipping rum drinks on a T-10 while giving some training on the RailMeets dashboard. Thanks! But my favorite comment was from a J/109 skipper telling me how RailMeets changed his program, from finding crew to tracking the crew schedules. As he told me, when he gets a text from a crew saying they are available for a race he texts back “Don’t tell me, tell RailMeets!”


How did the boat I was on do? Well after sitting in the fog on Friday we got in four good races on Saturday. We were tied for second (with two other boats tied for first). We really needed a race on Sunday but more pea soup fog prevented that and after all the tie breakers were applied we ended up fourth. Not bad for a new program and a good chunk of the crew picked up from RailMeets.