> Any sailor worth their salt can tell you that a boat can travel faster than the wind by cutting zigzag patterns; that's called tacking.
This is a pedantic point, but when you're cutting zigzag patterns downwind it's called jibing, not tacking.
I guess there are high-performance boats that can go faster than the wind upwind, and that are so fast that they can perform downwind tacking (since apparent wind stays ahead of the mast), but this is the exception, not the rule.
This is a pedantic point, but when you're cutting zigzag patterns downwind it's called jibing, not tacking.
I guess there are high-performance boats that can go faster than the wind upwind, and that are so fast that they can perform downwind tacking (since apparent wind stays ahead of the mast), but this is the exception, not the rule.