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RYA Basic Skills (Dinghy Level 2)
The level where the instructor gets out of the boat.
Basic Skills is the point at which a dinghy sailor becomes independent. RYA currently describes it as a two-day course following Start Sailing.
The skills added are the ones that make solo sailing possible:
Capsize recovery
Level 2 is usually where a student capsizes deliberately for the first time and rights the boat themselves. It is the single most useful hour of the course, and the reason Level 2 holders stop being frightened of a gust.
For most sailors Level 2 is the practical end of learning to sail a dinghy. Everything after it is either stronger conditions or a specialism.
- Who it suits
- Level 1 holders, and beginners with some unstructured dinghy experience.
- What it is not
- Not a stronger-wind qualification. Level 2 is assessed in light to moderate conditions.
Before and after
Other RYA courses
RYA Sailing Pathway
The whole RYA cruising route in order, and where you are allowed to skip a step.
RYA Cruising Level 1: Start Sailing
A short introduction aboard a small cruising yacht — the shortest way to find out whether yachting suits you.
RYA Cruising Level 2: Basic Skills
The follow-on from Level 1, adding real boat handling on a small cruising yacht.
RYA Start Yachting
Two days aboard a cruising yacht, for complete beginners who want a genuine taste of yachting.
RYA Day Skipper Theory
The classroom half of Day Skipper: charts, tides, buoyage, collision regulations and passage planning.
RYA Day Skipper Practical Sailing
Five days in which you stop being crew and start being the person responsible for the boat.
RYA Coastal Skipper Practical
Skippering beyond familiar water and beyond daylight — longer passages, night pilotage, heavier weather.
RYA Coastal Skipper and Yachtmaster Offshore Theory
The advanced shorebased course: tidal work, passage planning, meteorology and collision regulations at Yachtmaster depth.
Which course should you actually book?
Three questions — your experience, the boat you want to sail, and your goal — give you a starting course and the schools that teach it near you.