Everything is discussed and agreed together but the final decision is made by the helmsman. Everything begins with putting the iceboat together. If this is done smoothly and quickly, we may expect that the other stages of iceboating will also go well. In a team where men have been racing together for a long time, both have leamed to share tasks and obligations, so neither one is disturbing the other. A Monotype XV can be assembled by her team in 20 minutes, from unloading the boat from the car or trailer until hoisting the sail.
Runners are a very important part of any iceboat.
They should be kept in the best Condition at all times. The most important thing is that the side runners are exactly parallel. Unless this is attended to very carefully the speed of the boat with suffer seriously. Nowadays the parallelism is measured with the runners on the ice, whereas earlier the iceboat was put on trestles and therefore the measuring could not be done so precisely. The more blunt the edges of the runners are, the better is its speed, but they must be sharp enough so that the boat does not slip sideways, and can be handled in the ice and wind conditions at that time.