Online RYA Day Skipper Theory

The RYA Day Skipper practical course is where you stop being crew and start being skipper. Over five days on the Solent, you will take command of a Bavaria yacht under the supervision of an RYA instructor. You will plan passages, make navigational decisions, and manage the crew.

The Solent is one of the best places in the UK to train for your Day Skipper practical. Tidal streams, commercial shipping, and busy harbours mean you get real experience of skippering in challenging conditions. You will visit ports like Portsmouth, Cowes, and Yarmouth, practicing berthing alongside and picking up mooring buoys. Successful completion prepares you for the RYA Coastal Skipper practical course.

Prerequisites: RYA Competent Crew (or equivalent experience) and the RYA Day Skipper theory certificate. You should have logged at least 5 days, 100 sea miles, and 4 night hours on a sailing yacht.

The RYA Coastal Skipper Practical training course is designed for sailors looking to enhance their coastal navigation and passage planning skills at Premier Gosport Marina. As the next progressive step from the RYA Day Skipper qualification, this training course delivers advanced sailing techniques and navigational expertise for executing longer passages. With over 30 years of Solent-based experience, Commodore Yachting equips you with the confidence to tackle essential Channel crossings. View our live course calendar for RYA Coastal Skipper Practical dates at Gosport Marina.

This Course in Summer?

You may notice that the RYA Coastal Skipper Practical isn’t often scheduled during June, July, or August. This is quite intentional. One of the key elements of this advanced course is meaningful night sailing experience. The long daylight hours of summer simply don’t allow us to provide enough genuine night time navigation for every student. To ensure you gain real-world skills—like plotting courses in darkness and handling a yacht after sunset—we schedule these courses more at times of year when darkness reliably falls early enough for proper night passages.

Every aspect of the course is designed for focused, in-depth learning. We limit numbers to just four students per yacht, all learning at the same advanced level. This lets our RYA instructors tailor tuition to the needs of budding Coastal Skippers. Please note: students must be at least 17 years old, and anyone under 18 will need a parent or guardian on board. But don’t worry we do run them but we have smaller numbers in the summer so we can get those night hours in!

Ready to navigate with confidence, day or night? Here’s what’s included in your training:

What the RYA coastal skipper practical course covers

The RYA Coastal Skipper practical course is the advanced level of RYA training. This is not a beginners course. You should already hold your Day Skipper qualification and have logged at least 800 sea miles with 30 night hours. The course pushes your navigation, boat handling, and decision making to a professional standard.

Over five days on the Solent, you will plan and execute coastal passages using tidal height and stream information, manage the yacht at night, and handle emergency situations. The Solent gives you varied conditions for this training — busy shipping lanes, restricted waters, and challenging tidal gates at Hurst Narrows and the Needles passage.

Successful completion of the Coastal Skipper practical course qualifies you to skipper a yacht up to 150 miles from a safe haven, day and night. It is also a prerequisite for the Yachtmaster Coastal and Yachtmaster Offshore exams.

Take a look at our live course calendar for dates for the Mile Building Weekend!