It will have been a sleepless night last night for most of the 52 skippers on their way from Lorient to Coruna on the first leg of La Solitaire du Figaro. Within hours of the start, in a respectable 10 knots or so of breeze, they were stalled in the forecast light and variable conditions, and for the single-handers that means only one thing – time spent on deck hand steering and trimming sails to wring out every fraction of a knot of boatspeed.…

Hundreds are expected to gather in Holy Trinity Church, Cowes, behind the Royal Yacht Squadron, on Wednesday August 5th at 17.30hrs to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the Fastnet Race tragedy of 1979. The names of the fifteen sailors who lost their lives will be read out during the ceremony. The tragedy resulted in one of the biggest  peacetime co-ordinated search and rescue operations taking place.…

Hundreds are expected to gather in Holy Trinity Church, Cowes, behind the Royal Yacht Squadron, on Wednesday August 5th at 17.30hrs to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the Fastnet Race tragedy of 1979. The names of the fifteen sailors who lost their lives will be read out during the ceremony. The tragedy resulted in one of the biggest  peacetime co-ordinated search and rescue operations taking place.…