OFFSHORE PREPARATION

OSR Category 2 is easy to achieve but Category 1 requires a little more effort and I found keeping a book of compliance helped. Consider borrowing expensive items such as satellite phones and appropriately sized storms sails to keep costs down.

Take suitable tools for every adjustment or repair you need to do. Rather than plan for the unexpected, plan for the unwanted. What situation would you not want to be in? Now think how and what you’d need to solve it. I carry a large inventory aboard

Boogie Nights which includes: a cordless drill, screwdrivers and spanners, fuses, a long-handled manual cable/steel wire cutter, snap shackles and enough spare ropes to replace at least one reef line, at least one spare halyard and eight sheets that can be repurposed elsewhere.

For me, the race was an expensive experience, one that I will financially struggle to recover from well beyond the next four-year race cycle.