PREPARATION, PREPARATION, PREPARATION!

Learn the boat inside out. Mark everything: key positions on sheets, halyards, the deck, whatever makes the job repeatable. It may sound basic, but getting the basics right helps you focus on the more complicated parts of the job.

If you can talk to people with experience of sailing the boat, ask them. Don’t be shy, and don’t be too proud to ask.

The more you can get your systems organised in daylight, the simpler things become at night. One of the easiest things to mess up at night is halyard storage; it’s normally the easiest thing to get wrong and the hardest one to put right again. Even if you’ve checked the halyards a hundred times, at sunset check them again, just really make sure that everything’s really well sorted.

Make sure you are the only one that touches and stores halyards – or else have a mid-bowman who knows the exact same system as you.

Sometimes you have no choice but to go aloft at sea, so work out your handholds in advance.