They say you should be careful what you wish for but nothing could be further from the truth. I am delighted to have been named skipper of team Turn the…
Yachting World
Dee Caffari: Professional female sailors and role models needed to inspire young competitors
Seeing Tracy Edwards reunited with her Whitbread Round the World yacht Maiden, which she raced with an all-women crew in 1989, stirred some memories. The yacht has come full circle…
Facnor FD190 flat deck furler
Although not a new product, this webbing line furler is rarely seen outside of French performance cruising yachts, writes Rupert Holmes. It’s a great option for anyone who wants to maximise…
Beach rescue – Skip Novak aids lone yachtsman recovering yacht from remote shore
It is rare to leave the Antarctic Peninsula earlier than need be. No matter how much time you allow for a cruise in that splendid and awe-inspiring environment it is…
Wind chill explained – how exactly does the wind make you feel colder?
Meteorologically spring is an interesting time of year as the weather can be quite volatile, particularly the sunshine and showers we associate with April and the squalls they bring (although…
Happy crew, happy boat – how to avoid crew problems and a bad atmosphere on board
Boat crews fall apart – it happens from time to time – but in Rodney Bay, St Lucia, at the end of the annual Atlantic Rally for Cruisers (ARC), the…
Summer sailing in high latitudes is no guarantee of good weather – sometimes winter is better
Although we are in the business of providing uncertainty as one of the mainstays of the Pelagic experience, there are times when you do feel your head banging against a…
Mike Peyton on learning to sail – an extract from his autobiography, Quality Time
Not many readers of Yachting World will have failed to come across the cartoons of Mike Peyton. Whatever branch of yachting is our choice, Mike caught us to a tee.…
“What the hell were we doing in this situation?” The true story of the Mutiny recreation for UK television
We staggered up the beach in a remote part of Timor, our weary legs gave way as each of us collapsed onto the pebbly shoreline. Tears of relief ran down…
Uphill all the way – reliving a leg of the BT Challenge across the Southern Ocean against the prevailing winds
Most accounts of grim conditions in the Southern Ocean are written by skippers of race boats or owners of smaller yachts engaged in high adventure, writes Tom Cunliffe. Uphill all…
Arkema 3 – the innovative foiling Mini 6.50 aiming to win the 2017 Mini Transat race
Looking at the armoury of innovations incorporated in the Arkema 3 Mini it appears to be an all-out effort to blast every other Mini out of the water, pushing new…
Conrad Colman’s Vendee Globe story in his own words – “I gave this race my all”
Carbon fibre race yachts are noisy beasts. Sharp creaks from the sheets in the cockpit, constant thumping bass notes from the hull slamming against the oncoming waves and the staccato…
Racing on Eleonora in the Caribbean 600 – a dream course for a giant classic schooner
One of the great wonders of sailing is that, no matter how wide our experience or how long we’ve been at sea, none of us has seen it all. Take…
Time for Ainslie to get angry? What will it take for Land Rover BAR to beat Emirates Team New Zealand
Ben Ainslie is not averse to controversy. It wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to suggest he thrives on it. Where most sailors perform less well when they lose…
Faeroes to Norway in a Wayfarer dinghy – Frank Dye’s extraordinary tale of sea survival
When I was a student in Liverpool in the mid-1960s, sailing the university’s Firefly dinghies when I ought to have been studying, the local hero was a young man called…
Undaunted – the 42-inch yacht still hoping to become the smallest boat ever to cross the Atlantic
Just 24 hours into his first attempt to sail solo across the Atlantic in Undaunted, his 42-inch yacht, Matt Kent had to turn back. He set off from La Gomera…
Rumours abound as the teams run out of time to make significant changes to their boats
Emirates Team New Zealand is making the most of its status as the dark horse of this America’s Cup. As I write, the Kiwi AC50 has not long emerged out…
What we can expect from the 35th America’s Cup in Bermuda – and why there could be surprises
If Jimmy Spithill had been invited to step into a time machine ten years ago to catch a glimpse of what his future looked like, even his famously cool head…
Pitchpoled in the Pacific in an open boat – survival depends on crossing a deadly Pacific Island reef
Webb Chiles is a one-off, writes Tom Cunliffe. The first American to sail single-handed around Cape Horn, he has circumnavigated five times, mostly in small craft, some of them open.…
What is a rogue wave and is it possible to predict where and when one will strike a yacht?
The first oceanographer to define a wave as ‘freak’ was Laurence Draper, a man who preferred to do his science on dry land rather than at sea. While his colleagues…