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Now we're into the series proper, memories of last weekend's practice in shorts and t-shirts long forgetten. This is the winter series, winter, and Hamble River Sailing Club had booked the weather to get things off to an exciting start. But that was Sunday, there is a tale to tell before we even get close to Sunday morning.

First of all was Tina's e-mail: Russell has very bad flu and might not make it, and that I'd been handed the baton for the weekend. Given Russell's imminent demise I thought Tina was taking it remarkably calmly, but then yacht racing is important. Having spoken to the patient, he sounded a little feek and weable, but just about able to communicate. Which was useful since I kind of needed to know who was coming for the weekend. A bit light on people so I enticed a friend Jon with the promise of his being allowed to steer. I'm probably in the doghouse with his wife, but you can't make omlettes without breaking legs.

Saturday morning dawned wet, foul, and windy - deep joy - a lovely drive down to Southampton. En route Tina called - she was suffering from a mystery headache an was going back to bed for a bit. One down. Richard, being in the flush of a new romance, wasn't coming down until the evening. Two down. Russell off sick. Three down. Mike rang round a couple of people he knew to bolster the crew for Sunday and came up trumps with Adrian, more of his adventures later. That left three of us for Saturday. Mike, Steph and I, so we went for a bit of a sail rather than a practice. We set off by midday, fortified with soup, the weather having brightened up nicely. As we motored out of the Hamble a 28kn gust blew accross the deck, could be interesting... Thankfully the cruising main was still attached, so three reefs it was and off we went. A fun blast in the sun was has by all.

The evening's plan went like clockwork. Richard arrived by train, Tina (now feeling better) arrived perfectly in time to collect him, Boomerang could feed us at 7:30, the beer was flowing nicely. Had also collected an eigth crew member, Liz, who was looking for a sail the next day (very easy sale, as a former owner of the first X-332 out of the mould). Sorted. There follows a suitable blurred evening of eating, drinking and bonhomie. Oh, and the 'worst blues band in Chrisendom' to quote Richard, playing at the square rigger. It wasn't that they were actually that bad, indeed through closed doors they sounded pretty good. It was just that having 5 members of the band who all wanted to be heard above the others meant that all their amps were turned up to eleven...

Sunday dawned fine. And that lasted all of ten minutes. The promised depression from Biscay arrived at about 7:30am and the rain started, no wind though. The shipping forecast promised F6-8 occasionally 9 later. Lawks thought I, glad we've got eight people, and that it would have been better if we'd sailed togther at some point. Ah well. After getting the cruising sails into my car Jon turned up looking pretty chipper, he'd driven to a party the night before so as to be in a fit state to sail (perhaps Emma won't be miffed after all). Getting close to 9am and Liz arrived looking slightly less sure about sailing, the combination of rain and a hangover. But hey, she was in good company, the team was complete.

Out to the start and the rain relented somewhat, a bit more wind, but still marginal #1/#3 weather. We put up the #3 genoa for a quick practice and the wind dropped to 8kn. Whispered discussions that we'd need the number 1 if it stayed that quiet. Fortunately the act of Richard, Adrian and Mike neatly flaking the #3 into its bag caused the wind to blow up. Finally into the starting sequence, we'd planned our approach, were in the right place... ...and there was a huge windshift and the start sequence was abandoned. Bugger, we'd have to do it all over again. But just to prove it wasn't a fluke we repeated the process and got a very good start in clear air at the right end of the line. Wind was now gusting over 20kn but nothing outrageous. I think we were something like third at the windward mark. Excellent.

The spinnaker went up a little twisted, but was sorted with very little drama, and off we went. Wind now gusting into the higher twenties. The vessel was becoming a big of a handful for Jon in the gusts, but he manfully clung to the battlestick. It was now that we decided that we should execute a manoevre that Russell had been exhorting us to practice for some time. The technical term for this is the 'big roll, dip the spinnaker pole in the water, round up swiftly into the wind and get pinned down by the spinnaker, immediately followed by the main gybing'. And may I say we executed this perfectly. It was at this moment that Adrian had his adventure, diving gracefully from the mast down to the leeward, submerged, guardrails. He caught them and hung on - Oh my god he'll never want to come sailing again, thought I. However his cheesy grin seemed to be saying something quite different. Anyway we got out of out slight predicament at the cost of one spinnaker slightly shredded but nothing injured but pride. The concensus was that we should continue (adrenaline, marvellous stuff), no more spinnakers - much of the fleet was making that decision too. Wind now gusting over 30kn, somwhere near the back of the fleet, but next to Exabyte, so some racing was still to be done. Gybed round the next mark, up the next windward leg, bit easier having now reefed the main. Wind gusting up to 35kn, we'd made it! Officially now a F8 gale, excellent.

Onto the next downwind leg. Not many spinnakers appearing now. But it was still something of a sleigh ride, Jon grasping the battlestick, someone ready to dump the kicker at all times, surfing at over 10kn down a short rough sea (max tide against a fresh breeze). Was that good, ooooh yes, its hairs standing on back of neck good. As we approached the leeward mark we realised we'd either have to gybe or sail dead down wind to get round. As it happened we didn't really favour either of those options right at that moment. Everything felt very powered up. A quick glance at the wind speed explained why. Wind now sustained gusts of over 40kn (that's as close to F9 as I wanted to get). So discretion took the better part of valour and we headed home. I think everyone was happy with that call.

However it was not the end of our adventures. Recall we are still in the middle of the Solent, wind gusting over 40kn, surfing at over 10kn, its rough, its raining. Fab! We took the decision that it was easier to sail in as we were, rather than take the sails down out in the roughness. That meant we'd have to gybe, or tack round a couple of times. We went for the tack option for the first turn. Slight problem, in those winds its almost impossible to bear away to get sailing again... Next one we gybed, worked fine. The final gybe something got stuck and we rounded up into the wind heeling magnificently - no one batted an eyelid this time, what a crew. Either that or we were too busy watching Richard submarine backwards down the sidedeck, stilll dutifully clinging to the kicker. Sacrificing himself for the cause. Oh for automatic-inflating lifejackets, that would have made the moment complete. After that we dropped the sails, drove in, tied up and headed for the pub to share battle stories. An exciting day! Thanks to everyone for a fun time!

Dave.