Rolex Fastnet Race

Clash of the Titans from Downunder

The Event

First sailed in 1925, and run biennially since the early 1930s, the 608-mile Fastnet race immediately captured the imagination of sailors the world over. It was one of the first true tests of offshore sailing skill to win this race is an ambition of every racing sailor. Organised by the Royal Ocean Racing Club (RORC) the course takes the impressive fleet from Cowes, on the Isle of Wight, around the Fastnet Rock off the SW Irish coast and back to Plymouth. It is a difficult race and tests inshore and offshore skills, preparation and speed potential. It has been the prime mover in the growth of offshore racing over the past 75 years, and is still intricately linked to advances in sail boat design, sailing techniques, safety equipment and hence to the popularity of the modern sport of sailing.

It means different things to the more than 2000 different people who will be on board the 230+ yachts entered this year. For some it is a once-in-a-life-time personal challenge to see if the human side can be dealt with, for others it is part of a much bigger picture, part of a lifetime of sailing, but never just another race. It is not undertaken lightly by anyone and each boat and crew must fulfill a strict qualification regime before its entry is accepted.

Above all the Rolex Fastnet Race is a challenge of seamanship in taking a suitably equipped sailing boat across what have often proved to be some of the most treacherous waters in the world.

A look at the race and how it is sailed

The Rolex Fastnet is never a simple race and early in August it is often provided with Westerlies that are strong to gale force in strength. Rarely is a Fastnet held in which there is not a strong wind at some time in the race and the progressive succession of low pressure systems which advance on the British Isles from across the North Atlantic Ocean provide a constantly moving weather pattern. These depressions are mostly centred north of the English Channel. Knowledge of where any meteorological disturbance is likely to occur and how best to use it is now the keynote to Fastnet success, it is even more important now that the boats have faster reactions and are more responsive to changes in wind pressure and direction.

The Rolex Fastnet Race always starts the weekend after Cowes Week has finished and almost always from the famous Royal Yacht Squadron start line in front of West Cowes. The RORC plan the start to coincide with the top of the tide so that the fleet can benefit from the West going ebb tide down the Solent and through the Needles Channel for as long as possible. Maximising the use of the tide is one of the most important factors for all sailing in the Solent, that narrow strip of sea between the Isle of Wight and the Hampshire Coast, which can at times see streams of up to five knots in places.

Because of the size of the fleet the start is broken into classes with this year slowest going first and the fastest last. Those that do go first quite often have to deal with half an hour of foul tide in the restricted waters in front of Cowes and handling the complex patterns of the turn of the tide correctly can give an immediate advantage over the opposition. From the spectators point of view this works doubly well because it usually means plenty of action just in front of Cowes Green, the strip of land running along the foreshore immediately past the start line, as far as Egypt Point.

So in optimising the start time to give the slowest and smallest boats the best chances of making an expedient exit from the Solent no matter what the wind, the RORC will start the 2005 Rolex Fastnet Race from 1100 on Sunday 7th August.

The predominant winds in the Solent are from the southwest, which would normally mean an upwind departure. But starting relatively early in the morning at the height of summer may yield almost anything in wind direction and strength, hence the importance of not having to fight the tide too. 2003 saw a classic start under spinnaker.

The Rolex Fastnet Race fleet will almost always pass out of the Solent through the Needles Channel in front of the excellent public vantage points at Hurst Castle on the mainland side and Fort Albert on the Island side. Each class will then move into the English Channel before the East going flood tide starts again six hours later at about 1700.

Depending on the size of the boat and the anticipated weather the next big milestone will be Portland Bill. The tide turns here just before the main stream in the middle of the Channel and can run foul at up to 7 knots just a couple of miles offshore. More often than not the fleet will steer well clear of this headland and stay offshore where conditions are more predictable and where the tide turns later. If it is really light there is always a group of boats of a certain size that must make a decision a couple of hours before Portland as to whether they will pass offshore or try and sneak past close to the coast and inside of the Portland Race and get quickly into the relative tidal shelter of Lyme Bay beyond.

The rest of the passage westwards along the South Coast of England will see the fleet tackle the remaining significant headlands, Berry Head, Start Point, The Lizard and Lands End in much the same way - determine the tidal situation at the time the point is approached; if the tide is favourable, position the boat to best use the local headland and its associated accelerations; if against in no wind, rock hop as close to the shore as possible or if windy, well offshore where the stream is more uniform.

The fleet will have spread out quickly having left the Solent and the massive differential in speeds of the various classes and sizes will mean different tactics and strategies for each size group of boats depending on the state of the tide and the wind conditions anticipated. Each group of boats will have identified its nearest rivals and primary targets early in the race and each will have a strategy prepared before the start to decide how to play the race.

The tricky times come when the sun goes down on the first night and the opposition is impossible to track because of the empty expanse of the sea and the small and relatively insignificant power of yacht navigation lights once more than a couple of miles away. For the less experienced crews the first night at sea, after the build-up and excitement of the start and the first day, will result in a certain amount of disorientation with the settling into an offshore routine with watches, meal preparation and navigation. For the leaders and the largest and fastest boats who may well be sailing in isolation, leaving the Solent and tackling the English Channel will see the crew settling in to a similar routine, but with more frequent crew rotations to keep the vital trimmers and helmsmen sharp.

On the larger boats a huge amount of effort will be put in at the navigation station to assemble as full a picture as possible of the anticipated and actual weather conditions further up the course. Many yachts are equipped with weather fax machines and several enjoy the benefit of broadband solutions on board which yield endless real time information about local weather conditions. All of this allows routing strategies to be determined and modified to optimise the course to be sailed to the next waypoint on the course. The facility for the detection of the relevant information is available to all, but like all information, the difficulty is in analysing it correctly.

The infamous Lands End, the last piece of England and the most western point of Cornwall, sees the English Channel, the Bristol Channel and the Western Approaches all join together. It is usually marked by a dramatic and immediate change in conditions. The course changes here too and the fleet start to sail, for what maybe the first time since the start, completely out of sight of land. The leg from Lands End to the Fastnet Rock is 170 miles long, sufficiently long and devoid of tidal factors that the weather is the deciding factor in how to play this northwesterly leg. Positioning the boat relative to the rhumb line or on either side of the immediate opposition, again in anticipation of how the conditions will be at the end of the leg, dictates the strategy for this first truly offshore section.

In 1991, the three-boat French Admiral’s Cup team had planned their strategy well before the start, and with the ace meteorologist Jean-Yves Bernot in charge and navigating one of the three boats, they were well briefed in the use of the information derived from their weatherfax machines and barometers.

The French boats, in what was a light air race, held true to the maxim of sailing where the wind was, and not where it wasn’t. Bernot had made his teammates aware of a variety of scenarios and drilled them as to how they should tackle each one. The result which included a major diversion north of the rhumb line from Lands End to the Fastnet Rock and another to the south of it on the way back to find the breeze, while the rest of the fleet were often becalmed on the rhumb line was that France scored two firsts and a second in their classes and took the Admiral’s Cup.

Depending on the weather and the size of the boat, the mythical, magical and much anticipated Fastnet Rock will appear on the horizon anywhere from 30 miles to just 500 metres out. The weather in the Western Approaches at anytime of year can be atrocious and the month of August, supposedly the height of the English summer, often seems to make no difference. On a bright and clear day, the Rock can be seen from a long distance, well before the coast of Ireland from certain angles. At night, the piercing light is designed to be the first landfall for ships coming across the Atlantic and so has a range of 27 miles. Sometimes, however, the weather can be so bad that you see almost nothing except the light and the sound of the horn from within just a few hundred metres.

Bishop Rock juts out from the sea several miles to the south of the Scilly Isles, It was also on this return leg in 1979 that the race leaders experienced the worst weather. The smaller boats were still on their way up to the Rock and passing each other in a similar stretch of water in storm conditions. The extreme seas were caused by a ninety degree veer in the gale force winds, from southwest to northwest, which built a new wave train on an existing underlying wave pattern developing plenty of rogue waves. And it was these rogue waves that knocked boats down, broke rudders, smashed masts, flooded boats and washed people overboard.

The tide starts to play a role again nearing the Scillies, so getting the approach right is critical. The next leg heading northeast to the last major corner of the course takes the fleet to The Lizard, the gateway to the English Channel and again another tidally crucial headland. The West Country headlands are all high granite cliffs tumbling into the sea with rocky outcrops surrounded by local fisherman’s lobster pots, another set of unpredictable hazards.

The last leg across Falmouth Bay towards Rame Head and the entrance to Plymouth Sound can see the hard work of the previous 500 miles all go to waste without careful planning. With crews beginning to relax, and think of showers, real food, beds, loved ones and a nice pint of beer, there are still many traps for the unwary. Mostly associated with the fickle summer breezes and the transition from gradient to thermally induced winds, the longer route around the edge of the bays along the rocky shores has often proved to be a smarter move than the direct straight-line route to the finish line.

The finish line itself, off the western end of Plymouth Breakwater - the big sea wall that protects Britain’s second Navy base, is still a couple of miles from civilisation and the lights of Plymouth, Queen Anne’s Battery and the welcome of the Royal Western Yacht Club.

To beat the current race record in a monohull, the first boat will need to be crossing the finish line by 16.08 on Tuesday 9th August; and in a multihull, before 03.27 on Tuesday. With the profile of the fleet entered in the 2005 Rolex Fastnet Race, both of these goals may be attainable with the right weather conditions.