For the first time in its history, the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris will achieve gender parity. For sailing, this means four women’s events, four men’s events and two mixed…
Yachting Monthly
How to rig a preventer and boom brake: Our expert guide
A well-designed preventer system is just as important as any other part of the rigging, but it’s often an afterthought, sometimes little more than an old mooring line tied around…
How to learn to sail: Catching the sailing wave
When I signed up to improve my sailing knowledge via an RYA Competent Crew course, I didn’t realise it would involve gasping at fins breaking through the water. As I…
August 2024
In the July 2024 issue of Yachting Monthly magazine: Features KATHLEEN PALMER – Sailing’s invisble woman, and how she helped pave the way to Olympic parity RAT ON BOARD –…
Maiden Skipper Heather Thomas: From dinghy lake to Ocean Globe Race winner
Heather Thomas is the first female British skipper to win a round the world race, and her team aboard Maiden, backed by Tracy Edwards MBE, are the first all-female crew…
Sailing to the Scillies and back: ‘In the timeless rhythms of the ocean, this latest period of flux and profound change is the greatest’
Being poked in the cheek and asked ‘Is this annoying? Is this annoying? Is this annoying?’ by my bored 11-year-old daughter Isla was indeed annoying. But what made it even…
How we installed a new engine on our yacht
Auxiliary engines, as they were called in the old days, were hot, noisy, smelly lumps of metal that weren’t usually powerful enough to motor into wind or tide. My first…
‘We got battered by a storm that wasn’t forecast’
Although we had managed a brief visit to St Kilda, the Scottish weather during 2022 had not been great, so my wife Sarah and I pondered going somewhere warm. I…
Grand Soleil 42LC review: a serious boat for serious cruisers
Light winds may not make for the most exciting boat test images, especially when it’s chilly, the sky is grey and it’s threatening to rain, which was the weather we…
What can be learned from these 4 major accidents at sea?
There are few incidents on board more destructive than a crash gybe. The power unleashed when the wind catches the wrong side of the mainsail is hard to overstate, and…