The Snake at Cowes

Fresh out of rehab, our slytherin correspondent stole a blazer to mingle at Skandia Cowes Week

Yacht racing developed into a recognisable sport during the Victorian era in days when a big boat’s foredeck crew was likely to be a moonlighting, local lobsterman rather than a gifted but gobby Antipodean. With a God given talent for world order The Victorians rapidly formalised Cowes Week, placing this late entry to the rigid and ritualised social calendar in early August. Presumably this filled an embarrassing and bothersome gap that yawned between watching young empire builders rowing down The Thames at Henley and before heading up to Scotland on 12 August to shoot at each other and any grouse that where careless enough to get caught in the crossfire.

This time of year is usually a period of light winds and high pressure and is not a recent El Nino-inspired meteorological phenomenon. It has always been thus. In the early days of yacht racing the light airs sailing left owners, crews and the less gouty royals with enough energy to rustle a bustle at Rosa Lewis’ establishment located in central Cowes. Ms Lewis’ (more famously known as The Duchess of Duke Street) crazy sailor hump-hump funhouse is now a respectable yacht club where behaviour and dress codes are somewhat more regulated. Today’s equally discerning Cowes Week crews have been able to vent their pent-up energy in a number of highly entertaining and unhealthy ways; many of which will be covered extensively in this column.

The likelihood of waking up with something unpleasant or disturbing during the regatta proved relatively high. With hangovers of intergalactic intensity common place, if this disability was accompanied by the presence of something feral and naked sleeping in the forepeak, then there were some useful numbers in the port authority handbook under “PANIC.” An equally disappointing, early morning sight was pollution from the uneven cluster of chimneys at Fawley oil refinery on the mainland shore rising in an unbroken, vertical stream. Those in the know forgot any Hornbloweresque ideas of wetting and holding up a finger or studying fluttering burgees; they merely checked out the local environmental blackspot for wind information.

The opening day’s racing on Saturday provided little excitement in light airs and gave many crews the opportunity to recover gently from any hot-headed, first night overindulgence. Lack of wind meant Sunday’s racing was postponed until 14:00 when the seabreeze kicked-in and classes were shot to all quarters of the Solent. This late start will have given ulcers to the pilot of the fully laden containership NYK Sirius departing from Southampton and forced to sail through the busy start line off The Royal Yacht Squadron. By 16:00 the sea breeze fan was switched off leaving dayboats scattered to the west of Cowes and being pushed towards The Needles on the height of the ebb tide.

Your correspondent had wisely elected to bale out of any racing early on and was installed at an extensive, extended and highly refreshing lunch on a lawn near Egypt Point to watch the proceedings. Struggling to avoid the full force of the tide in mid-Solent Victorys and Sigma 36s flopped and bobbed so close to the Island shore that The Snake could have passed the frustrated and sweltering crews a cool cocktail over the garden hedge. Meanwhile, unable to escape the tide, Squibs and the Seaview Mermaid fleet remained parked in the heavy traffic turning area soutwest of Calshot causing a massive car carrier to gingerly pick its way through the tiny boats; a stunning feat for a vessel the size of a small town.

Sunday also saw the Cowes Week tradition of the flying ant infestation. These annoying insects choose the regatta to mate or pupate or whatever it is they are up to and swarm around the town, often flying some distance offshore and onto competing boats. This pestilence ends up in the eyes and ears of those it encounters and cause ugly scenes on The Squadron lawn when landing in The King of Spain’s sangria and performing a frantic backstroke.

Although Monday and Tuesday produced some breeze and all classes raced, Wednesday morning saw the wind switch back to the west bringing damp air and a thick sea mist obliterating The Mainland. Rapidly the fog crept across The Solent, smoking between waterfront houses and then sat on silent haunches until it was finally burnt-off in the late morning. This provided further delayed racing that for many was to herald a succession of long and barren days.

An exception to this proved to be the early evening match racing between IRM boats Chernikeeff 2 and Bear of Britain. This supplied a much needed spectacle and a chance to view some close quarters racing. That both boats had already completed a full day of racing and that the crews managed to maintain enthusiasm, focus and stamina was impressive. Although only two of the four evenings of match racing were completed Chernikeeff 2 saw off The Bear 3-1 to satisfy many local sailors who had wagered money, handshakes and honour on such an outcome.

The light airs and stunning weather provided the perfect showcase for big boat corporate hospitality. This feature is becoming an integral part of Cowes Week and is essential for sponsorship gathering and the financing of many sailing projects. Most prominent on the Solent was Alex Thompson’s black Hugo Boss-sponsored yacht. Thompson had the double mission of entertaining guests and racing a large, highly visible boat safely and successfully. The new heavily branded yacht was a marketing triumph attracting attention both on the racecourse and while moored in prime position off The Green but was swamped with media hounds on the Friday when David Coultard, McLaren's square jawed Formula 1 driver was handed the helm.

The Offshore Challenges team once again showed how planning, organisation and dedication win support and sponsorship. Fielding two boats, Open 60 Kingfisher skippered by Ellen MacArthur and Open 50 OC1 with Nick Moloney, the company saw 270 guests across their decks and entertained many more ashore during days where the team started hospitality at 05:30 and seldom finished before mid-evening. Open Class boats have a rating that is an enigma at an inshore regatta rendering racing pointless and their beamy flat decks allowing teams to crowd guests on board.

It became clear early in the week that most of the action would be shore based and nocturnal. There are endless possibilities throughout the week from ticket paying balls and drinks parties to promotions where a small amount of oily spade work will secure an invitation.

The week’s first social engagement was on Saturday night in a high street restaurant held by the Girls For Sail team and hosted by mouth-watering PR pin-up, Susie Lister. The team entered 40 female sailors racing on four boats, each sponsored by a champagne label and with an overall goal of broadening the appeal of yacht racing for women and not reopening a modern day branch of Ms Lewis' house of fun, much to the disappointment of the Pimms-soaked on the pull.

Girls For Sail had a very fruitful week with an impressive fifth place on Wednesday by Bolly Dollies, with skipper Antonia Gripper. The Snake and a few unworthy cronies spent a very entertaining time at the party guzzling Veuve Cliquot and trying not to get caught staring before tearing himself away, donning a dinner jacket and heading for The Royal Yacht Squadron Ball.

This event provides a party benchmark that many other yacht clubs strive to achieve. The setting is quite brilliant, the company polite and the music would not offend your Great Aunt (quite fortunate, really, as the shrubs bordering the club’s immaculate lawn may well have a higher metabolic rate than a few of the guests). Squadron members can be distinguished by their quasi-military 'mess kit' that is worn to such parties and comprises a black, bum-freezer jacket, tight trousers and a lot of shiny buttons. This attire can cause confusion and mistaking a mess-kitted member with the club’s staff and asking him to carry your luggage or valet-park your car is a hideous faux-pas.

For those devotees of drinking beer from a plastic mug, the Cowes Yacht Haven provided huge entertainment. As usual the giant beer tent and stage area formed the framework for heroic post-sailing drinking where yachtsmen could meet the cream of the south coast’s womanhood. The safety capacity for this part of the marina is 6,000 people and this limit was met on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights when at peak times many of the 50 beer pumps required a freshly tapped 22 gallon barrel every seven minutes.

The Snake is unsure as to the collective noun for a large quantity of bare midriffs, but it may well be 'a wobble' and if one met the girl of one’s dreams in the beer tent there was no better place to take your new found, budget Barbie to work up a vigorous sweat than the heaving Mount Gay Rum Nightclub in the marina’s converted boatshed.

However, for a sheer concentration of beautiful women it would be hard to better Adam Gosling’s 40th birthday party held on the Monday night of Cowes Week. Gosling helmed his Synergy 40, Yes! Murphy & Nye to a hard fought second place overall in Class 2, but most agree that he was outright winner of the week’s party scene. The aching pertness of his female guests was such that The Snake was reduced to sobbing quietly into his glass of Chablis at an early stage of the evening.

Nothing in the universe travels faster than the speed of light, with the exception of bad news, which obeys its own unique laws. The grim tidings on Wednesday were that the food in many pubs and restaurants was inedible or indifferent. Veterans of Cowes Week are accustomed to this, but many new visiting competitors find this sudden change midway through the week upsetting, especially when the bill for feeding an entire crew can be horrendously large.

One noticeable exception to this was Dana Bena's newly opened Cats Bar and Restaurant on the town’s high street, where the quality of the food and humour of the staff remained consistent throughout the regatta. The restaurant’s basement also houses The Kitten Club where battle weary sailors could retire safe in the knowledge that they were unlikely to have beer slopped all over them or become involved in lengthy bouts of karate sailing (the tedious business of discussing and debating the day’s racing with hand chopping motions to illustrate tacking and using a wine bottle as the windward mark).

Remaining with the theme of food, The Snake was an accidental casualty in possibly the longest and most devastating food fight since records began. Taking place in the town’s only Italian restaurant the incident may prove that a plate of spaghetti alla carbonara is a Weapon of Mass Destruction and an airborne bottle of Rioja is as dangerous as a well aimed Tomahawk missile. The perpetrators of this war crime were a crew known as'“The Fat Gits' who have been part of the Cowes Week scene for 12 years and were sailing on a chartered Beneteau, Blue Juice, in Class 3. Quite what they were doing in a restaurant is a mystery as the crew adhere rigidly to the regatta, non-eating credo that one should never put solids in a hydraulic system. Indeed, any attempts at personal hygiene by a Fat Git crewmember during the week is similarly regarded with scorn and suspicion. Your war correspondent quickly fled the restaurant using a plucky and brave young waitress as a human shield. The Fat Gits left sometime later on good but slightly strained terms with the management who are probably still picking tiramisu out of the attractively patterned plasterwork in the restaurant’s ceiling and scraping garlic bread from the light fittings.

Friday night was a chance for those non-sailors holidaying on The Island to join in the one event of the regatta that was understandable without constant explanation from Cowes Week Radio via the loudspeaker system strung along the waterfront. The firework display drew thousands to the town to boggle and exclaim at the impressive show and visiting yachts and motorboats filled Cowes Roads turning the harbour into an attractive, if confusing, mass of navigation lights.

This year’s 25 minute show was the result of one and a half days of preparation by Cambridgeshire based Kimbolton Fireworks. 10 tons of equipment was set up on a barge anchored off The Parade from which 4,000 individual rockets containing 20, 000 pyrotechnics were launched by a control panel on the balcony of The Royal Yacht Squadron. The warm, windless evening produced a surprisingly relaxed, Mediterranean atmosphere that may have contributed to a relatively trouble-free night on an occasion that can often give the police a severe headache.

Saturday and the final day of racing saw most crews leave the marina to return home immediately after their race and attempt to reconstruct their lives in the real world. One enjoyable, recent tradition at the end of the regatta is The Osborne Bay Beach Party, below Queen Victoria’s residence Osborne House. To finish the week at a party on the private beach of the woman who inspired the whole event seems totally appropriate. The Snake climbed in a RIB and while softly humming The Beastie Boys classic “No sleep ‘til Brooklyn” shot round to the quiet, secluded bay just east of Cowes.

The idea for this beach party was conceived roughly 10 years ago and was initially an exclusively Etchells affair, in days when the combined annual income of the three man keelboat’s crew was often more than the GNP of many Latin American countries. Over time the party’s emphasis has changed and rather than persuading Fiona from Fulham that swimming naked is mandatory, a guest’s priority now is likely to be stopping five year old Archie from putting any potentially toxic beach flotsam into his mouth.

As a gentle mist cloaked the bay and candleflares along the beach held back the night throwing quivering pools of golden light on the sand a band began playing in the small marquee set slightly back from the shoreline. Moved by the perfect mood of the evening, one veteran of 20 Cowes Weeks sat alone on the beach recalling past regattas; the boats, crews, fine racing, frenzied partying, gorgeous girlfriends, ghastly behaviour…….and awoke two hours later soaked with dew, riddled with cramp and covered in insects.

Strolling along Cowes High Street later the same night, the buildings and pavements seemed to be almost panting with exhaustion after a hot and hectic week. The town was (almost) quiet and any yachtsmen still remaining had clearly elected to save their energy for the following day’s Fastnet Race. The regatta was definitely over and Cowes had hosted and survived Britain’s premier sailing fixture proving that even though the racing was borderline due to meteorology, the town can still host a great party and a boisterous event.