Race Guides & Case Studies
RORC race guides, previews and debriefs
Most offshore races are lost before the start. Not on the water, but at the chart table the night before, when the crew decides what the race is about and gets it wrong.
This section is about getting it right. It covers the races that make up a season, from the Cervantes Trophy and the Myth of Malham to Cowes to St Malo, as well as the Round the Island Race. Each piece looks at a specific course: where the tide decides things, where the wind tends to go soft, which headland rewards a brave call and which punishes one.
Some pieces are previews, written to help you plan. Others are debriefs, looking at what the leaders did differently and why it worked. Light-air races get as much attention as heavy ones, because a race that is too light to be easy is often where the places are won.
None of it is theory. It comes from more than 200 RORC offshore races since 1971, including the 2022 Round Britain and Ireland Race, sailed four-handed aboard Morning After. We won Class 4.
The lesson from that race applies to all of them. You do not win offshore with one brilliant call. You win with hundreds of slightly better ones, and they come more easily if you have thought about the course before you get there.
The articles are listed below, newest first. Explore the other subjects in the FirstShift article library, or read the latest articles.
