Sailing single handed, I was on the edge of needing to reef, having only one persons ballast, that being me. So one reef was set before the race start, then shaken out, then set again, and our one minute gun was fired.

Being the only single handed boat, and therefore the only one with a reef in, I decided to start on a "long" port tack, while everyone else crossed the flood stream on starboard. A risk strategy can pay off if you're the most disadvantaged. We were plugging against wind and tide. I had no timer so began counting from 60.

When we started, it was immediately clear I should've gone for starboard. 3 mins later the wind dropped a little and I had to head up and shake out the reef, by this time the fleet was rounding the first mark, a quarter of a mile ahead, I had a lot of work to do, now being in 12th.

Two and a half hours later, through a long complicated course, I had tried every trick in the book. The centre plate up downwind and minimal rudder to reduce drag, I put all the weight in the boat forward to reduce the transom drag, and stayed in as shallower water as possible against a strong flood tide, and the deep water carrying me back.

A final placing of 4th wasn't the result I was looking for, but good enough for the first race of the season. 2014...here we come