BSC at the 2026 Round the Island Race
Published 15:45 on 27 Jul 2026
The Round the Island Race in "Sea Urchin", a Cornish Shrimper 19
By Sarah-Jane Hall
I have raced in the Round the Island Race many times before and it has always been great fun. If the weather is kind, it's a lovely day out. The course is simple. The start is in Cowes, leave the Needles lighthouse to port, St Catherine's point to port, Bembridge Ledge buoy to port and back to the finish in Cowes. However, the course is 50 nautical miles long, the same distance as sailing from St Catherine's point to the Cherbourg peninsula, so it is a long way.
The age-old motto about racing around the Isle of Wight is to stick to the island shore. This is much easier, and perhaps much more exciting, in a boat that only draws 18 inches with the centre plate up!
I fell in love with the Cornish Shrimper during lockdown. I needed a boat for trips around the Harbour, that had the capacity for 2 or 3 other people on board. I now share her with Jos Palmer (our new BSC Environment Officer).
She is a very good harbour day boat and I have never stayed on board, because she is also incredibly uncomfortable. Living on board is equivalent to very basic camping, with no loo. This last fact makes It is very important who you are prepared to go sailing with, because you have a "bucket and chuck it" routine (apologies for getting down to basics so quickly, but you are all sailors). This has ruled out sailing with some people that I don't know terribly well.
When I first started sailing the Shrimper, it did not occur to me that you could (or should) sail her in the open sea. However, during the Round the Island race in 2023, to my absolute amazement I saw a Shrimper out racing at Bembridge Ledge and watched her on her way back to Cowes. She was tacking up in the shallows, all the way past Seaview and over Ryde Sands, keeping up with much larger boats. The conditions had been severe down the back of the Island, with 35 May Day calls. I just thought, "How marvellous to be able to do that!" and I have wanted to do the same ever since. However, this is not a new thought for BSC members. Other members have told me that they did the Round the Island in a Shrimper with Chris Welland many years ago.
I do enjoy long distance double handed sailing and was lucky enough to do the Azores and Back in 1991. I only wanted one crew member for the race, the choice of crew being all important. I needed someone who had a with a sense of adventure themselves and preferably someone with muscles, because I thought that this would be handy down the back of the island, if the wind got up (I was right). So, I asked my friend and fellow skipper, Mike Sutcliffe to come with me. He is a bit of a "Bear Grylls" character and immediately understood that this was going to be an adventure. He is also a strong swimmer and I had instructions not to turn the boat around if he fell over the side, "Just heave to and I will swim back to the boat". Perfect!
For us, the event was over 3 days: the trip to Cowes; the Race; the trip home. So in about September last year, I booked accommodation at the RORC and a berth at Shepards Marina.
Day 1 Sailing to Cowes
The trip to Cowes was an early start from the mooring in Bosham Channel, to catch the tide, in the middle of the last heat wave. Surprise, surprise, Shrimpers do not have biminis. Before the race, I had purchased a large golf umbrella (an idea stolen from my friend from Fulham when she had come on board last year) and this was effective in sheltering us from the sun.
Cruising to Cowes.
It was good to have a shakedown cruise. We stopped in Osborne Bay for a swim. We set up the reefing points at the correct angle and swam around the boat, scrubbing off the weed.
At the end of Day 1, our marina berth at Shepards was a big success with our own pontoon berth (no rafting up). Being able to step ashore was total luxury. A quiet evening with dinner at the RORC was also very welcome.
Day 2 The Race
Dawn breaks on the Big Day
Race day had arrived. It was going to be a beautiful day and the "too windy to go" forecast from earlier in the week had moderated to 15 to 20 knots down the back of the Island. We were "Game On!".
Our start was at 7.10am, which was just as well, as gaffers need as much time as possible to get around the island before the Finish closes at 10pm.
On the way to the start, many crews started pointing at us and laughing, which I thought was a bit much, but I am sure that we just looked ridiculously small. We played dodgems with some enormous boats and several large multihulls. I did manage to do a timed run sailing to the line with 5 minutes to go, just to ensure that we weren't going be over the line in the westerly tide. Although our start was slightly conservative (about 20 yards back when the gun went), I was happy that we weren't over the line. We were off!
Before the Start
I was also pleased that the new jib pole (all-important for downwind sailing) was put into action in the Easterly breeze. And then came the first gybe and "ping" went the pole, straight into the sea. Mike was insistent that we tried to retrieve it (I thought that it would sink too quickly). We missed it the first time, but amazingly it was still floating. We went around again and even more amazingly, managed to grab it!
By this time, the other gaffers had overtaken us, but we pursued our island side of the course, and this served us well, as by the time we got to Hurst Castle, we were probably the first gaffer again.
The Needles are the highlight of the race and I was keen to go as close as possible to the lighthouse. I also know that this is an aggressive route, with most boats staying well away from the rocks and the wreck, but with the tide whipping the boats towards Poole, there is a distinct advantage to be close. Approaching the Needles, we were the most island side boat in the fleet and passed the lighthouse so close that I could clearly see the rock shelf in the sea at the base of the lighthouse.
Approaching the Needles Lighthousee at 9.43am
As we sailed around the lighthouse, we came into an extraordinary wind system. Rather than it being the expected easterly breeze and the start of a long beat to St Catherine's, the cliffs on the South side had made a vortex of wind in their lee and suddenly we had very little control. We were stuck on a port tack making very little progress, then the wind switched to starboard, then behind us. And all the time we had other boats who were basically heading straight for us on starboard. This was quite hairy, so we decided, as soon as we could, to tack back into the shore, hug the island shore again, staying out of the tide as much as we could, but also out of the way of the other much, much, bigger boats. There were a lot of tacks in to and out from those cliffs and by 12.45pm we had reached Freshwater Bay, which is only 5 nautical miles from the Needles, passed 3 hours earlier. I thought that we were doing terribly badly. However, when we got back to Cowes, we did discover quite how many boats had to retire at this point, as they were going backwards in the tide.
We continued beating towards St Catherine's point, still against the tide and in slightly too much wind, hoping to catch the back-eddy.
Spotted by Ben Lewis after Freshwater Bay
We had plenty of time to think about the overfalls at St Catherine's on our long beat. One of the people that I used to sail with in Lymington was Peter Bruce in his boat "Owl". Peter, who sadly died last year, wrote "Solent Hazards" and also "Wight Hazards" about the south side of the island. I rather wished that I had actually read the latter as we could clearly see the overfalls. Nearing St Catherine's, we tacked right into the shore where there was flat water. We tacked back into the shore as soon as we got close to the disturbed water. We made good progress in completely flat water as we rounded St Catherine's.
Rounding St Catherine's at 3.11pm
We continued beating towards Ventor (due East of St Catherine's). The wind was more manageable and we had plenty of time to admire the Botantical Gardens and the lovely villas along the shoreline. After Ventor, we were on a fetch to Bembridge Ledge Bouy, both quite tired after a 7 hour beat. We both managed to have 10 minutes kip (not at the same time).
Rounding Bembridge Ledge bouy at 6.20pm
Finally, we were on the home stretch. The wind had dropped to about 12 knots and although the tide was against us at first on this leg, we were confident that we were going to finish before the time limit of 10pm
Heading towards the Finish
The rescued jib pole came into use again and we crossed the finish line at 8.34pm, 13.5 hours after we started.
The Finish at 8.34pm
We received a friendly wave from the Committee Boat and headed back to Shepards and the RORC, who had kindly saved some dinner for us, which we ate to the cheers of England winning a world cup football match.
Day 3 The trip back to Bosham
The wind was forecast to increase in the late afternoon to 30 knots (too much for a Shrimper), and we did not want another very early start. We set off at around 8.30am from Cowes, with two reefs in the main and motor-sailed back to Chichester, against the tide. Again, we hugged the shore from Gilkicker Point, across Portsmouth Harbour entrance and through the inner channel of the sumbmarine barrier that runs from Southsea beach to Horse Sand Fort. It was fun discovering this passage close to the beach and we needed to keep a very close eye out for swimmers!
It was tricky coming into Chichester Harbour against the tide. Due to the high pressure system, the tide was flowing out much faster than expected and low water that evening was 0.5m lower than forecast. We crept up the side of the bank on the East side of the entrance and made slow but steady progress.
To our delight, as we finally rounded the corner towards East Head, we saw that John was out in the Cream Mary, looking after the few remaining boats at anchor and we were able to pick up an ice cream on our way past.
Also delightful was the welcome received as we passed an anchored Selene with the Kents, Palmers and others on board, all cheering us on. A lovely welcome home.
Results
When I collapsed onto the sofa that evening, I had a look at the Round the Island Race Results. We were second in Class and second overall in the Gaffer division. However, I also noticed that another Shrimper was first, that we had not seen. On closer inspection, it turned out that the other Shrimpers that had entered (3, but 2 retired), had the same rating that was better than our own. At midnight, I was emailing the Race Office, as the Shrimper that had come first actually finished 10 minutes behind us. By my calculation we were first in class, first in divisions. The conversation with the Race Office continues, who seem very reluctant to amend our rating and change the results. I shall keep you posted!
Other BSC boats who complete the race are: Selene (George and Mel Kent); Family Tides (Philip ten Bosch); Mirage (Chris Moore); Glider (Ben Lewis). Well done all! A great day.
Last updated 16:54 on 27 July 2026
