Individually, the British team has enjoyed mixed fortunes with Corum Indulgence lying third in its class and the Mumm 36 Bradamante second. The team have, however, been let down by the poor performance of the ILC 40, Easy Oars, which lay in last place going into the Fastnet Race.
Easy Oars’ crew, led by Andy Beadsworth, will relish the prospect of some light weather where their two-year-old boat will be at its best. Whilst not impossible, mathematically, it is unlikely that the British can win. However, with the Fastnet Race counting for quadruple points, a second- or third-place finish is not an hopeless dream.For the American team, the chances that could bring Britain back into contention will be those which denied them victory in 1995. Going into the Fastnet then, a comfortable American lead was converted into an easy Italian victory when the Americans bombed out in the decider.Away from the Cup, the 250-boat Fastnet fleet is likely to be led into Plymouth by a group of 60-foot grand prix multihulls and a fleet of nine Whitbread 60s, having their first real test as they prepare for the start of the Whitbread Round The World Race in Southampton on 21 September. The leading British contender is Lawrie Smith, at the helm of Silk Cut, and his main rivals here are Grant Dalton in Merit Cup, Chris Dickson in Toshiba, and Paul Cayard in EF Language. Both Dalton and Dickson have had recent victories in their Witbread boats, while Cayard is one of the world’s finest yacht racers.Aboard Silk Cut we had a good opening to the race.

With Gordon Maguire at the wheel and Smith calling tactics, we beat down the Solent at nearly 10 knots in less than 10 knots of breeze. At the first cross we were third behind Swedish Match and Kvaerner but an hour into the race Silk Cut appeared to have an up-wind edge on her rivals and we led the fleet out towards the Needles. Surprisingly Toshiba and Paul Cayard’s EF were well back.Swedish Match took the first psychological victory leading the fleet out past the Needles two hours into the race but they were only half a boat length ahead of us with EF Langauge and Toshiba beginning to make progress.Sailing the Whitbread 60s in close tactical situations is an interesting process. The boats have the minimum number of winches to save weight and so tacking and manoeuvring is a delicate and complicated process involving swapping a lot of ropes and winches around.

There is also a large amount of water balast to be pumped from side-to-side on each tack – the engineer down below has a full-time job in close-quarter racing.As we left the comfort of the Solent and headed for our first night at sea, the discomfort of the next few days began to become apparent. Even though the wind is light the boat is fully stacked, with sails and gear piled into the windward bunks. Sleep, where it is possible, will be taken on deck on the windward rail or alongside a bag of tools or a wet sail. We took some comfort from the fact that our first-night meal, instead of being freeze dried food as it will be during the Whitbread race, was delivery pizza – cold of course.. Glenn McCrory, a former International Boxing Federation cruiserweight champion who is now amongst the shrewdest of television boxing commentators, appreciated instantly the significance of the fact that the trainer of the American welterweight Ed Griffin was perched on the ring apron with a video camera recording every moment of his man’s short-lived encounter with the British light-middleweight Ryan Rhodes in Barnsley last Saturday. Such behaviour, McCrory pointed out, was amateurish in the extreme: the Americans were clearly just here for the trip, and were preparing a “What We Did On Our Holidays” video with which to bore the neighbours.

His scepticism was soon justified, as Griffin, who had never weighted more than 10st 11lb in his 17 fights, was swept aside in two rounds by the powerful Englishman, who would have been well above the division’s 11-stone limit by fight time. At stake, for what they were worth, were Rhodes’ IBF inter-continental light-middleweight title and the vacant World Boxing Organisation equivalent. Rhodes had won the IBF belt in April with a first-round stoppage of Lindon Scarlett, a Birmingham welterweight with 14 wins in 25 fights who had not weighted above 10st 10lbs since February 1990.
Yet such farcical non-events are presented as serious championship boxing, complete with studio analysis, post-fight ringside interviews, statistical overkill and the rest.To their credit, Sky’s commentary team of McCrory and Ian Darke are properly critical when the occasion demands. Darke was involved in an on-screen row with Frank Warren in June after Luciano Torres flopped in three rounds against Joe Calzaghe in an embarrassing mismatch. Warren was insisting angrily that Torres was a world-ranked fighter and a worthy opponent but Darke reminded the promoter that Torres was the same fighter whom Warren (and Darke) had watched lose a dreadful six-rounder in Milan eight months previously, in the Brazilian’s first and last appearance as a Warren fighter. After the Milan show, he described Torres as “so bad even I could beat him”, and when asked whether that meant that Torres was no longer on his books, replied “On my books? He’s not even in my library.”The proliferation of these minor titles (known as international by the World Boxing Council, Penta-Continental by the World Boxing Association and Inter-Continental by the IBF and WBO), and their popularity with promoters as cheap and cost-effective labels to help pull in the punters, means that McCrory and Darke are likely to have their critical faculties tested again. The basic idea of the titles was sound enough: to afford boxers outside the top 10 the opportunity to fight for a “second division” championship, but in practice they have become a means of promoting ordinary fighters beyond their merits by adding artificial “championship” gloss to matches which are often not even of British title standard.Of the 16 second-string title fights held in Britain in 1996, nine were all-British affairs, including the WBO Inter-Continental cruiserweight title fight featuring the unbeaten Chris Okoh against Gypsy Carmen, who had lost 20 times in 38 fights and whose previous four contests had all been over the bottom-of-the-bill distance of six two-minute rounds.This year, there have already been 21 staged here, of which Sky Sports screened 16.