Compared with fixing brains or the science of designing rockets, writing about yottin’ surely ranks pretty low on the scale of worthwhile careers for a grown-up. Indeed, my first editor, Bernard Hayman, once told us we should be paying him to write for his magazine.
The coverage of yacht racing was undoubtedly once a grander, shall we say more noble, occupation, when kings, princes, potentates (and grocers) owned overcanvassed sloops, cutters and schooners, aboard which rode gentlemen correspondents the likes of Major Brooke Heckstall-Smith, secretary of the Yacht Racing Union (later IYRU), author of Britannia and her Contemporaries and the Complete Yachtsman.
‘Bookstall’ succeeded the legendary Dixon Kemp as yachting editor of The Field, rubbing shoulders with King George V, indistinguishable from the royal guests in white ducks, jacket and…