Sailing News

Preparing the yachts It had been a long-held ambition of mine to cross the Atlantic Ocean. I’d had several opportunities over the years, but sadly none of them came to fruition. Technically it’s a race, but the vast majority of competitors are there to simply have fun and achieve the feat of crossing the Atlantic.… Read more

If you’ve been sailing on the Solent during the early part of 2015 you may well have seen the Ben Ainslie Racing team going through their paces. The images below were taken by our crew and left everyone impressed by their speed and dedication. All this preparation is building up to the big day in… Read more

We want your opinion about holding tanks! Should they be compulsory in British waters? Or should sailors be allowed to put black and grey water into the sea? Below you will find a survey about holding tanks and if they should be compulsory in UK waters. Once we have collected the opinion of sailors and… Read more

As part of our survey about holding tanks, and if they should be made compulsory in UK waters, we’ve come across the locations of all the coast pump out stations. This information was originally gathered by The Green Blue who have also collated the details of all inland stations. They too have been campaigning on… Read more

How do you fancy taking one day off work yet get five days of sailing? Well, that is easy with the Easter break as Good Friday and Easter Monday are public holidays, which means the only day you have to take off is Thursday! Depending on the next level you want to reach we have… Read more

It is quite common for people to wonder about the relative merits of taking the Day Skipper yachting course in the Mediterranean or the Solent. The thought of first rate Mediterranean hospitality and glorious sunshine are definite temptations. However, learning on the Solent is the only real option. There is a very good reason why:… Read more

In our series of Eco Blogs, First Class Sailing is discovering a variety of issues that concern people who use the seas. In the previous blog we highlighted Ecover's new bottle of which 10% of the plastic is reclaimed from the sea.

In the summer our survey of south coast sailors provided a resounding "No!" against the closure of coast guard stations and a centralised system. In a follow up guest blog Dennis O'Connor, Group Coordinator from National Coastguard SOS, gives us an update on the campaign so far and highlights a potential issue to sailor safety,… Read more

Ocean plastic has become, in recent years, an ever-growing and serious problem for our planet. The ocean’s ecosystem is very delicate, and is being severely damaged by the abundance of plastic waste being dumped into the seas.