If somebody had said last spring that I'd have the chance to compete in the A Class Nats, F16 Worlds and Tornado Nats I wouldn't have believed them. However, due to a friends mis-fortune I stepped off the safety boat and onto a Tornado last Sunday. The wind was 15-20 knots and although I had most of my usual sailing gear on my footwear didn't make for safe and comfortable trapezing. I survived upwind but downwind was out of the question. I didn't need to worry for too long as on our second beat of the second race the forestay snapped, compression strut disintegrated and the all carbon snuffer/pole snapped in half. Luckily due to the great generosity of the competitors we found and fixed enough spare parts to be out racing again on Monday morning. 3, 3 lap races in 10-12 knots and flat sea's. A great days racing. Tom Phipps and Jon Cook won the event but an ex F16 sailor Aaron Young and Bob Butterfield came second a great result as Tom is an RYA sponsored sailor. In the attached photo I was crewing 439 currently lying in 3rd place with Tom in 1st John Ready 2nd, Aaron 4th. More photo's can be found on the Mumbles YC Website; http://www.mumblesyachtclub.co.uk