'Atlantic low moving rapidly East, expected Shannon by 1900hrs...'

THAT was the news I and the crew had been waiting for. As the ship's radio relayed the latest weather information from the BBC shipping forecast, expectations grew that we may be in for some severe weather - at last!

Bound for the Fastnet Rock, just off the South Western corner of Ireland, bad sea conditions would normally be the last thing any sensible yachtsman or woman would wish for, but we were no ordinary crew and were cruising a far from ordinary yacht.

This was going to be the challenge of a lifetime for me, experiencing some heavy weather sailing completing a near copy of the famous Fastnet Race, only for us starting and finishing, (hopefully), in Plymouth.

Interest in this Fastnet Challenge, promoted at the recent Southampton Boat Show, resulted in two of the giant BT yachts taking part in the 570-mile round trip.

Heath Insured II — the same boat that took local optician Angus McPhie around the world the wrong way in the last BT Global Challenge and one of the same fleet that saw Tavistock butcher Brian Bird (no relation) sail around the globe in the British Steel Challenge some years previously — was joined by another crew of 12 onboard the identical boat CGU.

Having two vessels completing the same course didn't turn the trip into a race, but it did focus our team's ambitions not to come home second.

Severe weather on board a yacht is something impossible to describe to anyone that hasn't already seen it, analogies of someone throwing buckets of water at you for hours on end do not even come close to experiencing the adrenalin rush of real heavy weather sailing.

Having a high pressure hose pointed at you from close range while at the same time bungee jumping in a steel cage that you have to hold on to so tightly every muscle in your body aches is a closer description.

Fortunately for me, under my feet were 40 tonnes of steel — all crafted in Plymouth by Devonport Yachts, a subsidiary of DML, and more than enough to calm any fears I might have about my own safety. It was more a case of endurance, and being well harnessed on.

The crew on board our 67-footer was a mix of dinghy sailors, experienced yachtsmen and perhaps more than one extreme sports enthusiasts, with two professional skippers to calm the nerves of the less confident and keep the peace between the rest of us.

At times, screaming across the Irish Sea doing 12 knots in a rough sea with the mainsail fully reefed and only our two other smallest hankies up, my watch team was more similar to a bunch of hooligans in a stolen yacht trying to find the biggest waves to jump off.

The crash we made at the bottom of the next trough must have been deafening to those down below in their bunks. I think they tied themselves into their lee cloths good and tight for our three-hourly stint on the helm.

Although, at one time when I was wedged into my own berth wondering if it might actually be more comfortable on deck, my slumber was interrupted by the worst noise I have ever heard. A deafening banging on the underside of the hull just below my head, roughly amidships.

It resembled a mix of someone playing the bongos, very badly, or perhaps an Irish miner with a pick-axe trying to get in through the half-inch thick steel. Later, the skipper informed me he was too preoccupied navigating a shipping lane off the Scillies with a coastal tramp refusing to give way to our sailing vessel, to have more than a quick glance up at the mast and rigging points to quell his own fears that we may be about to loose the entire rig.

It has been known several times in the past for these hard racers to be dismasted.

The battle with the coaster ended with us hove-to. A clever manoeuvre that stops the boat in its tracks, well just about, to give way to the other ship's bad manners. The banging stopped immediately. It turned out to be no more than a lobster pot caught round the keel, but sadly no posh breakfast resulted, just a few chips in the hull paint.

The contrast between the two legs of the trip was enormous. The outward leg, which was largely off the wind, was in the company of up to two dozen dolphins giving us a never-ending aerobatic display as they leaped and performed somersaults. In the blackness of the night it provided a dazzling display with the speedy mammals leaving a spume of glowing lights in their wake, like a jet across the sky, as they disturbed the sea-borne phosphorescence.

It gave us plenty of time to work the boat and learn what all the different bits of string did. Of course they all have specific names and widely differing jobs to perform, sheets, warps, halyards, downhauls, outhauls, etc, etc.

On a previous sailing trip I was reprimanded by a skipper for referring to one of them as a rope, and quickly informed that there was no rope on his boat. They all had names and I was to use them. Our BT skipper was far more friendly and often issued instructions to 'Pull in that bit of string —just a bit, mind !'

The Fastnet rock and its attached lighthouse erected in 1854, appeared out of the gloom a little before five o'clock on this late October afternoon.

Looking more like a huge Cornish steam engine house you might see at the top of an abandoned mine-shaft, it is one of the main weather reporting stations in the chain around the British Isles.

We rounded the monument only 300 yards ahead of the other boat, and raced just a mile off the south coast of Ireland in the darkening night skies towards our goal, a pint before last orders.

A relaxing Saturday in the quaint little Irish port of Kinsale just a few miles west of Cork, enjoying the scenery and the famous Irish hospitality which included more than a pint or two of the black stuff, was most enjoyable.

Meanwhile outside the safety of the harbour raged a severe storm force 10.

It was the same depression which caused trouble for a trawler further down the coast and claimed the life of one unfortunate sailor just off Plymouth Sound.

Even the next day as we headed out for the last leg and return to Plymouth, the remains of a confused rough sea was evidence of the conditions of the day before. Still blowing a sustained force 8, we blasted off across the Eastern side of the Atlantic Ocean resembling a freight train in a hurry.

Spray filled the air, and water penetrated even the best high-performance waterproof clothing, then news came in over the VHF radio, from our competitor, CGU, that their skipper had been washed over the stern when a particularly large wave came across her decks. Only her harness preventing her from being lost to the boiling sea. It certainly raised the concentration levels on our boat, and saw me adjusting my already drum-tight harness.

Navigating 250 miles in 26 hours was pure exhilaration. With visibility down to just a mile, and virtually zero in the frequent squalls, it would seem that nothing could stop us.

The skipper was on the ball the whole time checking our position on the twin GPS satellite navigation system, and keeping a regular watch on the radar and the often fatigued helmsman.

The adventure saw us back in Plymouth some two hours ahead of CGU, not that it was a race, of course - but it was great to come first!