It’s a worry when a classic James McGruer one-off is re-rigged to become a gin palace, but at least the skipper has something to keep his mind off the light winds this week…

There’s one team at Cowes Week that is clearly making a late bid for the Skandia Squad in the Creativity category; namely the crew aboard Frenesi of Clynder, the beautiful James McGruer one-off, owned and skippered by David Hart.

During the abandonments of Monday, Hart’s imaginative crew put their heads together and came up with an idea to relieve the skipper’s boredom during the light wind races that have been a feature of this year’s regatta. In true Blue Peter style, the crew searched the boat’s lockers for scraps, fortunately ignored the washing-up liquid bottle and unearthed instead a spirits optic lurking under the bunks. Quite what it was doing there we failed to establish – most sailors we know prefer direct infusion straight from the bottle. Nevertheless, the discovery was opportune and it was promptly strapped to the mizzen mast just behind the skipper.

They didn’t have to look too far for the bottle of gin to sit atop the optic. We have been promised that the inventive crew will not create a mark two version involving a water hose and a sharp implement as an intravenous drip.

So was David Hart pleased with the modification of mizzen mast? It seems so, although he was heard to grumble that “the measures are not very large!”