Apart from telling the time, one of the most useful functions on the ground-breaking Garmin Quatix sailing watch is the tidal data, which allows you to find HW and LW times for pretty much anywhere.

I’m conscious that you might have expected some of the many advanced functions – some of which I’m yet to discover – such as the start line proximity, navigation, streaming NMEA data to your wrist and controlling your autopilot to be the most appealing features of this watch.

The trouble is that some of these sophisticated functions are not as easy to use as you might hope. Being a watch, the screen is small and being on your wrist means you’re looking down when you should be looking up and out of the boat.

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You also need to be quite proficient at operating the watch. Learning the functions in the heat of the moment is impractical. To get the best out of it you really have to practise.

What surprised and impressed me this racing season, though, was how useful the watch is in assessing your performance after racing. When used with Garmin’s Base Camp software, the data logging facility is excellent and allows you to go back and analyse your track second by second.

For performance boats with asymmetric spinnakers – particularly sportsboats and dinghies where there is little or no instrumentation – this helps you solve the high-and-fast v low-and-slow conundrum by plotting your VMG on the screen. This is especially useful when training alone as you start to build a picture of your performance with each run.

I was also impressed by the battery life on one charge – the watch is charged using a USB cradle – even when the GPS is left on. This is a big step forward given other failed attempts over the years.