One of the yacht's crew for the week is Williams Formula 1 technician Mark Pattinson who's normally in the pits looking after Juan Pablo Montoya's racing car.

BBC Southampton's Indy Almroth-Wright caught up with him after his three day stint onboard Sunsail 78 to see what he made of grappling with an entirely different racing vehicle...

How many of you are there onboard Sunsail 78?
There are around seven or eight of us onboard throughout the week.

Had you ever been on a boat before?
No, only a ferry!

Heading back into Cowes

Are many of the team experienced sailors?
Well, a couple of the guys had done it before and about four or five of us had never done it. I only knew a few of them beforehand but it's been really good meeting everyone.

What was your job onboard?
I wouldn't know the technical term, but I was down the front helping with the sails, wrapping them up getting ready to use them again. I was kept quite busy actually but it was fantastic, I loved it.

Your team are having a great week so far with two wins and third place yesterday...
Yeah, but we blew it yesterday [Monday]. It was a good recovery to finish third though because when we got to the first turn we were about 30th.

Williams F1

What did you make of the racing?
It's very hectic on the start line because there are a lot of boats - it's not only our class, there are what seems to be millions of other classes going on as well.

Where there any hairy moments?
Not really, but we almost lost the kite on the second day. It almost went into the water because there was a lot of wind, but we managed to scramble across and save it.

What do you normally do at Williams F1?
I'm a front end man on Juan Pablo Montoya's car, I look after anything from the driver forward I take car of on the car - suspension, brakes, steering anything like that is my job.

Did you find sailing more or less hectic?
Well I find my job relatively easy because I know what I'm doing but with sailing I haven't got a clue really.

What are you off to do now?
I fly out in the morning to Hungary for the next round of the Formula One World Championship.