To find the real action in Cowes Week, you need to locate the protest room where a former naval commander from South Africa dispenses justice with a twinkling eye and a firm hand. Geoff Myburgh has been chairman of the juries for more than two decades now, so his knowledge of the twists and turns of competition at Cowes is pretty near exhaustive.

A dribble of sailors head for Myburgh’s office in the regatta centre each afternoon after racing, nursing grievances that might, by nightfall, have turned into handshakes all round or full-blown vendettas. Myburgh tries to head off protests before they reach the jury room, but his assistant is logging protest number 75 in her notebook and the week is barely at halfway.

Sittings can last until late in the evening. Calculations are tricky: protesters need to be sure of the rules or they risk disqualification themselves. Besides, there are better things to do during Skandia Cowes Week than haggling over the day’s racing. But it’s good to remember that the heart of the event lies closer to the waters of the Solent than the watering holes of the town.

“Protests are all part of racing and sailing,” says Myburgh, brandishing a thick volume. “It’s all here in the rule book. Mostly you can see people come out of the protest room and shake hands. Some can get a bit upset.”

Outside the regatta centre, Hamish Edsell is perusing the daily results sheets intently. His Sunsail 37, Deloitte, stands at the head of its class after five races and a third place that day has confirmed its position. All he has to do is hang on tight for another two days, sail hard and steer clear of trouble. Easier said than done when the current can be 50% of the boat speed and boats have been known to drop anchor to avoid being driven backwards by the tides.

Edsell, a former naval officer and retired doctor, is a part-time sailing instructor and part-time professional sailor. He looks well on his new life, even better now that, in his 18th Cowes, he is so close to the ultimate prize. Edsell and his boss from Deloitte, the man who pays the bills, are the regular members of the crew; the rest of the cast on board his hired vessel changes by the day.

It’s not an increase in the intensity of the racing that Edsell has noticed in recent years, merely the speed with which a racing “incident”, to use the correct term, can turn to obscenity. He blames Gordon Ramsay for reducing the conversational range of young people under pressure. “Section 69,” he says. “Bad language and bullying behaviour. They should dole out a few more of those. There was one incident this week when a youngster charged up on us at the start and thought he had the right of way. I told him not to be so silly and that was that. We’re very well behaved, of course.” The wry smile said it all.

In the Fosters Bar where the crews congregate after racing, Ian Walker, an Olympic medallist and America’s Cup campaigner, tries to explain the complexities of sailing at Cowes. He turns his hand palm up and traces a straight line down his middle finger, bisecting his palm. “If you need to get from here to here,” he says, “only at Cowes do you need to go this way.” The arc takes in the index finger and the thumb. “You’ve got to calculate the tide, head off through the Sunbeam fleet, tack back through the multihulls, then dodge some moored boats, just to get from A to B.”

Calculating the speed of the current against the force of the wind is mostly a task for the computer. Only a few old-timers keep the coefficients in their head. Julian Pearson, another sailing instructor, is shaking his head hours after he has come off the water. “Fluky winds today, it was hugely complex,” he says. “I wanted to throw my computer overboard. But where else are you handed a Heineken as soon as you cross the finishing line?”

Year after year, everyone returns to do battle with the winds, heavy traffic and stresses that characterise a week on the Solent in late summer. If it was straightforward, they would look elsewhere for their kicks.

But if Cowes still shows the English at play, it also acts as a reminder of a more ancient tradition. Out there, where trundling Sunbeams are ambushed by flying multihulls and three generations of the same family do battle in the venerable XODs, important skills are being handed down, including a basic understanding of sport’s beauty and inequity.

Nobody can tell you why they keep coming back to Cowes. If you have to ask the question, you’re not a regular. “It’s just different, that’s all,” says Walker. “I was speaking to a bunch of Italians earlier. It’s their first time at Cowes. They’re confused but they’re loving it.”

Few other weeks foster such a sense of social and sporting democracy. Though the dress code smartens noticeably at the top end of the town, down in the village Olympic gold medallists happily rub shoulders with the humblest deck hand. On the water, the vagaries of Cowes and the handicapping system cut down overweening egos.

“It’s like playing crazy golf instead of Wentworth,” explains Andy Rice, tactician on Dark and Steamy in the IRC Class 2. “The best golfer will probably win but you’ve a better chance of beating Tiger Woods at crazy golf than you have at Wentworth.” Imperceptibly, the event is changing. Big corporate sponsors, such as Volkswagen, are muscling into Cowes Week in search of a sport untainted by the excesses of professionalism. More boats are now being chartered by companies for the week, crewed by a mixture of professionals, keen amateurs and complete beginners.

“The high profile of sailors such as Ellen MacArthur, Sir Robin [Knox-Johnston] and our Olympic medallists has opened up sailing to a wider corporate market,” says Stuart Quarrie, chief executive of Cowes Combined Clubs, the organisation that runs the week.

Skandia, title sponsors for the past 13 years, are pulling out after next year’s regatta, which will usher in a new phase for sailing’s oldest festival. Yet an abiding beauty of Cowes is that the more it changes, the more it stays the same. The racing is fierce, the social life relentless and the balance between the two is as open to interpretation as any rule in the book.

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Gloria, publishers of the landmark Superyacht luxury limited edition, have teamed up with The Sunday Times to offer one lucky reader the chance to acquire one of only 1,000 copies published. To have a chance of winning it answer the following question:

In what year did King George IV present a cup to signify his approval of the Cowes Regatta: A. 1826 B. 1827 C. 1828

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