Is sailing a sport? The crews of the 12 America's Cup boats currently fighting it out in Valencia (or would be if there was any wind) must think so, having trained to within an inch of their lives, with endless hours in the gym, and running on the roads, to get into shape for what must surely be one of the most physically demanding of any international competitions.
The question, maybe, is not how you define “sport” but how you define “sailing.” And the beauty of sailing is that it can be so many different things to so many different people.
For some it is simply a matter of relaxed pottering around local creeks, for others a way of crossing oceans. For some it is all about cruising - destinations being almost more important than the time spent getting there. For others, racing is what matters, finding how to squeeze the last fraction of a knot, the best possible pointing angle, out of hull, crew and sails.
And all of them are equally entitled to their own opinion as to which group actually understands what sailing is really all about. But then, isn't that true of almost every other sport?
I am a rubbish skier, and unlikely ever to get any better. But I probably enjoy my time on the mountains just as much as a World Cup downhill champion. Weekend golfers are just as entitled to time on the course as members of the PGA Tour. You don't have to race in the Manchester Velodrome to call yourself a cyclist - and so on.
And as to the technology issue, every sport you can think of has moved with the times. Today's carbon fibre and featherweight alloy bicycles are nothing like penny farthings, but that doesn't mean they don't still require skill and athleticism to get the most out of them.
The same is true of yachts. Yes, we may be lucky enough to have electronic position fixing, computer driven chart plotters, e-mail and radio connections for all the latest weather info, and all the rest. But we still have to make sense of all the information, and make our own decision about which way to go, which sail plan to use, and so on.
Nobody gets anywhere, not even in the America's Cup, the most technologically driven sailing event of all, by simply plugging in the electronics and letting them get on with it.
That is why top teams like Emirates New Zealand take on gifted natural sailors like Ben Ainslie, who earned his Olympic medals in Lasers, among the lowest tech sailing craft there are.
There is still no substitute for that “seat of the pants” instinct when it comes to helming. Equally, electric winches are a poor stand-in for human crew who actually look at what they are doing, and understand how, when and why to adjust sails, sheets and halyards.
I'm inclined to argue that anything that gives you fresh air and exercise can be classified as sport, and that incorporates all branches of sailing, from creek crawling to blazing through the Southern Ocean at 35 knots in a Volvo 70.
And yacht racing, even with today's technology, is one of the most demanding forms of sport there is. That is because it brings together so many different skills. There's teamwork and athleticism, in terms of efficiently executed manoeuvres: tacks, gybes, sail changes and so on.
There's the intellectual challenge of navigation - and no matter how much information you've got, you've still got to interpret it. You won't win a race by blindly following the rolling road on the GPS display. You've got to know - just as pre-Decca navigators did - what the tide will be doing by the time you get to the end of the leg, which way the wind is likely to shift, which is going to be the favoured side of the course, and plan ahead accordingly.
And then there's the added spice of playing chess with the opposition. Do I tack and cover him? Do I go off on a “flyer,” which might be the only way of overtaking him, if it works, but would be very embarrassing if it didn't?
Even the best navigation software in the world won't help if you're over-canvassed, or caught out in a port and starboard, or whatever. You've still got to sail the boat.
Some people argued that Ellen MacArthur's record circumnavigation was in some way devalued because she had so much “outside” help and advice in terms of weather routing, maintenance and repairs and so on.
It was still her that kept the giant, over-powered cat upright all the way round, that pulled the reefs and changed the sails in time to stop it flipping over, as more than a few did in the recent Route du Rhum. It was Ellen who climbed that towering mast in mid ocean - something way beyond many of her armchair critics, I would hazard a guess.
I have absolutely no hesitation in concluding that sailing most emphatically is a sport, and one of the best there is. Let's be grateful for all the electronics which have helped to make it intrinsically safer than it was - but remember to be their master, not their slave. And accept that, like modern boat design, and advances in sail technology and marine clothing, they have helped to make our great sport even more enjoyable than ever.
