It's April, I am on a one month countdown to my first ever IMOCA race and the days are relentlessly charging by.

I thought a long time before deciding to sail Superbigou single handedly 250 miles back from France to my home port of Poole.

I can't get rid of the knot in my stomach. It's been nearly two weeks since I first sailed the boat I will be racing around the world, and the enormity of what I have set out to achieve really settled on me for the first time.

If the last two weeks are any indication of what the next two years are going to be like then brace yourselves because we are in for a hell of a ride.