Rules are important. They help matters to run their course in a fairly predictable way – I know what you’re doing, and you know what I’m doing. However, there comes a time when the paths of rule and reason cross, where right becomes a matter of primal might, where one’s instinct for survival tells you that law has been suspended. The rule is proved by exception – spotting the proof is an evolutionary requirement.

In some people, that yin and yang of rule and reason is unbalanced, skewed, out of kilter. And one day, inevitably for these people, the uphill bicycle of rule will meet the downhill juggernaut of reason, usually with Darwinian consequences. Take, for instance, the skipper of this Nordic 40, captured in sequence by the lens of Peter Lyons . Clearly, his love for regulation is far stronger than his love for life.

Do you think he actually shouted ‘starboard’?