HAPPY Birthday! Skandia Life Cowes Week is in party mood as it celebrates a major milestone in its long history today.

Exactly 175 years ago to the day, at 9.30am precisely, a yacht race began just off Cowes which was to change the face of the sport of sailing.

This was the start of the annual competitions which continue as Skandia Life Cowes Week - the longest-running, regular regatta in the sporting calendar.

The first race was for a gold cup worth £100 and was held under the flag of the Royal Yacht Club, later to become the Royal Yacht Squadron.

There was another race the next day with the top prize of £30 in cash. A ball was organised for the high society yachtsmen together with a dinner and firework display in the evening.

Many of the regatta's traditions still remain today although these days sailing is not just for nobility. Skandia Life Cowes Week 2001 has attracted skippers and crews from around the globe and from all walks of life.

Now the annual festival of sailing is the most famous event of its kind in the world with a reputation going from strength to strength.

So popular is the yachting festival that, after the London Marathon, the regatta has the biggest number of entrants for any sporting event in the UK.

This year a record breaking 1,005 yachts of every shape, type and size with a total of 7,500 crew are taking part in the Solent races.

Even before that day in 1826 there had always been racing of some sort in the waters off Cowes even if it was at one time smugglers, bringing contraband from France, trying to outrun the excise cutters.

Back in the 1800s Cowes became so popular that the local newspaper, the Southampton Herald, described the town as "this highly favoured spot".

Even in those early days sailing was not the only attraction at Cowes. Many people came for the parties and dancing held in the many country houses on the Island and so the regatta's all important social side was born.