Today's Sailing News
The Race: Team Adventure's
Day
The two front runners in the race have dipped into the mid 40's
in latitude and the 20's in speed. Team Adventure has closed to within 109 miles. They gained via a 24 hour run of 614.7
miles.
Team Adventure
sailed under a single reefed main and solent jib. Skipper Cam Lewis describes the Race Class cats dilemma: "In the latitude belt of 40 to 45 south we predict good favorable winds with
wind strengths averaging around 25 knots. To the south there will be more
wind. If we go south of 45 we will take more risks, and will encounter bigger waves and bigger winds but can cut down the mileage sailed...Smooth seas and 25 knots of wind is all we need for maximum pace."
The latest position report shows Team Adventure continuing at high speed, 25.4 knots. This compares to Club Med's 20.3 knots.
The third sister ship has fallen over 600 miles back. Last report shows a speed of 24 knots, so
Innovation Explorer too have hit the 40's and the good winds.
For the crews sailing the plus 100 footers in waves and wind its learn as you go. Grant Dalton describes a hairy moment: "We stuck it in once, sailed into a wave and the boat stopped. I was in my bunk and ended up standing on the bulkhead at the front of my bunk. Neil McDonald was on the mainsheet and went flying straight down the hatch."
After the three sisters comes Warta Polpharma having an excellent
day sailing 432 miles. Tony Bullimore's Team Legato has reached the Southern Hemisphere, but are still suffering light air having sailed only 141 miles.
Once again at the front of the fleet Team Adventure has shown boat speed superior to Club Med's. Factors that could cause this imbalance are:
sails, Team Adventure being lighter than Club Med, how intensely the crews are pushing the boat and weather.
This time Club Med skipper Grant Dalton is picking weather as the cause saying: "The Golden Position is not so golden. We’ve lost 30 miles overnight and this situation may continue as Team Adventure is able to enjoy a better and more established wave pattern and a freer wind angle further behind us."
We'll see who gets the best of these speed enhancing and reducing factors in the next 24 hours.
Times Clipper Update
Leg 5 is from the
Galapagos Islands to Hawaii, 4100 miles.
Leader: Plymouth Clipper by 45 miles
Best 24 Hour Run: Portsmouth Clipper 240 miles
Position: 439 mile spread from 1st to 8th
Current Weather: NE 20-30 knots
Weather Forecast: Data NA
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Globe Report: More around Cape Horn
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Today's Sailing News
Key West: Day 3 Report
The middle day of the week proved to be a one race day for the
300 boat plus fleet. All divisions sailed one race in 6-10 knot winds
that were more subtle than Tuesday's big shifts.
These conditions were to the liking of the 1D 35's Avalanche and Joss. Avalanche won the day's race with Joss 2nd. Avalanche now lead
with 12 points, with Joss back by 3 points. It's a ways back to Wild Thing in 3rd with
33 points.
Elsewhere in Division 1, the Melges 30 Tiburon was finally defeated in PHRF 3.
In Division 2, the J-80 352 has finished out of the top 10 twice after 4 straight winds. They still lead by 6 points.
The fleets largest class the Melges 24 has seen Neil Sullivan's M-Fatic take a 12 point lead over Zenda Express. Sullivan has no finishes
out of the top 10 while 2nd place Zenda Express has a 14th, and Full
Throttle in 3rd finished 19th on Wednesday.
The Farr 40 class continues to be quite competitive. Wednesday's
winner was Tom Neil's Nitemare. Tactician on Nitemare is J.J. Isler.
Her husband Peter is sailing with Revolution which was a race winner on Tuesday.
Predator leads the class by 4 points over Revolution. Pegasus scored a 4th, while Barking Mad was 20th. This gives Pegasus a 5 point
lead in the duos Admirals Cup battle.
In the Mumm 30's Turbo Duck continued its top 10 finishing pattern and now leads by 17. West Michigan based Asylum finished 18th on Wednesday. They are now in 7th place, but only 8 points out of 2nd. With this class being competitive for anyone to have a bad race they are still in contention for a top 3 finish.
Race organizers hope to sail 2 of the 3 remaining races today. Forecasted winds are from the SE @ 10 knots. Wind observations match
this forecast almost exactly meaning 2 races today are not a certainty.
Today's Cam-Gram Quote
Team Adventure skipper Cam Lewis
is not just a world class sailor he's also one of the best sailing
writers around. He's writes daily reports/Cam-Grams from his
Race Class cat. Here's an excerpt from today's: "Tonight I am going to give a call over to the tent at Key West Race Week and give a live report to the sailors there and tomorrow will be calling into the Atlantic City boat show Sail magazine dinner. I am busy putting the final touches on an article for the NY Times and busy working on the tactics for the next couple of 1000 miles."
BT Challenge Update
Leg 3 is Buenos Aries to
Wellington New Zealand via Cape Horn.
Leg 3 Finishing Order
1. LG FLATRON
2. Olympic Group
3. Compaq
4. TeamSpirIT
5. Quadstone
6. Isle of Man
7. Norwich Union
8. Logica
9. VERITAS
10. Spirit of Hong Kong
11. BP
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