Sunday fun day, another week has come and gone; and thus another chance to try my hand at keeping the people of the land entertained and informed with my literary malarkey (not sure if that word is used correctly but will go with it, help me out editors if its not :) thanks) (you can probably cut this section out as well!)

Well what can I say about this last week? Or better yet the last 48 hours? When sailing around the world for the first time there is margin for error (growing pains if you will), everyone is learning here, and with learning you make mistakes, and that's fine. Since departing London on September 1st, we had in our mind how certain things would and wouldn't work. Then you get your team and your boat and head out into the very real oceans of the world and do what you have trained to do.

It’s been over five months now, and we have made our share of mistakes that's for sure,"every day is a school day" one of my go to quotes on deck. With these mistakes I would be happy to say we have always learned and gained from the experience, as overall sailors, as well as ocean racers. Now we get to a line where you repeat mistakes, and unfortunately this has been the theme of the last two nights and this is not the direction you want to be heading in; and in turn it has cost us 20 miles on Qingdao a boat we have been sailing neck and neck with for the entirety of the week.

Focus on deck especially on the helm, ESPECIALLY when your flying kites at night is always essential. A lapse in such, cost us a wrap and a 7 miles (equivalent of a day and a half of drag racing downwind similar conditions (aka a country mile). Last night, heading into the Dell Latitude Rugged Ocean Sprint and were setting up our line for the dash. We were forced to drop the Code 2 with an approaching squall that looked rather uninviting. I was woken up to the sound of the commotion on Deck and the call to "Wake Ryan'' came.

I wiped my life jacket as quick as I could to be greeted by the sight of a snapped trigger line (the line required to release the tack shackle of the sail allowing us to bring the sail down) and in inflated Code flying a near 40-50 meters away from the boat (the entire length of the tack line (line attached to the shackle.) We attempted to grind the tack in so I could manually spike the tyallaska (the shackle) to release for the drop but as we were doing so the Kite collapsed and the tack of sail dive bombed for the water; started to pool with water from the bottom up. I scream to the healm to bear away to help try and inflate the Kite again this was just enough for the Kite to flicker alive for just a second and the tack line to spring up out of the water along the side of the boat exactly where I was standing and just in reach, where I am waited, spike in hand.

The tack was released and the kite was brought down. A great effort for the whole team to bring her home safe no damage. But as we have learned before any adjustment to the tack should be spotted ahead of time, even when releasing. It is believed the trigger line was trapped between the line and the friction ring and rather then the load being transferred to the release mechanism of the tyallaska its entirety was put onto a 12ml bit of sun beaten rope snapping the line and costing another 10 miles. Thankfully this happened prior to us crossing the line for the Dell Latitude Rugged Ocean Sprint and were still able to make the approach with speed.

Now it was a long tough hall for everyone last night with the incident and for the first time this race we’re having 20-30 knots forward of the beam, making for some less then comfortable conditions; the first taste of rougher upwind sailing for the joiners in Airlie. So needless to say the crew needed a pick me up and this morning we achieved our fastest ever head sail change a Yankee 2 to Yankee 1 from trimmed to trimmed downwind, in 12 minutes averaging still 10 knots through the transition to now upwards of over 12 and just like that the team is back in good spirits absolutely sending us through the sprint, with our eye on another 3 points and a podium finish. Thanks for reading, till next Sunday

Cheers,

Ryan Barkey

Daily Stats:

Tune of the day: Dark side of the moon - Pink Floyd

Daily Run: 228 nm

Max boat speed: 18 Knots

Sealife spotted: Flying fish in and out of the boat

Sailing manoeuvres (sail changes, tacks and gybes): kite drop, Yankee 1 hoist, Yankee 1 drop, Yankee 2 hoist, Yankee 2 drop, Yankee 1 hoist.

Drinks consumed: Mate, coffees and teas - steady stream now

Meal of the day: Cinnamon toast

Crew of the day: Ben Stokes for being an absolute machine on the bow ripping those sails down like they were nothing

Tip of the day: In heavy weather, many hands make light fast work. (If required wake up more humans )