Race 5 - Day 15
Skipper Report
06 January

Chris Brooks
Chris Brooks
Team Qingdao
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So, we were going coastal- that was the plan. I decided to play out all the options. It appeared when the wind fills in from the north east, we would be in a position to need to tack up the coast against foul tide. The making tack starboard would be fine but the port tack would hurt. With the tide probably making a south easterly direction each time we tacked away from the coastline. I did a stupid thing and used the routing software and it confirmed the latest weather information that we had, that there was a gap in the ridge that allowed us to sneak through offshore and pick up the north easterly wind from further out to sea.

Feeling pleased with the plan, we deliberated the benefits of sacrificing out nine knots in an almost northerly direction for a better angle in the new breeze. That was it and the offshore route would cover the fleet too.

We opted to gybe and head offshore, confident that we had lead enough to pay a few slow hours.

Well...we gybed, we stopped, we gybed a few more times and have moved very little in the last 12 hours. Unfortunately, being a realist, this is going to be very difficult to come back from. Ha Long Bay, Viet Nam are making there ground and Bermuda came on the same course as us - parallel from a further southerly position and seemingly made 45 degrees with adequate progress.

We are stuck. Keep your fingers crossed that we find wind soon. I don't mind light winds, but once you fall into no wind at all in a position on the forecast that shows wind well then you have a lottery on your hands. This is very far into the race to make gains back after a failed endeavour. I think we will gybe again and try to at least to stem the flow of current here. Trouble is we have tried to cross it and run out of wind in a stronger southerly flow.

Today will be a tough day watching the others pass, but then we will have good pressure and be able to continue on our way.

In other news when I was sleeping (yes I did get some). The crew saw a pod of pilot whales, six or so of them :) They came quite close to the boat and were a real spectacle. They are always quite impressive and can be quite large. They have big backward hooking dorsal fins and they are two or three times bigger than common dolphins which makes them have quite a presence.