The Great Escape
It is Kirsten who is shining this morning on International Women’s Day: with 147 miles covered at 0800Z, the boys are all giving her some distance back: between 30 and 70 miles! Abhilash is still making progress but stays short of a northern course as she continues with her NE option. The wind will drop again at the end of the week, but it seems this time that Kirsten’s position is in her favour!
Simon is trying to escape from the calms through a mouse hole and has tacked overnight with the wind shift. First upwind starboard tack for at least a week, it’s a change and surely he had to tidy up the boat a bit! Behind him, Michael managed to limit the damage and keep up some speed despite the wind collapsing all around him. 700 miles behind the leaders another east-west scenario is playing out.
Ian is living the no-go zone exit as a liberation, and literally ‘the end of a leg’. En route towards 50°S in cold and steady SW winds, he is enjoying the deep south conditions that will stay with him for weeks to come. Jeremy, at 53°S is heading north as advised by Race Control, to mitigate the wind strength and sea state later today with the more extreme conditions south of his position. Guy, on his own solo voyage, is crossing the half-way longitude between Hobart and Cape Horn.
