Pacing Oneself
There’s a good pace along the exclusion zone this morning with distances over 140 miles for Jeremy, Abhilash, Simon, and the best of the day for Kirsten at 154 miles. All except Capt Gugg lingering in the whispering 40s. Jeremy is very quick at 152 nm/24 hours. With the current forecast, he may well beat his 24h and 7-day personal best this week, watch this space!
Kirsten received 35 hours compensation and Abhilash 12 hours for their participation in Tapio’s rescue which will be deducted from their final time. Kirsten is also entitled to 30 litres of diesel as compensation for the use of her engine. Abhilash repaired his windvane and continues racing.
South of Good Hope, Ian and Elliott are struggling with the strong currents in the area, even backing off to the west yesterday. Elliott is learning to manoeuvre his revised rig which is more limited in sail combination, and Ian is finally approaching 40° South! They are 1000 miles from the exclusion zone and Jeremy, 5th.
In the Atlantic, Guy has crossed the meridian and is finally sailing in the East! He is now only 900 miles from Cape Town, which he should reach mid-December. The situation is more complicated for Arnaud, struggling with rigging issues and unable to sail directly to Cape Town.
Update: Abhilash had a problem with his Windpilot Windvane
The servo pendulum shaft holding the rudder sheared off. This was an easy fix as he carries a complete spare system onboard to strip for spares. He has fitted exactly the same part again. The question now is why did it break? And when will this next one break? The Windpilot does not have a breakaway coupling (like the Aries or Monitor) to relieve any overload pressure and is not therefore meant to break. Jeremy has the same Windvane, but his boat may not be as powerful as the Rustler 36.
