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Wow, What a ride
indeed! We've had a mixed bag of everything on this trip, but I must admit, so
far it's been the easiest passage I've ever made... touch wood! The fleet has
experienced some major equipment failures, and quite a few shredded sails as we
contended with a major cold front coming down off the East Coast a few days
ago. It sent us quite a concentration of squalls all hidden nicely in major
lightning storms that were flashing all around us for two nights in a row. The
boats further back took most of the brunt of the weather as that's where the
squalls were concentrated.
 Mike manning the helm with a visiting bird looking over his shoulder
Luckily,
'Sophisticated Lady' has been well matched to her element in this mixed bag of
weather and has performed very well with no failures so far... again, touch
wood! Her crew onboard has been excellent at being pre-emptive about storm
settings and sail trim and thus far have avoided any mishaps due to any weather
sneaking up behind us. We tracked several of the squalls on radar the other
night, and managed to get a good line of attack on their front lines that
effectively helped us sling-shot out from under them before the nasty stuff came
over us. Unfortunately, the only trade off was, that tactic always seemed to
leave us bobbing in calm conditions looking for the next squall to find some
more wind... but at least our sails are still intact!
 Mike and Mark practicing reefing drills before the squalls hit Having started the Rally in calm weather seems to have worked well for us so far, when we held back to start sailing in the light airs, the rest of the fleet took off motoring and hasn't really stopped. They got stuck in the light airs ahead of the front, and keep getting further away from the wind by continuing to motor South. After yesterdays 6am role call, we found after factoring in all the time corrections that we were just barely in 1st place in our class against all the other boats. Our main contender is still Parallax but we were ahead of them by roughly 3 miles overall with all factors considered... that's close after 700 miles! After today's role call at 6am we had gained good distance, but had fallen back into 2nd place behind Parallax because we ended up becalmed last night and had to motor through the night to gain any distance. This gained us an additional 25 miles on them towards the finish line, but now we owe them 10 hours of motoring as they were able to sail in the light airs better than we could. Parallax is a 36 foot catamaran sailing on a handicap the same as ours because of their light weight and spinnaker rating. Downwind in light airs is definitely an advantage for them as 'Sophisticated Lady' prefers 15 knots on the beam to 10 knots on the transom. We've been doing a lot of bobbing around since yesterday, and they've been making tracks.
 I'll bet there's wind under that cloud! Our only hope of regaining our lost time is to beat them to the heavy airs waiting for us down South and get the Lady back in her element. We have forecast NE 15 knots for tonight if we can make it down South of Latitude 25, so that's where we're headed. By Sunday the forecast increases to 30 knots and that's where we'll make or break the race with Parallax. Being a catamaran, she'll sail like a rocket downwind, but as soon as the wind turns out of the East she'll be upwind, and that is not a favourable element for a light weight catamaran. We're taking a bit of a gamble in betting on the trade winds to fill in East of Longitude 65 for the final 100 miles or so, but if that happens we'll be well positioned by then to sail in perfect conditions right across the finish line at top speed.
Nana Maria is our next closest contender, they have 15 miles towards the finish line but still owe us almost 15 hours of motoring time as of 6am today, in addition to 9 hours for the difference in our handicaps. The other boats in our class seem to have turned into motoryachts, Destiny has racked up an incredible 110 hours motoring, Joy For All has 93, Special Delivery has 87, Arch Angel has 70, and we were at 28:30 as of 6pm last night. Of course, we've added another 15 hours since being becalmed last night, so we won't know until tomorrow how many of the other boats have added similar hours, or if they're finally sailing in the elusive wind we've all been looking for.
Onboard, things have been great! Everyone is in great spirits and having lots of fun. We've been challenged in a few gales, but otherwise it has been smooth, easy sailing, with the Lady sailing over 8-9 knots for several days in 15-20 knots of breeze. The weather has been absolutely fantastic, it has been sunny and hot every day since we passed over the Gulf Stream, and everyone has been enjoying wearing shorts and t-shirts every day with the temperature in the mid 80's all the time. We've had a couple of barbeques, been eating really well, and even getting some boat projects done! The guys have been great and we've been working together to get the Lady really cleaned up while under way. The autopilot blew up on us one night, so that was the only major repair to the boat so far. I managed to build a new mount for it using misc pieces of scrap material I keep for just such an emergency, and now it's back in action and working as good as new! The only other major repair involved the head (toilet) in my cabin... it seems that after 10 years of reliable service, it was time to pack it in the day after we left Hampton! After 2 days of completely rebuilding every major component of the entire system, it is finally working again... but let's just say I'd rather not have to do that job ever again! lol
 Relaxing on deck after the tedious task of fixing ones head! We also have the privilege of testing a brand new wind generator on this trip! The generator is manufactured in Canada, and while it has achieved excellent results from it's land based testing, it was time for some on-the-water testing, and there is no better forum for that than the Caribbean 1500! We installed it the day before departing Hampton and have had a good chance to test in wind conditions from 10-45 knots so far. What makes this wind generator unique is that it features a constant velocity rotor with variable pitch blades that function much like the rotor blades on a helicopter.
 Variable blade pitch mechanism of the new generator This is the first of
it's kind in the small wind generator market as the rotor has been designed
using the same design principles as it's much larger land-based counterparts.
So far it has performed admirably, and I must say it is very quiet at high
speeds due to the constant velocity propeller! Once it hits 8-10mph, the blade
pitch gears up to it's high speed setting, and then after that it just
constantly adjusts the pitch to match the wind speed so the rotor speed never
changes... this is going to be a huge feature as the generator can run in any
winds up to 100mph without any attention, and without any risk of overspeed or
needing to be shut down, on top of that being optimized for maximum power
generation in the lighter wind speeds! With a 60" rotor and higher output in
light winds, this generator will be a great option for the larger boats with
higher power requirements!
 Rick fine tuning the new generator at sea The wind generator is so new that it doesn't even have a formal name yet... if you have any ideas for a catchy marketing name for a new wind generator, pass it along and we'll see what we can all come up with!
 The new wind generator up and ready... just waiting on wind! The evenings on the ocean have been nothing short of spectacular! We've had beautiful sunsets almost every night, followed by zillions of stars in air so clear it just boggles your mind! Being that the weather has been fairly calm lately, we've even enjoyed sundowners on deck as we watched in awe the amazing colors that you only find in a mid-Atlantic sunset... doesn't matter how many you see, the one you're looking at is always the best!
 Another amazing Atlantic sunset
Last night we were
on deck enjoying the sunset when Jimmy Buffet came on the stereo... perfect! We
all grabbed a beverage of choice and sat on deck mesmerized by a completely
surreal feeling you can only imagine if you've never sailed the open water on a
sailboat. Bringing out the conch shell to salute the sunset always seems like
the perfect way to end a perfect day!
 Mike saluting the sunset the traditional way!
We even had a
fishing line out last night, and by the time we went back to the cockpit and
started to bring the fishing line in for the night, Mike yelled out "Fish
On!!". It was definitely a good sized fish as it required some work to pull it
in by hand on our hand reel. We caught a 42" 30lb Wahoo on a 100lb test line
hooked up to a bungee cord that was hooked onto our cockpit table... how cool is
that! Mark and Mike immediately set to work cleaning our first Wahoo, and now
we have 20lbs of the finest looking steaks in our freezer you could possibly
imagine... guess what we'll be barbequing for lunch today!!
 Mark and Rick posing with 'Sophisticated Lady's' first Wahoo! Anyway, that's it for now... it's noon on Saturday as I'm writing and we finally started sailing again after a long night of motoring. The winds are still fairly light at 10 knots out of the NE, but we have to sail in order not to lose our entire advantage over the fleet of motoryachts! ;o)
Take care and we'll talk to you soon!
Cheers, Rick, Mike, and Mark 'Sophisticated Lady'
Wind
In
My Sails Inc. |
