Poking The Bear

I has been quite a day on Prospector.  After blinking twice on two

attempts to sail to the southern edge of the big low pressure system

pacing us to the northwest, at 0430Z, lifted by a right shift, we began to

discuss gybing and trying again.  Larry, Paul and Terry huddled and

discussed the pros and cons of the move.  They decided to go for it. 

But, Paul had one condition, if we gybed Larry couldn’t change his mind

and want to gybe back again in 15 minutes.  Paul knows Larry has a

tendency toward gyber’s remorse.  Larry agreed and said he would go

take a nap to avoid the temptation.  The order was given and we gybed

to a northerly heading and started sailing toward the low again.  Before

climbing in to his bunk Larry took a quick peek at his nav screens and

immediately was happy with the decision.

This practice of sailing toward the big low is now universally referred to

by the crew as Larry poking the bear.  For what it is worth Larry doesn’t

really want to poke the bear.  Expedition, our navigation and routing

software does.  Larry is just Expedition’s spokesperson.  For the last 36

hours every route Larry has run on Expedition has called for an

immediate gybe to the north.  He has tried every trick that Peter Isler

and Chris Bedford have taught him to convince the software otherwise,

but it is adamant about the gybe.  That is why we have been looking for

every opportunity do so.

After the gybe with our go to sail combination of a reefed main, J4 and

Genoa Staysail, we were off to the north and sailing fast.  We awoke to

an unexpectedly beautiful morning.  It was warm and sunny. The crew

enjoyed their morning coffee and oatmeal breakfast on deck and

everyone took turns driving Prospector in terrific sailing conditions. 

Henry, gave Larry a new nickname, Longboard Larry, because he was

having so much fun surfing the big sixty footer in mid 20 knot winds and

a huge following sea.  Matthew busied himself taking photos and

videos for us to post later.  Some of the photos will go up tonight.  The

video will need to wait for us to have a faster, cheaper internet

connection than our FB150.

Larry turned the helm over to Paul, and went to do his thing at the Nav

station.  We were still 36 miles from where we thought the southern

edge of the low was, but the wind suddenly jumped to 30 knots, the

limit we had set for our proximity to the low.  It was time to gybe back.

Tery and Quinn quarterbacked prepping for the gybe, something not to

take lightly in such strong winds and high seas.  They began by putting

in a second reef assisted by Matthew and Andrew at the mast, Lucien

and Scotty at the pit and Tim, and Dave in the cockpit.  Paul manned

the helm with Henry assisting by calling the waves. The reef complete

Bruce and Matthew went to the bow and struck the Genoa staysail. We

were getting ready to gybe when the wind jumped to 42 knots, making

gybing too dangerous. Tery decided it was safer to do a chicken gybe,

performing a 360 degree turn to a tack, rather than a straight gybe. 

The only problem with the chicken gybe being the risk of stalling the

boat and getting stuck dead in the water in high winds and a big sea. 

Completing the maneuver involved turning Prospector very quickly and

backing the jib to pull the bow around, which with Paul on the helm

and Tery on the jib, was executed perfectly. 

The chicken gybe completed we immediately put in a third reef in 40

knot plus winds.  Now sailing in a triple reefed main and just the J4 and

a strong following sea, we were pointing straight at the finish line and

going very fast.  The only issues were the waves and the weather.

The waves had become bigger than ever, and made driving very

challenging.  The weather was complicated too.  We were sailing with

the low to our left, the warm front ahead of the low just ahead of us

and the cold front trailing the low just behind us.  You could see these

features very easily and didn’t need a weather map to figure them out. 

Squalls were popping up and tracking from southeast to northwest

along the leading edge of the cold front.

We were not in any danger, but were facing very technical and

challenging sailing conditions.  Our ace in the hole was Prospector

herself.  Flat and stable, she reveled in the conditions.  Her helm was

balanced, she tracked straight and smoothly and she responded

beautifully to each course adjustment.

The Prospector crew, a terrific bunch of sailors, was also up to the

challenge.  We shortened the driving rotation, normally shared evenly

by all, to Tery, Paul, Henry and Tim.  Larry went to the nav station to

learn how to track the squalls on radar, something he had never done

before, assisted by Jeff.  Colette made sandwiches to keep the crew

fueled up.  Brendan called waves.  Scotty repaired a torn batten pocket

on the GS.   Matthew, Lucien, Bruce, Dave and Andrew trimmed sails. 

We adjusted the watch schedule to reflect the new rotation and began

rotating people below decks to get some sleep.

Everything well under control we began to put up some big numbers in

a steady 35-38 knot, with low 40 knot gusts, southwesterly wind.  As

the sun set, we struck the J4 and put up the J5, our smallest headsail in

30 knot winds.  Quinn has a nickname for each of our sails.  He calls the

J5 the Lindsay Vonn, because it is beautiful, tough and always comes

through in the clutch.  The winds and sea are forecast to settle down

over night, but we are trying to be as conservative possible as we sail

on in a very dark, still very windy night in a pretty tossed up ocean.

So, why did we really poke the bear?  It wasn’t all about the routing. 

We wanted to sail left to take advantage of an expected left shift over

the course of tomorrow.  Also, given the loss of two kites we can’t go

toe to toe in a downwind VMG race, particularly with Snow Lion and to

a lesser extent with Maximizer.  Nomad IV is so big she poses a whole

different set of challenges.  What we have learned over the past few

days is that Prospector loves pressure.  The more the better.  We have

also learned that we can sail as fast, and perhaps safer in a big breeze,

with a reefed main, the J4 and a Genoa staysail than we could have

sailed with the A6 we no longer have available.  The track we are on is

forecast to have consistent 30 knot winds for the next 8-10 hours

followed by 25-30 knot winds for the 18-20 hours after that.  The winds

on the track we left are forecast to be much lower.

We gained ground quickly today on the two yachts in front of us, Snow

Lion and Maximizer.  We are now second in our class and sixth in our

fleet.  We have sailed 1,858 nautical miles in just over six days since we

started.  We have 1,242 nautical miles to go to our finish at the Lizard in

Cornwall, England.  A lot can still happen, both good and bad.  We have

a nice little race going and are looking at a potential podium finish in

our class and top ten finish in our fleet.  Both outcomes are well beyond

our most optimistic hope when we began this adventure.  We are

proud of what we and Prospector, more to come on the mighty

Prospector in a future post, have done so far and very aware of and

focused on what we still have to do.

Knowing When To Blink

That is the hard part of playing chicken.  We blinked twice in the last 18

hours.  When we left off last night we were setting off to the north to

find the southern edge of the big low pressure system bearing down on

us.  We set a waypoint for where we guessed that might be and with an

A5 and full main started sailing towards it.  We were flying down the

track and loving life.  We expected to reach the waypoint and gybe at

approximately 6am.

At 3am, 25 miles to the west of where we were headed the edge of the

low found us.  Paul and Larry had just discussed taking the A5 down if

the wind built to 25. The wind at the time was 20-22knots.  Larry had

just climbed in this bunk when 30-35 knots of wind arrived with no

advance warning.  Way over canvassed all hands jumped on deck and

wrestled the A5 down.  Unfortunately, it didn’t come down in one

piece. The A5 has joined her pal the A6 on the disabled list for the rest

of this voyage.  We are running out of bullets out here.

Recognizing that the low was a lot closer than we thought, we blinked

for the first time and gybed away.  After the gybe we put up our tried

and true double headsail combo of the J4 and Genoa staysail. 

Prospector loves this combo in 25-35 knots with reefs added as we go

up the wind range.  True to form she settled in under the new canvas

and we sailed away from trouble at 13-15 knots boat speed with a flat,

smooth, well balanced yacht. 

We were expecting today to be a challenge as the low hunted us down

from behind.  We were wrong.  We had another amazing day on the

Atlantic.  The sun broke out, the sea squared up behind us and we

surfed along at 12-15 knots in indescribably pleasant sailing conditions.

The ocean was breathtakingly beautiful, changing colors frequently as

we moved from cloudy skies to bright sunshine.  When it was cloudy

the ocean was an ominous slate gray with menacing whitecaps.  As the

sun came out the ocean turned cobalt blue with amazing blue green

whitecaps with rainbows forming in the spray as the waves crested.  It

was an amazing show.

Oh, and the waves built.  They were big square things the size of Mack

trucks that would tower over our stern before lifting it gently, picking

Prospector up and propelling her forward.  Thank, God they were

behind us.  Everyone took turns driving our 60 foot surfboard.  Few of

us could remember having more fun driving a boat.

Just before our delicious Chicken a la King dinner, a big dark squall

appeared on the horizon.  The wind built quickly to over 35 knots.  We

had one reef in and quickly put in a second.  Fortunately, the squall

changed its mind and passed behind us.  In its wake we got lifted as the

wind shifted to the left.  Larry’s around the buoys racing instincts took

over and he started analyzing a gybe to take advantage of the shift. 

Looking at the tracker he was puzzled to see that none of the other

yachts nearby were gybing either.  He dug a bit deeper, played with his

weather files and quickly saw why.  Gybing, while tactically smart,

would bring us back to the edge of the low in 40 knot plus winds. 

Everyone was using the lift to get in to relatively gentler 20-30 know

winds further away from the edge of the big storm system.  We blinked

for the second time and stayed with our wing men to seek relatively

safer sailing conditions.

We are currently settling in to our overnight routine.  Colette is

cleaning up from dinner and leaving a stash of leftovers out for her

raccoons.  The off watch crew is heading to their bunks.  Larry is

working at the Nav table to plan our next move. 

We are sailing fast, gaining ground with each position report and having

a ball. 

We can’t wait to see what new adventures tomorrow will bring

From The Deck Of Prospector 0030z 06 July 2015

A Magical Day

Today was about as good a day as you can have ocean racing.  The clouds lifted, the sun came out, the air temperature dropped, the water temperature dropped, the air dried out and someone turned the waves off.

It was shorts, tee shirts, sunglasses and sunscreen for the Prospector crew as we enjoyed the spectacular improvement in the weather.  We spent the day running down wind gybing back and forth to head east north east. 

The big boat was nice and flat and we took advantage of the relative calm to tend to some maintenance that had been hard to do over the last couple of days.  We also brought out all our damp gear, our cushions and sleeping bags, turning Prospector in to a bit of a floating clothes line, to take advantage of what NOAA used to call excellent drying conditions.

The crew enjoyed dinner on deck, Mexican Chicken and Rice, specially doctored by Colette to freeze dried perfection.  Our night watch raccoons will make short work of the leftovers.  Scotty, the leader of the raccoon den, keeps a spork in his pocket overnight so he can be quick on the draw with the left overs.  Last night he crushed the leftover Colette enhanced beef stroganoff, allegedly enjoying a beef stroganoff sandwich.  Colette’s freeze dried beef stroganoff is our favorite crew meal, and is the closest thing to a July 4th hamburger we carry.  Colette packed on board a surprise July 4th treat, individual mini apple pies, that we devoured for our pm snack.

The great weather was a welcome respite for the crew and our yacht.  It was an unexpected treat and we made the most of it.  We are glad to be leaving the Gulf Stream and its maddeningly unpredictable currents and frequent squalls.  But, the respite is going to be short lived.  We are working to get ourselves north to hook up with the southern edge of a big low pressure system moving our way.  Yes, you read that right, we are intentionally sailing towards bad weather.  This weather feature is going to dominate most of what is left of the race.  We are going to play a bit of chicken with it, getting as close as we can to its southern side to pick up and ride the strong southwesterly winds it should provide.  The chicken part is not getting so close that the ride will be miserable.  Either way the fair weather we so enjoyed today is going to end.

From the Deck Of Prospector 1600z 04 July 2015

Duct Tape

They say if it moves and it shouldn’t – use duct tape. Well I am happy to report, the duct tape has been deployed to another critical item that Henry and I broke last night. The night before as you recall we teamed up to demo the critical A6 kite as we hit warp speed pressing as hard as we could. Just five minutes before the kite disintegrated in spectacular fashion as we screamed along deep into the 20 knot boat speed range, we remarked knowingly to each other “this is the right sail”. Five minutes later as we frantically tried to devise a method to get it down, with the bow wake back by the cockpit and as high as the spreaders, Henry remarked “this is nuts”. Indeed.

Larry has remarked how hard we have been pressing in the big breeze. For us 30 knots of windspeed is the new 15. 20 feels like light air. We continue to do so. Foot hard on the accelerator. However, safety is critical and we do need to arrive in one piece. Last night we even took two reefs to keep the boat under control. Even with that, as the waves and the wind continued to build last night we found ourselves surfing along on our 60 foot surfboard occasionally on the edge of control.

While I was driving fast down a wave, another huge wave came aboard completely uninvited and swept Henry into our carbon wheel which gave way with a loud crack! I was swept off my feet but hung onto the wheel. Henry ended up upside down on the driving platform while I grabbed the leeward wheel before we crashed.

Our resident MacGyver's in Tery, Quinn and Lew puzzled over the repairs talking knowingly about stresses and load factors for carbon. Plans were hatched to take the wheel off and grind it out and repair with fiberglass. Formulas debated. But after deep consultation as we ripped along in the dark, it was deemed that wrapping the cracked part with duct tape and our special “super secret” tape (aka duct tape) would do the repair nicely and indeed it has.  Henry and I are here all week so I suspect the duct tape will be back.

At one point last night as we surfed down the 500th bonsai pipeline wave, I swear I saw the tube of a breaking wave over Tery’s head. It’s daunting in the dark but fun.

Henry and I have been on best behavior all morning as we bounced between thunder squalls in “typical mid ocean weather” whatever that means as I have never been out here before.  As I finish up, the boys are back at it in our customary 30 knots of wind.

Finally a note on Larry’s skills as a navigator. There are a lot of fast boats and talented crews out here and no amount of fast sailing would put us in the place we are now unless the navigator did an absolute amazing job. And Larry has. We have a long way to go but there isn’t a navigator I would rather have.

Actually one last thing, we smell like goats and that’s an insult to goats. Collette has taken up mushroom farming in the soaking, steaming environment below. It could be worse, it could be raining. Actually, it is.

Back to the mayhem.

Paul