1900 Ship’s Time – 958nm to the Finish

The evening roll call of the Caribbean 1500 fleet tells the story. We’re ahead of course, but the key is the wind pressure distribution. The two boats which followed us out to the east, have stronger winds than those do on the rhumb line. And it now looks like the differential will increase, as those more to the west will feel the light airs of the high first.

In the meantime everyone has been having a lovely sail. Seas are moderate (just enough in our case for invigorating surfing), it is starting to warm up (water temperature is up to 74F), and we’ve got the contrast between the deep blue of the ocean and white puffy cumulous clouds of this high pressure system.

Throw in some tandoori chicken and curried vegetables from the Indian restaurant we found in Hampton…Add a couple of bubble baths for the crew…Well, it just doesn’t get any better than this!

0100 – 900 Miles to Go

The breeze has lightened up and our speed has dropped considerably. In fact, we’ve eased the bowsprit a bit to leeward and moved the tack of the mizzen genoa down, and are sailing a hotter angle. We’re playing off extra speed against moving towards the west – closer to the lighter airs of the center of the high. The barometer, which has been rising steadily for the last 20 hours, has started to fall. This could be a sign that we’re turning the corner on the high. The breeze is back up into the high teens and we’re averaging closer to 13 right now. If we do make it around the high center, without getting caught, we’ll put some real distance on the folks behind us.

We’re also playing with the water ballast system again. Water in when the breeze looks like it is holding – then out when the lulls come through. Probably would be faster at this angle to go empty, but is much more comfortable when we’re upright. Inside the pilothouse it doesn’t feel like we’re sailing very fast – until you look at the performance polars. We’re sailing at about 135/140 true to the wind, and doing a consistent 98 to 102% of predicted speed – without our spinnakers. The new main and mizzen are really doing a job!

The real challenge now is to break the five-day barrier. To do that Beowulf has to average 10.8 knots, a relatively slow speed for us. However, if we get caught in the center of the high, with the wind deep behind us, it will be very difficult.