Miranda writes this morning.....Pretty glamourous conditions for the last 24 hours, sailing east towards Cape Horn, stable wind direction and not too much sea. I am really anxious that something will go amiss, with just 367 miles of Pacific Ocean in front of Campagne de France's bow. Countless sailors have had their dreams dashed in this ocean, including ours on our Jules Verne record attempt on Royal SunAlliance in 1998. Yesterday, Sam Davies wrote a beautiful hommage to our mast, which is resting in peace in the depths about as far from land as it is possible to get, and to the extraordinary adventure led by Tracy Edwards. It had a major influence on my subsequent choice of career.
A big thank you to Sharon Ferris (former fellow team mate on Royal SunAlliance) for the running commentary all night (via whatsapp) on the Prada Cup!
At 260 miles to the Equator this morning and in an E’ly trade wind which has built and rotated right a little since the minor pinch point at Recife the leading trio of IMOCAs, Apivia, Bureau Vallée and SeaExplorer Yacht Club de Monaco have accelerated slightly returning average speeds of between 17.5 and 19 knots. Charlie Dalin, Louis Burton and Boris Herrmann have all gained slightly on fourth placed Thomas Ruyant who is, unfortunately, not able to match the leaders’ speed with no useable port foil. The 24 hours average speed for Ruyant is 13.9kts compared with between 15 and 16 for the leading trio.
Third Placed Herrmann Applying Pressure to Top Duo
Racing some 35 miles off the NE corner of Brasil, at Recife this afternoon, speeds remain very even between the top trio of Vendée Globe boats, German skipper Boris Herrmann having moved into third place overnight.
It's 4am and I am, sitting staring at my computer screen, trying to make some sense of this Atlantic weather for the umpteenth time today.
Sailing in the Southern Ocean was tough for many reasons, but the navigation was reasonably straight forwards. The ice limit gave us a boundary to the South and we made our way from west to east, weaving our way north or south to keep in a steady flow of 'goldilocks wind' not too much, not too little but just right. The weather in the Atlantic does not seem quite so straight forwards. With the objective now to head north, it means crossing weather systems rather than riding with them and all of a sudden things are looking a lot more complicated.
