Dean's Diary- Extreme 40's in Turkey - Dean Barker reports

by Dean Barker on 26 May 2011
New Zealand's America's Cup challenge is providing a very strong multihull focus. Dean Barker, Emirates Team NZ skipper and Director of www.kiwiyachting.co.nz!Kiwi_Yachting_Consultants_Nexus_AB, reports from Turkey on the first day of the Extreme40 series, in which he is helming Emirates Team NZ .

Sailing with Dean Barker are Glenn Ashby (AUS), James Dagg (NZL) and Richard Meacham (NZL)

Day 1 in Istanbul

Hi

We are in Istanbul, Turkey for the third round of the Extreme Sailing Series. First time for me in Turkey so another new experience which is always pretty cool.

We arrived here Monday night, and with the containers being very late arriving, didn't get our hands on the boat until Tuesday morning. It was a full scramble to get the boat assembled and in the water on Tuesday and ready for the first day of racing today.

We are sailing on a tiny river that runs off the Bosphorus and would be little more than 500m across. So to say racing is very confined is an understatement. You basically start, sail for 30 seconds and normally find yourselves on layline. Within two minutes the fleet arrives at the top mark and this is where the fun and games begin!

The sailing today was very much like racing on a lake with huge puffs and lulls, massive and often unpredictable shifts, and fair degree of the random factor. We survived today in fifth overall with some mixed results like all the fleet.

We are 7 points out of the lead which is certainly not a lot given we will have at least another 25 races over the next four days in what I am sure will be equally testing conditions.

All for now

Dean

To read earlier editions of Dean Barker's blog http://www.kiwiyachting.co.nz/dean-barkers-blog!click_here