Loving the Southern Ocean and other VOR Boat Blogs

by Volvo Ocean Race competitors on 20 Nov 2008
Boat Blogs on Day 5, Leg 2 of the Volvo Ocean Race.

Loving The Southern Ocean - Blog From Nick Bubb, Watch Leader on Team Russia

At last, two minutes to breath! I’ve just come off deck having peeled our largest spinnaker; it’s a great feeling to be under max sail. The first few days have been testing to say the least with a tricky first day followed by big wind and close racing, all of which have of course been coupled with a few technical challenges onboard.

After a good start we sped round the inshore course with the lead pack only to sail in into a huge wind hole as the gradient breeze battled with sea breeze. One wrong call as we tried to steal a march on the fleet and we were toast, out the back in no wind as the others sailed off, how depressing! We were left with no choice but to pick up the pieces and battle on, which is exactly what we have done with good effect so far.

With keel issues from the word go, again I was busy early on. This time the new ram boots have been fine but the keel kept easing down from max cant as soon as we loaded the boat up. After much fiddling around we discovered it was due to some dirt in the release valves and after a thorough clean up, everything seems to be ok now. A few small repairs here and there but touchwood, Kosatka is holding up well.

My personal highlight of the race so far was the other morning; big rolling seas, overcast sky, freezing water, 40 knots of breeze, A6 (fractional spinnaker) and 2 reefs, fully stacked aft, Mikey on the pumps Jez trimming, me on the wheel. We were just blasting along with prolonged periods pf over 30 knots boat speed and a max speed of 34 knots. However this was then followed by near disaster as soon after the watch change, Mikey and I were in the bow bailing out when we heard the boat take off, down what must have been a huge wave, as we hit the bottom, with nowhere to go, the boat had to either roll into the breeze and broach or Chinese gybe (an accidental gybe).

Unfortunately the helmsman was powerless to control her and we ‘chinesed.’ There was carnage on deck and down below. Sail stack in the water, keel on the wrong side, crew clipped on half underwater, runners on the wrong side, boom in the air, spinnaker in the rig, boat half under water, kit everywhere down below as various missiles launched themselves at the off watch. After what seemed like an eternity we sorted the keel out, completed the gybe, got the kite down and gybed back to our proper course, all very relieved still to have a rig in the boat!!

Anyway enough stories for now, I must go, only two hours until I need to be up again. We are currently engaged in a thrilling battle to try to beat both Telefonica boats and maybe even Puma to the scoring gate tomorrow afternoon. We should gybe north later on today and the crew are all very excited at warming up. For me, my feelings are slightly different, this will be the last of the southern ocean for a while, which unofficially starts at 40S and I do feel a tinge of regret at not following the old course and heading south for Australia. There are certainly new challenges ahead however so I better prepare for that, if we beat Telefoncia Black and Delta Lloyd to this scoring gate we will move up to 6th overall so motivation is high….. and Green Dragon is only 40 miles directly in front of us, under 2 hours away!!

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TELEFÓNICA BLUE LEG TWO DAY 5 QFB: received 19.11.08 0439 GMT

Hi There,

It still seems that the days are passing very quickly. Perhaps it is because we are headed east and night falls a little earlier each day or maybe it is the pace of life onboard.

Right now life is busy onboard, some would even say chaotic, with sail making, sickness and injuries, everyone’s day is full keeping the boat in one piece and headed down the track.

It has been a tough last 24 hours. We have struggled once again to keep in touch with the fleet in the windy downwind conditions. Everyone has slowly extended on us leaving us somewhat frustrated and left behind. Hopes of a good score at the waypoint gate seem to be slowly slipping away but with many, many miles to go before we arrive in India, I am hopeful that we can pull off a good overall result in this leg. This is what I am trying to focus on to stay positive.

Lighter conditions will no doubt suit us better and a return to the sunshine and warmer climes will no doubt raise the spirits of everyone onboard. Right now, it is cold and grey outside, cool and damp inside. It would be fair to say that the thing everyone looks forward to most at the moment is the inside of a warm sleeping bag!

Up on deck, things are kept interesting by the passing of squalls fairly frequently taking the breeze from 25-35 knots in a matter of minutes and changing the sea state from tolerable into a nightmare as our wet ride continues. However, even this looks likely to stop soon with the breeze now forecast to drop over the course of the day. Perhaps this will be a good thing; with change afoot as the scoring gate approaches, it might offer a little window of opportunity to take a few points off the guys ahead.... Here’s hoping...

Cheers,

Simon Fisher - navigator
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TELEFÓNICA BLACK LEG TWO DAY 5 QFB: received 19.11.08 1033 GMT

Hi all

Yesterday, when dawn came, we saw a navigation green light to our port side, and we realised that it could not be no other than our friends from TELEFÓNICA BLUE. And there they were. We were sailing a very interesting internal match-race to the gate, and in the next position report it came out that we had gained 14 miles to the waypoint ahead of them!

It was a very nice time, sailing beam-to-beam no more than two miles away from one another. And, as dawn came, they had sailed a bit northward of us, probably because they are with a different sail, and with different strategy. We still want to go a bit east-southeast, and we will see what happens when heading north with the expected gybe ahead.

Apart from that, everybody onboard begins to feel a bit tired, as there has been four days now of intense sailing in rough conditions, but happy anyway for the position. We enjoy every wave, but as Javi Plaza says, ‘it is time for a bit of sun bathing and relaxing, isn't it?’

And, hopefully, we will have our Maciel ‘Cicho’ Cicchetti trimming on deck in a couple of days, eager as he is to recover completely. We have to tie him up to make him rest! Ha ha!

Now it is lunchtime, so let's go for the ‘Serrano’ ham.
All the best.

Mikel Pasabant - MCM

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GREEN DRAGON LEG TWO DAY 5 QFB: received 19.11.08 0628 GMT

Not giving up

Four days into leg two and the Southern Ocean is living up to its name. One broken steering system, one Chinese gybe, one broken boom and now three knockdowns, but we are still charging along for the scoring gate at longitude 58 east.

I have to confess to being slightly nervous about our predicament, but the forecast is good and we will soon be heading North (ish).

We seem to have the boat going pretty well, but we are vulnerable to being knocked down in the frequent squalls as we are fairly committed to carrying a full main and there is no easy way to ease it.

It is also setting very full and this affects the balance of the boat. It wasn't an easy night for the guys on deck - and the temperature is falling fast. Down below everything is sodden as we have several leaks (one of which is the hole we drilled in the side to jury rig the steering!). We also have a leaking daggerboard case, which has split.

I feel a bit like the Black Adder TV character that refuses to be beaten and keeps on fighting as his arms and legs are cut off one by one by his adversary.

We now have about 400 miles to the scoring gate and we lie in third