Frustration personified on ING/Brunel
by A frustrated Grant Wharington on 12 Jan 2006
Mark Bartlett hangs on in rough conditions trying to make the best of damaged track on the mast of Volvo Open 70 ING Real Estate Brunel Volvo Ocean Race
http://www.volvooceanrace.com
It is enormously frustrating to drive a V8 motor car running on only four cylinders, that’s how it feels out here!
On day 2 in this leg from Cape Town whilst sailing under 1st reef we pulled the mainsail luff track off the back of the mast at the reef point. After Woos (Gareth Cooke) spent 2 hours up the rig repairing it, we decided we could continue without using this reef point, so for the next week we had to go between full mainsail and reef 2. But 36 hours ago, whilst pushing hard to get across the bottom of the low which had formed across our path and into the fast north westerlies, we ripped the track off the mast again, this time at the second reef halyard lock and far worse!!
Now we are down to 3rd reef only as we cannot pull the mainsail up past the broken track at reef 2. The 3rd reef on a Volvo 70 is about the size of an optimist mainsail, which is fine if you have 50+kn of wind which we did get when we did not make it across the low!! However in any less windspeed we are dreadfully slow and stuck watching or opposition put big miles into us on every sked.
What can we do out here?? Nothing, as this is the kind of repair which gets done on the ground with the rig out. We will have to just battle on with what we have. This is now a flash back to leg one where the rich get richer every day!!
Signing of a very frustrated Grant Wharington Skipper ING Real Estate
Brunel
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