The morning after the night before!
Well done boys
Huge Congratulations from all of us who have been watching you from home in the UK and around the world: Australia, New Zealand, America, Germany ..........
Grace
Wednesday, 30 June 2010
Tuesday, 29 June 2010
The Finish
cheers from the balcony of the RWYC. 4th in Class 3 and 5th in IRC
overall - a result that has far exceeded our expectations.
The final leg from Lowestoft proved to be one of the most mentally
challenging as a "slack pressure" system left much of the English
Channel without wind. With its many headlands and strong tides there
was plenty of opportunity to make significant gains or losses.
To complete the race is an achievement in itself. Jangada proved more
than capable with the only damage a broken shackle and some chafed
lines. And more importantly no injuries to Trevor & I, apart from a
few bruises. There were times when we deliberately backed off the
pace, surrendering a few places. But this race turned out to be a
marathon with a sprint finish in which the tortoise very nearly beat
the Hare!
Richard
Monday, 28 June 2010
Start Point evades us again
As so often happens racing along the South Coast, the wind has died 15nm
from Start Point with foul tide building. Once again we are testing our
deep water kedging - this time in 62m depth. So far with 0.8kt of tide
flowing past along with the Jellyfish, we seem to be holding station.
from Start Point with foul tide building. Once again we are testing our
deep water kedging - this time in 62m depth. So far with 0.8kt of tide
flowing past along with the Jellyfish, we seem to be holding station.
Watch this space......
Richard & trevor
www.jangada.co.uk
Sunday, 27 June 2010
Kedged
In case you are wondering why we are stationary on the tracker, we have
stopped for a pot noodle.
stopped for a pot noodle.
At anchor in 53m of water. 10m chain + 30m warp + 100m dyneema line. Speed
throught the water 2.7kt, speed over the ground zero. But at least we are
not going East any more, unlike some of our rivals. Not looking forward to
winching it back in, but could be worse - we could be trying to row.
Richard
Thundering along
menacingly. Although it is lovely to be in the fortunate position to take
this photo, I suspect our Class 1 rivals are cursing the weather and
wondering just where did Jangada Too find their breeze.
Of our nearest rivals, Chris & Kim on their J105 Taika passed the lighthouse
just ahead of us, having tucked in closer to the island to take advantage of
a tidal eddy. Meanwhile Tony & Sam on Comedy of Errors are snapping at our
heels followed by Nigel & David on Fastrak VII.
Given the rating system we need to finish in Plymouth within 20 mins of
Comedy of Errors, 2 hrs 40 mins ahead of Taika and 4 hrs ahead of Fastrak
VII in order to beat each of them on handicap. Pip & Phil on the Shed
remain outside our reach, although their lead has been whittled down to
12nm. To make it into the trophies is going to be almost impossible given
the standard of the competition, but we are determined to battle it out to
the end - after all we still have a foul spring tide off Portland to contend
with.
So off to check the weather files and prepare for the final 24 hours -
Plymouth Ho!
Richard & Trevor
And here's the proof!
When I checked the tracker this morning I was astonished to see that Jangada (No 28, blue number paddle) had moved into second place in class. See Trevor's blog below to read how they did this.
I have just spoken to Richard (9.30am) they are anchored at the moment to stop them going backwards, as there is a foul tide against them and no wind..... Other competitors have not been so lucky and are disappearing in the wrong direction. It is unlikely that they will catch up with The Shed (32) but if they can just hang on in there ahead of the others..... and start sailing again when the wind picks up..... we could be in for a very interesting finish.
Grace
A lovely leg
Sunday 27/6m 0630hrs
What a race! We had a blinding first day, making great progress down the
east coast and even managed a small tussle with Streamine, until we each
opted for different routes around the new Thanet wind farm - us to the West
and Streamline tot he east. Our cunning plan was to take the Gull Stream -
a narrow and shallow gat between Ramsgate and the Goodwin Sands, pop out in
front of them. Not so cunning, with a great big wind hole waiting to trap
us off Deal - which we promptly fell in to. By the time we extracated
ourselves, Streamline had passed us. But, to our surprise,, they then
crossed the shipping lanes (nice angle, boys!) and that was the last we saw
of them. The wind was very fickle, but we managed good time along the
coast, in beautiful sunshine for the most part, all the way to Beachy Head.
with only two hours left of tide in our favour, the wind died and we were
left stranded, once again. A line trawler was our only compand - that and a
load of niggly flies that tormented us in our wallow.
Then, just as we were contemplating a kedge, a southerly wind sprang up -
first barely a zephyr, but increasing ini strength until we found ourselves
trolling merrily along in 13kt of fair breeze. It was clear this was not a
gradient wind, but a very local effect, seemingly extending from about 500m
off shore to about a km out. We literally surfed this wave of wind all the
way to Brighton.
This amazing wind took us all the way to the transoms of our rivals, so we
now find ourselves in the company of Thunder, Taika, Izara, Fastrack and
Comedy of Errors, with Rafiki and Greyhound only a little ahead. Most of
these boats are in higher IRC classes than ourselves, so this is really
excellent. By careful trimming and tactics, we've managed to work ourselves
up to second place in the group of six. But thee wind is no longer with us
and a foul tide is mounting. My next task is to prepare the anchor for
kedging...
Trev
What a race! We had a blinding first day, making great progress down the
east coast and even managed a small tussle with Streamine, until we each
opted for different routes around the new Thanet wind farm - us to the West
and Streamline tot he east. Our cunning plan was to take the Gull Stream -
a narrow and shallow gat between Ramsgate and the Goodwin Sands, pop out in
front of them. Not so cunning, with a great big wind hole waiting to trap
us off Deal - which we promptly fell in to. By the time we extracated
ourselves, Streamline had passed us. But, to our surprise,, they then
crossed the shipping lanes (nice angle, boys!) and that was the last we saw
of them. The wind was very fickle, but we managed good time along the
coast, in beautiful sunshine for the most part, all the way to Beachy Head.
with only two hours left of tide in our favour, the wind died and we were
left stranded, once again. A line trawler was our only compand - that and a
load of niggly flies that tormented us in our wallow.
Then, just as we were contemplating a kedge, a southerly wind sprang up -
first barely a zephyr, but increasing ini strength until we found ourselves
trolling merrily along in 13kt of fair breeze. It was clear this was not a
gradient wind, but a very local effect, seemingly extending from about 500m
off shore to about a km out. We literally surfed this wave of wind all the
way to Brighton.
This amazing wind took us all the way to the transoms of our rivals, so we
now find ourselves in the company of Thunder, Taika, Izara, Fastrack and
Comedy of Errors, with Rafiki and Greyhound only a little ahead. Most of
these boats are in higher IRC classes than ourselves, so this is really
excellent. By careful trimming and tactics, we've managed to work ourselves
up to second place in the group of six. But thee wind is no longer with us
and a foul tide is mounting. My next task is to prepare the anchor for
kedging...
Trev
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