Day 9 in Sevenstar Round Britain & Ireland Race 2010 has started today Tuesday 31 August at 1300 UTC

August 31, 2010

Day 8 we added 132 Nm to our distance which now accumulated to a total of 1.202 Nm. An amazing figure for us, especially when one considers the fact that we still have to do about 650 Nm, the entire distance of a Rolex Fastnet Race .

Yesterday we have added some photo’s to the web page in order to give you, our loyal supporters and readers, an impression of how it looks outside and inside the boat. Though we have been unable to really grasp the atmosphere on board, you can see that not all moments on board are enjoyable.

The 132 Nm we covered in the last 24 hrs were mainly of tactical nature i.e. how did we not loose the wind by staying away from the eye of the High Pressure area, how did we stay far away enough from land, how did we not loose any ground to our competitors etc. Steering was pretty difficult last night, but we all sailed the boat like we did a small race lasting only 3 hours. In other words with the same intensity as a day race.

It all took place in an area South of The Hebrides, West of the Isle of Mull/Isle of Islay (where Carl Grootjes has his Castle), North of Northern Ireland.

We are now 100 Nm away from the next mark called Black Rock on the West of Ireland, south of their border with Northern Ireland.

Spirit on board is excellent, the food is superb and we really do sail the boat very hard.

We justed observed a whale, fortunately at a distance of approximately 0,5 Nm away from us.

Wind Speed 10 knots, boat speed 5.6 knots, a bumpy sea. Both SELENE and BELUGA are now within a distance of 10 Nm from us. Though we are still behind them on the water, we are technically after our and their rating corrections in front of them. You can see that in the result prediction of RORC. It is too complicated to explain it in a short message so if you are interested how this works, please call any of the crew who stayed ashore. They will be happy to explain it. It is much too early to say anything about our final result with still 650 Nm to go, but we can say at least we are in contention and the boat is still in 100% condition. So is her crew.

More and more stories are popping up concerning our families and home. That is normal I believe after having been 9 consecutive days at sea together.

Our eta in Cowes will depend entirely on the wind. We really had expected another storm at the West Coast of Ireland but it dissipated last night. Let me say Saturday night 4 September as my best guess at this moment.

Best regards to all of you.