The wind varied from 4 to 10 kts and from where we were in the tower seemed to have quite a few shifts for the windward leg out to R2.
Certainly the ships to the west were lying more NW but shifted again lying to the west later. The leg from R2 to Y off Green Point brought the spinnakers out such that 2 handed crew experiences were happening. PRION made superb gains to be second around although the fleet was spreading out now. By the end of the first round, FUZZY LOGIC maintained their lead in a time of 1 hr 12m approx. but PRION had moved to a clear second followed by HORIZON SPRINT & SIERRA (Patrick/Andrew Mollison). REMEDY was overtaken just before the mark by ALIEN (Mike & Mark Welsh) and then came FREQUENT FLYER.
As RECKLESS (R Thomas/D Jeffery) passed, the wind was little more than a 3 kt puff leaving a fair gap to SHENANDOAH II and MINI-BAR (A Doolan/D Watt). Note that MINI-BAR is what might be called a ‘facilitated entry’ as she is training for the mini transat.
The wind became consistently light at 3-4 kts for the second round and shifted slowly south becoming little more than a puff. 1 kt at times. The ships had moved around SSW long before a hint of direction change at the tower. It even went SSE here. It became clear that the course would need to be shortened and difficult to get the last of the fleet home at the end of the second round. A lot of slop for just a small amount of wind! Making a difficult leg to R2 the second time. By 1340, just when it looked as if it couldn’t get worse-it did! 0 kts (not sure if it is correct to say we recorded 0). FUZZY LOGIC opened up a huge lead to drift over the finish line at 13.55.35.
As FREQUENT FLYER rounded the Y mark, the breeze began to fill in a little-like 4 kts! And now 1440hrs.She maintained her position to be second over the line. Next rewarded for patience and quite a group of yachts but still only 4 kts. Very noticeable in the finishing order was GOOD NEWS (Ron Walker/Jon Evans). And that nice little breeze faded away to just 1 kt as BOOTS (George Shaw/Robyn Brooke) approached the line and 12 minutes to shutoff time. I apologise for not getting all to finish and can only say repeat after me, if you did not make it “Well ! That’s yacht racing!”
