Melbourne Osaka Cup - Saturday morning sked 23 March, 2013. Escapade over 230 nautical miles East of Sydney and making steady progress on a North Easterly heading - still in a 25 knot North-North-Westerly at 7.00 am. Reported avoiding a lightning storm last night.

Southern Cross, almost as far East as Escapade, but 200 miles further south, also still sailing into a Northerly breeze,

Turbulence remaining inshore, 25 miles North of Eden at 7.00 am, reported a sea flat as glass with a light South Westerly. This was in contrast to Eric’s email written last night:

Hi folks, really rough night last night (Thursday) 5 to 6 metre sea and very blowy at times, 35 to 45 knots. I had a bad night with sea sickness but settled now, and sailing in perfect conditions off Eden, 14 knots of breeze and trucking along at 8.5 knots.

Paul is asleep right now so she's on sleepy bill auto pilot. Paul is going super well as always and only had 1 beer so far, last night’s weather even slowed that down! Tomorrow I think we'll get out the CD's that Jacko set up for our voyage and give them a blast. Well over and out for now! Keep watching the tracker. Cheers Eric & Paul, Turbulence

Melbourne Osaka Cup - Friday evening sked 22 March, 2013.  At the 1900 sked, Turbulence was 20 nautical miles east of Gabo Is with a 10 knot South Easterly breeze and heading up the NSW coast.

Escapade (300 miles North East of Turbulence) reported they still in a Northerly, but now less than 25 knots and clearing.

After 2 days of bashing into very strong Northerlies (see their report from yesterday) Southern Cross reported that they’d had an afternoon of good sailing, but were now almost becalmed!

NSW coastal forecasts indicate that Turbulence should have moderate winds behind the beam until Saturday afternoon, but it’s likely that winds for the other 2 boats will stay in the north overnight. It’s looking a bit light for them after that.

2013 Melbourne to Osaka Double-Handed Yacht Race - Start times

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Melbourne Osaka Cup - Update from Southern Cross Friday morning 22 March, 2013 from skipper Yasu:

Position - 37 54 S 154 30 E
Weather - Cloudy
Wind speed - 30 knots Nth
Waves - 6 meters
Speed - Average 4 knots
Crew - All well

Yesterday it was pretty tough. We faced extremely strong winds and big waves and with the violent shaking and rolling it was impossible to write a report for you.

Last night our strongest recorded wind gust was 46 knots. That’s the strongest I recorded, but they're only measurements taken whenever I felt a gust of wind, so they could be stronger.

Currently we’re using a storm sail tied down with a shock cord, we're thinking of running closed reach. Right now the wind is about 60 degrees of the port bow. Occasionally the sail lifts too much and tucks sometimes.

Although we have been pushed away quite a bit from the Australian continent, we have finally arrived where the northerly current flows and we’ll be able to finally turn north. Let’s hope we can continue now without having to try too hard". - Yasu