TransPac Day 3: Ups and Downs

Or … to put it into chronological order: Downs and Ups. 

 

We had a very tough pill to swallow this morning.  We suffered significant losses in order to execute on our overall race routing and positioning strategy.  To compound our woes, we were a couple hours late to change the spinnaker from our reaching oriented A3, to our downwind spinnaker, the A2.  Thus, the lead pack of OEX, Pyewacket, and Grand Illusion all gained on us  from sun rise to noon this morning.  Certainly the questions were asked; “ are we sure that we are doing the right thing here”.  There is nothing worse, as a navigator, than having to deliver 3 back to back scheds (position reports) that only feature  losses. 

 

However this afternoon thing turned around.  Since 2pm we’ve been making massive gains on the fleet.  In a 2 hour stretch, from 2 to 4pm, we erased all of our morning’s losses- the expensive move that solidified our southerly lane.  From 4pm onward we’ve been mak’n money.  Now that the opening moves in the race have been made, and with our competition locked into their lanes, we’ll have to see how we do over the next 4 days on starboard tack.  We anticipate making gains down here to the south, but have our eyes on an unstable forecast for the last 2 days of the race.  Anything can happen, but for now, there are plenty of smiles to go around onboard the Holua.

 

-Matt out

27 17.16N

127 58.00W