Beautiful sailing weather with sunshine and wind from our starboard quarter have been with us for the past few days. This was only interrupted by occasional rain showers as we got closer to the approaching front. But we managed to stay ahead of the front and with that in relatively stable winds. Things were going well for us and we even were in the lead for some time.

On the route we were sailing along under spinnaker for some time. That allowed us to sometimes even hold an average of over 13 knots. It was hard work both on the helm and in the cockpit. But the sound of joy could be heard everywhere on deck when we took a wave and started to accelerate towards 20 knots. Unfortunately our C3 spinnaker was not very happy with this. At one point it decided to let go and ripped apart just a few metres below the head. The recovery of the sail went fast. However the repair is still ongoing. And without that sail we are struggling to match the speed of the other boats. As a result we had to surrender our lead. At least we could secure third place for the intermediate Scoring Gate. In front of us are currently just Gosh and Unicef. Most other boats seem to be behind the front and are thus moving slower. The gap behind us is around 100 miles to the next boat with just under 1200 miles remaining to the finish off Oban.

The forecast for the next couple of days is looking good and we hope to continue making great progress. With the high pressure system moving north we should have favourable winds up to the finish. And then we are back in Europe, back in the United Kingdom – hard to believe. And in addition the high promises good weather for the stopover. Let’s see if the weather lives up to the forecast.