Last night we lost a few miles to the lead boat in our class, the Wyliecat30 Nancy. We thought we had an advantage over them in heavier air runing, so we've really enphasized the night watches to press that advantage. Night before, we had a 17 mile gain, while in last night's lighter air we lost about 3 miles. Drat. Still pressing on though.
This morning we ended up in front of a pair of really strong squalls, the first building to a steady 27 knots, so we took the runner down and put up the chicken chute, only to have the breeze go away rapidly. Back up with the runner, and the breeze build again to about 28 knots, with Friction Loss actually riding up and over the back of the Pacific swell. Some would call this planing, maybe a J30 really is a sportboat? -heh. We got a little video of it, hope to upload when we finish. It was tons of fun, and kudos to EP for building a .6spinnaker that can take the abuse we've given the poor thing over this race.
Food is running a little low, not counting the freeze dried stuff. We're all rummaging around for snacks and sweets and not finding much. We still have a bunch of Jolly Ranchers though- the surprising hit of the night watches. The cockpit floor is currently littered with the wrappers until cleanup in the morning. We have surplus fresh water, so have been washing hands and faces with it, a real treat.
-C
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