Keep the faith is a phrase that springs to mind on this long leg up the equator. The fleet is spread out over a 100 mile line NE to SW and the S Easterly trade winds blow more or less dead astern through this broad area. Inevitably there are variations in wind strengths and boats move forward and back depending upon what they find. You would not expect the wind in Southampton and Cherbourg to be the same all the time and so it is in the ocean. Over the long run you hope that the winds even out their favours across the whole area, but at present I have a feeling that the north end of the line is doing slightly better.
With the wind dead astern you are constantly offered two options, to go to the left or the right of the course. And as the wind oscillates + and - 10 degree one gybe or the other is favoured. When yachts are in sight of each other they often accompany each other on the same gybe for days upon end. Then the wind shifts in one area or another. One yacht takes one gybe, the other the opposite, and they begin to diverge and eventually lose sight of one another. Gybing to and fro over the last 24hours we have lost sight of Spirit of Sark and now have another companion behind us Team Stelmar.
Gybing a large yacht with spinnaker is a complex operation, which requires all of the watch to execute a role. The spinnaker is briefly flown with two spinnaker poles, the direction of the boat changed and the main transferred to the other side of the boat, and the redundant pole dropped. The stronger the wind the more difficult the operation. In the present conditions we may gybe as many as 16 times in 24 hours.
Teaching crews to gybe is something of a headache for the training crews in the UK. For a time nearly every rope and winch on the boat is in operation and eight or nine people must co-ordinate their activities. Crew volunteers face a very steep learning curve and all of them have their own training horror stories of exasperated skippers and confused crews. In discussion the other day it was estimated that gybes during training can take up to 20 minutes to complete, with the skipper and training mate running around like mad things trying to keep the spinnaker flying and the crew unharmed.
At present the fastest gybe performed on BP Explorer is 2.5 minutes and I don't think I was on deck at the time. Many of our manoeuvres are timed to gauge efficiency and this veteran crew do seem to get genuine satisfaction in their ability to understand a task and execute it quickly. The less direction they receive from me the more they can measure their progress from bumbling crew volunteer to skilled foredeck hand or spinnaker trimmer. Learning to sail the yacht and be confident onboard is as much of a journey
as the physical miles sailed.
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