Daily Report - July 20 - Fatigue Is Starting To Creep In

by Race Committee, July 20th, 2014

It started very early, 55 minutes after midnight to be exact, when JAM, the big J-160 crossed the finish line. While John McPhail and crew, hailing from the Gig Harbor Yacht Club on the western shore of Puget Sound, were quite used to the rain after days of squalls and heavy rain down the West Maui shoreline, the torrential downpour that dumped on the waiting families and well wishers at the Lahaina Dock came as quite a shock.

JAM’s Welcome Party was getting started under the veranda at the Pioneer Inn when Turnagain, a Beneteau Oceanis 50 skippered by Travis McGregor from the Royal Vancouver Yacht Club, crossed the finish line. Travis and crew promptly motored down to Lahaina to join the festivities. The Pioneer Inn was rocking as great eats and Mai Tais fuelled the party until the wee hours of Sunday morning.

Later in the morning, Alegria X, a Dufour 45e owned by Eberhard Heinzemann and skippered by Colin Jackson of the Royal Vancouver Yacht Club, finished to much more Maui-like weather about 10:30 on Sunday morning. Their Greeting Party was no less enthusiastic, despite many working on only 3 hours of sleep. The heavy took its toll on Alegria as they worked through their whole inventory of spinnakers with only tatters left in the bags. 

At Roll Call at 5:00 pm HST tonight, Turicum had just finished and were working their way to Welcome Party. Warren Hale and crew are aboard the many time Vic-Maui participant C&C41 from the Vancouver Rowing Club. The tough weather first thing this morning clobbered Turicum and they are sailing without a main sail – the one that was flying is in tatters.

And the next wave of boats is rumbling to the finish in close formation. Kinetic, Passepartout and Family Affair are all together about 35 miles out and will finish together about 9:00 pm. That is if the sails hold together – they too got pummeled with the 50 kt gusts this morning and tested out their never-used storm sails. Passepartout was pleading for things to hold together for just the next 3 hours as they have very few useable sails left. 

While escaping the worst of the winds from the tropical depression this morning, the Avalon, Bedlam II and Losloper are about 350 miles out are hoping that the wind holds all the way for their expected finish on Tuesday.

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