18 to 21 Jan
Prior to planned race start we loaded 50 15 litre cooler bottles of water onboard as the watermaker had not been repaired.On the Saturday morning it was announced that the new watermakers were arriving and start would be delayed until Monday.
We still had a slipping of lines ceremony and did the parade of sail, and then did a refresher sail which very useful for the joining crew.
Monday we then motored to hydrographer’s passage.
Once outside the reef the breeze had dropped and the decision was there was not enough wind to start the race.The fleet had gathered in a circle and almost all the fleet went in for a swim.
We then motored overnight and gathered the next morning for race start. This would be a Le Mans start a clipper invention. All boats line up ,with mainsail only up ,motoring at a set speed and course and with 4 minutes to go all crew are behind forward pedestal grinder. At 1 min to go the engine is cut. On start crew go forward and hoist headsails.
We had drawn the windward position and our start went well. Light winds were the order of the day.
Qingdao eventually crossed ahead ,but after a couple of tacks we were back ahead of both them and Punta.As for Korea on the other side of the course, time will tell.