Golden Globe 2018 - 50th Anniversary

[SeaHusky]

Every one is constantly changing course trying to find wind.
I wonder if they would have been more successful by simply holdig their heading and sailing through it?

[Norman]

When Moittessier sailed through this region, he had 360 degree shifts in a few hours time, all very light.  He was flying his large, light weight Genua, created especially for such conditions.

That is even more frustrating than becalmed, you cannot afford to take a swim or nap, there are miles to be made, but if you simply leave it to the wind vane, you may find that it is now sailing back toward the start.

With the leaders in the doldrums, Cousot is rapidly closing the gap caused by his stop.

Also interesting is that the leaders took widely different routes past the Cape Verde's, close to Africa, down the middle, just east of the islands, and west of them.  The results seem to be the same for all.

Mild criticism of the organizers, any skipper who falls out of the main event should not disappear from the leader board, they should just cross a line separating the GGRs from Chichesters and Carrozos..  If they are in an official class, recognize them, let their fans follow accurately how they are doing in comparison to the fleet.

I wonder what the organizers would do if all competitors EXCEPT the late starting Italien skipper broke and did not finish.  In the original, each vessel started at their convenient time.  We, and they, must remember that only one finished the first race, and he was by far not the fastest vessel there, nor the ruggedest.

On a very positive note, after the early troubles of many skippers, the fleet is settling down to steady progress.

Norman

[Norman]

Mark Sinclair reported that the wind boxed the compass.  Relying on the wind vane to steer would have simply sailed a circle, and a wobbly one at that.  To make any progress, the skippers must helm constantly, and re trim sails, or they may lose distance made good.  At this point, the leaders are out to the south, and making good progress.

Suzzie Goodall posted today,'Last fresh veggies today, wind at last'.  She is in 6th, and is finally out of the doldrums (unless they shift south, they are not a place, just a barometric pressure relative to the area).

I previously posted that the organizers should continue to track the skippers who downgrade to a lesser status.  I find that they do, at the top of the leader board, is a drop down menu to chose GGR or Chichester.  Why do they have a Carrozo if they are not going to track their progress against the GGR's?  Dump them completely, or fully track and compare them.  In the same vein, the progress of Suhaili is on the live tracker, based on Robin's logged positions in the original race, but not in the leader board.  Additionally,since the official vessel of the next GGR is going to be Joshua, Moittessier's vessel, they should be tracking his voyage too, as they are Suhaili's.  He was the man to beat until he passed the Falkland Islands.

Abhilash Tomy, from India, is sailing in the only wood vessel, a copy of Suhaili, created in the same region, and with the same materials as Robin's vessel.  For that he should get a positive handicap.

These should be controversial opinions, tell us what you think.  Obviously greater minds than mine made the decisions for these rules.

What do you think?

Norman

[SeaHusky]

I agree that all competitors who are still sailing should be tracked and presented equally. Why have a Chichester class if you are going to treat it as inferior? As you pointed out, before the race is over they may all be in that class.
Showing Suhali is good and sure, it would be interesting to see Montessier also but then why not show all the original boats, and then you come to the question of Donald Crowhurst...
I think the discussion may have gone along those lines when the event was planned.
I don't agree that Abhilash Tomy should be given a handicap for choosing an inferior, although very symbolic, boat but they could have made a point of comparing him against Suhali.
Regarding Crowhurst, I am not sure if it would be a fine gesture to commemorate him or if it would give the race bad publicity? One entrant realized after the first week that this was psychologically overwhelming for him which shows just how demanding such a race actually is. I attribute his ability to make this very difficult decision to his judgement as a skilled mountaineer.

[Norman]

Crowhurst quit the race, his escapades are irrelevant to the race.

I agree that Abhilash Tomy is racing against Robin, more than the rest of the fleet, but the weather in the low latitudes was mild in the original race.  Moittessier commented in his book that his trip south of Australia and New Zealand was the easiest he had ever experienced.  Hopefully, the fleet will have a similar weather pattern this race.

An interesting sidelight on the race rules, limiting the competitors to mono hull, ignores that there were several two and three hull competitors in the original race.  Just because they all failed to reach the finish line seems to be a poor reason to eliminate them from this race.  What if Crowhurst had carried off his charade successfully, and won the race?  Would the current race require multi hull for all?

I have just read Moittessier's book, and the first portion, until the opportunity to turn north to his favorite Pacific islands began to torment him, an excellent book.  From there he turned into a 60's hippie, and his moral wanderings began.  Skipping over this excuse for abandoning the race, the Appendix at the end is the most compact compendium of essential information for preparing a boat for blue water cruising that I have read.  Unfortunately, this a library book, and worse, one transferred from a different county, so I am limited as to how long I may keep it.  I would like to follow what he experienced in similar waters as the current competitors.

No, I am not interested in buying a copy, I am currently carefully decreasing the size of my library, and rather than go backwards on this endeavor, I am only reading new books from the library.

From his book, I am amazed at what a stone simple wind vane he used, with near complete satisfaction.  Without attempting to quote chapter and verse, though, his Appendix has a rosier description than my memory of his actual description of the voyage.  The difference is not really material to the performance.  The complex contrivances used today have the POSSIBILITY of more accurate steering, and easier course setting, but at a cost if you do not fully understand the adjustments required to simply make them work.  I believe he said that he broke 6 vane blades, but still had more.  That was the only fragile component, and was easily replaced.


Norman

[SeaHusky]

http://caphorn.com/en/yves-gelinas-on-self-steering/

[Norman]

One feature that I missed, the link from the tiller to the wheel in the cabin "turret" steering station used when the vane was broken, or unsuitable for the conditions.  The Apendics text seems to not count that time as hand steering, just tiller time.  Total vane steering time remains very high.

Some of this races skippers have already done more hand steering than he did in the entire sail around to the Atlantic Ocean.

A very thin piece of plywood cannot creat forces that can put a one inch pipe at risk, so it is sacrificed repeatedly, saving the rest of the system.

The clamp bolt to set the heading is a potential weak link, but apparently caused no problems.  Release the clamp, helm to desired heading, clamp, trim the sails.  Check heading, repeat if necessary, fix lunch.

[Norman]

The order behind the two leaders has changed many times that I have not seen, as the distance between many of them is small, in miles to finish, but they are far away east and west.  They pass, and are passed, completely unaware, and unrecorded in my occasional perusal of the standing on the leader board.  Goodall/Slats is an example, from last night to this morning.

There are still 12 boats racing for the GGR trophy, and the chance of variable weather driving one from the rear to the front is not small in the 40's.

  A cautious sailor who takes a route that proves to have more manageable winds and seas, versus a leader reduced to storm jib and fully reefed main in huge waves, might sail by the whole fleet.  Mark Sinclair is my dark horse pick in that category, especially as he is an Australian.

The lead remains unchanged, but the top 5 are in continuous contention.  Van Den Heede is 248 miles behind Peche,  but far east of him.

Last night Suzzie Goodall rose to 3rd, today she is 4th.  Mark Slats is just 3 miles ahead, but nearly 600 miles away, across the Atlantic, about 300 miles off Brazil.

Mark Slats in the last few days has gone from 3rd to 5th, and is back to 3rd as he sailed far west to get in favorable winds.  Peche has followed, not as far, but is now 700 miles from Brazil, with a 319 mile lead on Slats.

Moitessier also sailed nearly to Brazil to get a combination of favorable direction of wind, and more stable velocity, with a higher average but lower maximum, to make up for a greater distance.

Abhilash Tomy is now 10th, with the wooden Suhaili.

Are Wiig has dropped to 6th.

McGuckin 7th, is now sailing for Brazil, and is one of the 4 that are the furthest west, so if the winds are indeed as they were in Moitessier's time, he should rise in the standings.  The wind smooths out as it gets further from Africa, and fewer sail changes are necessary to keep the boat at its maximum performance.

Lehtinen at 8th, is in a clump of boats off the African coast, containing all the 3rd through 8th except Slats.  Will the shorter distance prove an advantage?  The wind will decide!

The synthetic Robin in Suhaili, is in the equivalent of 12th, and heading toward a route more westerly than the fleet has taken, and his present direction will take him to Slats present location.

I wonder where Moitessier's log would place him now?  I wonder if his exclusion is the penalty for failing to dash for the finish, leaving Robin to be not just the first, but the last, and only boat to arrive there?  A race with out a second place finisher looses its luster.

[Norman]

Update on some technical topics.

In an earlier post, I wondered why the GGR did not include AIS in their safety package.  In fact, they did, plus a radar transponder with alarm.  I am now wondering why a skipper had to go hard over on his tiller for a large cargo ship coming up behind him.  Perhaps he expected that they would, as the regulations require, change course to give him a wide berth, and they either did not see him, or felt that 100 feet was sufficient.  They may also have passed close enough to get a good look at his boat, out of curiosity.

Note that the HYDROVANE is a sponsor, but many of the competitors are not using it.  The text quoted here is from a promotional piece, not the rules.  The point being made was that the additional equipment cost if you already had a suitable boat was low.

So how much then for the EXTRA safety and GGR gear which any sensible solo circumnavigating would want to carry anyway. Life raft, survivor 06 hand desalinator , 3 EPIRBS, Two PLB's, AIS beacon, AIS alarm, Radar Transponder-alarm, SART, 3 x YB3 satellite trackers and texting, serious First aid kit and 24 hour medical cover, 2 satellite phones, 2 x HH GPS, Solas Life jacket, GGR survival suit, HF SSB radio and tuner, four VHF marine/aviation/GMDSS radios, RDF, liability insurance and misc bits and a HYDROVANE wind vane, approx EURO $20,000! That's it.



22 radio's in all, of one purpose or another, is quite an electronics package, and the redundancy is impressive.

[Bubba the Pirate]

Thanks for the gear list; interesting to peruse.

[Norman]

Hi Bubba, glad you are enjoying the race.

And now there are 13!

Istvan Kopar requested a review of his sat phone call and port entry, where he only anchored to deal with the wind vane.  He received no advantage from either, no outside assistance occurred.  He has been assessed a total penalty of 24 hours, and returned to the GGR leader board.  A very fair treatment.

He did succeeded in repairing his wind vane, and is now making good progress.

I think that the committee is aware that loosing a competitor this early in the race over a trivial issue could prove very bad later, if too many entrants have troubles that cannot be overcome, and must drop out.  As I have previously pointed out, the worst race end would be if the first, and last boat finishing were the same boat.  Keeping as many entrants as possible increases the odds of avoiding that outcome.  Really, they are now down to 13, one entrant above half the intended maximum fleet, 25, and before restoring him, 12,  one below that magic number.

There can be little doubt that there will be unavoidable retirements south of Australia and New Zealand.  The challenges to both man and machine there are often severe to the extreme.

  Norman

[SeaHusky]

About the constant shifts on the leader board, I read a comment from the organizers that the boats positions are measured as a distance to a waypoint somewhere south of Africa toward which the boats are not heading so the leader board is currently not true to actual placement.

On another topic, the Swedish sailor Anders Eriksson participating in "Longue route" on his OR 40 "Malala" has decided to abandon the race. He has for many years had a dodgy shoulder which has not been a problem until now. While changing sails up on deck in large seas an overhaul made him lose his balance and his shoulder prevented the reflexive grab of the hand rail resulting in a fall. He did not hurt himself but realised that continuing would not be safe. After buying the boat and three years of preparation that was not an easy decision to make. He says that his voyage is now a pleasure cruise to Brazil.

[Bubba the Pirate]

Norman, I agree with your assessment. I think it was a fair penalty and I think the organizers were wise to keep him in the race.

I don't remember RKJ discussing Moitessier's choice to sail on in his own book about the race, A World of My Own. I suppose he was right to focus on his own victory. I'm just curious to know his thoughts at the time. He can be an irascible guy, but then again -- he won it. Not much else to worry about.

SeaHusky - that's a curious. At one point I thought I was looking at an estimated finish time. I didn't pay much attention; I'll have to look again.

[Norman]

There are two confusing items in the calculation of place in the race.  They take the staight line distance to the Cape of Good Hope check point.

The wind in the South Atlantic flows in a counter clockwise direction, highest velocity furthest from the center.  Thus, along the African coast, you are nearest the turning point, beating to windward.  The fastest route is across to Brazil, south, then west to Good Hope.  It is a little like going through town with 30 mile limits, or around on the bypass, with 60 mile limits.  Even if the difference is twice as far, if the through town trip has one stop light, you loose.

Mark Slats went west earliest, and farthest, falling from 3rd to 8th, but he may really be in the fast lane compared to all the rest.

Peche has just dropped out of the lead, for the first time, but he has headed further to the west than the new leader, and now is the second furthest west.

Jean Luc van den Heede, the new leader, may not hold the lead long, unless there is a variation in the weather pattern (could such a thing happen?), and he finds he has as much wind as they, and in the right direction.

Gregor is following Mark Slats, and is the dark horse here, as if the wind is really good next to Brazil, he may wind up with only Mark ahead of him.  That is unlikely, but worth the gamble.

Suhaili is pointed toward Brazil as well, set to take the traditional windjammer route.  Joshua did the same 50 years ago.

Who knows what will become of the flotilla of boats following the coast?

Norman

[Norman]

PS Mark Slats is the only boat to sail more than 4000 miles so far.  Technically, that makes him the fastest!  He is finding the best wind.  Or could that be the miles he rowed in the doldrums?

Jean Luc Van Den Heede has the second most miles sailed, just a trifle ahead of Peche.

Norman

[Norman]

I just spent some time with Bowditch, issue #9.  previous owner bought it in 1962, Daniel Gearhart.  Before that a smudged Scandinavian name, and date 1952.  Date of publication, unknown, for some reason, the page where such would normally be found has all data except the date of publication.

The main point of interest was the wind chapter, and specifically the trade wind charts and text.  It seems a bit like cheating to turn on the wind overlay to see what is actually happening, rather than use the sources that the competitors themselves are using, albeit on a much smaller scale than they use.  The text warns that the standard flows are often distorted by shifting lows and highs, and substantial variability in actual velocity in a particular place and time will be experienced.

This is obviously true, as the competitors speed indicates that they are experiencing variations, with in particular Mark slats in an area that should have the best combination of velocity and direction, as found in #9, but is under performing the last several times I checked.  On the other hand, he continues to have the fastest boat speed of them all.  He has turned more to the east, and time will tell which route is indeed faster.

The ghost of Suhaili is far behind them all, and is now headed to the S.  I have RKJ's book, and today read up to his crossing of the equator,so I am ahead of the location of the ghost.

Other than Susie losing her spinnaker pole to the ocean, the fleet is progressing with little trouble, and passing one another while many miles, even hundreds of miles apart.  Not many days south of them, there is developing an area of winds that will tax them severely, but that is beyond there awareness. Their barometer may be hinting, though.

RKJ, in this initial leg of the journey, completed quite a bit of repairs and tuning of his rig, even caulking two seams of his garboard strake, which were leaking badly.  The doldrums have their value.  At the time of this posting, he had the astonishing speed of 10.1 knots!

There should not be much excitement until the racers approach the next check point near the Cape of Good Hope.  There the true lead will become clear.

The positions, miles behind, and miles traveled for those past 4000
Van Den Heede      0     4385
Peche                   53    4347
Randmaa             354    4012
Wiig                     402    4086
Lehtinen               432
Goodall                 442   4105
Zeretsky                610
McGuckin               821   4242
Tome Suhaili copy  859   4076
Lepage                  904
Slats                      925   4425
Sinclair                 1029
Kopar                   1142
Suhaili's ghost          ?not shown n the chart?

As you can see, the miles sailed do not make a leader, but the leaders do have nearly the highest miles sailed.  Randmaa in particular has high efficiency in his sailing as seen from the ratio of miles sailed and distance behind.

Norman

[Norman]

Half a century ago, I had 4 year old, and 2 year old sons, and I do not remember following this race.  The news was on the Vietnam war, constantly, and this race would not have been mentioned in this country most weeks, let alone days. Communications with the racers was sparse, so little was really known even in England or France.

Present day news is not too much different, if Kurt had not posted the link, would we be following the Golden Globe Race?  The link he posted does not go to the best part of the site any more, and I use   https://goldengloberace.com/  which works better.

The live track is here   https://goldengloberace.com/livetracker/   .

The positions, miles behind, and miles traveled for those past 4000
The last 2 columns are the position and miles behind a day later

1  Van Den Heede        0     4385       1        0
2  Peche                     -53    4347       2     -38
3  Randmaa               -354    4012      4    -450
4  Wiig                     - 402    4086       5    -442
5  Lehtinen                -432                  3    -435
6  Goodall                 - 442   4105       7
7  Zeretsky               - 610                  6
8  McGuckin                -821   4242     10
9  Tome Suhaili copy   -859   4076       9
10 Lepage                  -904                 8
11 Slats                     - 925   4425     12
12 Sinclair                 -1029               13    -1158
13 Kopar                   -1142               11
14 Suhaili's ghost          ?Miles not shown n the chart?

Nine changes of position in the last 24 hours!

Peche had a 122 mile run, and closed on the leader.
Randmaa, just 42 miles, and slid back from 2nd to 3rd.
Wiig was also in some poor wind, just 35 miles made good, and slid a position too.
Lehtinen did 89 miles, and rose 2 places.
Zaretsky and Goodall changed places.
Slats, 24 miles and McGuckin, -5, are obviously in the wrong place, and both dropped back.
Kopar had a 116 mile run, and moved up 2 places.

Clearly, no one is in a position where they can be confident of their standing, the wind is still the deciding factor, followed by choice of route.

Sinclair is falling further behind, but his cautious sailing may prove to be valuable when he reaches the 40's south of Australia, or else "caution never wins races", and he is just out of the running.  Time and weather will tell.

Suhaili's ghost only updates at erratic intervals, five so far, so we do not know if it is currently gaining, but that last segment at an average 10.1 knot, if repeated, will put it right up with the fleet.  No one this year is even putting in a single day at that rate, 242 miles a day, and he averaged it.

It seems strange to me that 2 boats have had broken halyards this early in the race, could they have started with their old ones, expecting to replace them before reaching the roaring forties?  I believe that I remember Moittessier doing that.

[Bubba the Pirate]

Aaarrrrgh!!  My hank-on hero has dropped out of the GGR class.

https://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/2018/08/11/golden-globe-disaster-philippe-peche/

[SeaHusky]

Bummer!
I guess that he was tired, stressed and didn't realize what making a call to his support would entail.
It's 41 days now and according to the organizers the weekly calls have started to reveal mental stress on the sailors. Some seem to question their reasons for doing this adventure but they also said that Susie Goodall was "doing it for all the right reasons" and Are Wiig and captain Coconut were "having a ball"!

[Bubba the Pirate]

Further on in the article it says his tiller broke. He had already used the spares to repair his windvane and therefore could not fix his tiller.

They say he called his partner and then Race Officials. I imagine he called home first to say he was out. Now he's lying ahull in the Southern Atlantic; not where I'd want to do that!!