Ellen MacArthur Is Off And Running…: Solo sailing siren Ellen MacArthur cast off and went sailing Sunday. Her goal: beat the solo, non-stop round-the-world record set earlier this year by Wetass hero Francis Joyon. The time to beat–72 days, 22 hours, 54 minutes–requires massive amounts of luck (Joyon had miraculous weather) and superhuman sailing. The minimum course distance is just shy of 22,000 miles, but MacArthur’s 75-foot trimaran (Joyon’s IDEC is a 90-foot trimaran) will likely sail something closer to 26,000 miles as she plays the weather systems. The average speed she’ll have to maintain through the water is about 15.38 knots. Check out Ellen’s excellent website for all the details. It’s got lots of bells and whistles–web cams, audio, video, charts–so we’ll be following this one closely. Just over a day in, Ellen has covered more than 550 miles, and is keeping pace with Joyon. The weather scenario is unfolding as predicted, with Ellen running down the east side of a high toward Portugal, where she’ll pick up the northerly winds along the backside of a low to keep dropping toward the Equator at maximum pace. So far, the hardest thing for MacArthur (who is as competitive as they come) has been to sail conservatively and refrain from piling on maximum sail. It’s a long course, and any major breakdowns will doom the attempt, so it’s critical to protect the boat. Here’s Ellen’s latest report:
“Basically, decided not to push too hard and to be conservative…sailing with one reef and the genoa at the moment. Got a lot of sleep [ie 2.5 hours!!], don’t feel great right now, but on the whole it was necessary so that’s been quite cool. Had a bit of a drama yesterday evening just before midnight the main rudder cassette kicked up and broke two of the fuses. I heard a noise, I couldn’t work out what it was, went all over the boat couldn’t see anything and this was about 2 hours previous and then there was another noise and that’s when I saw the box had kicked up. But what I think may have actually happened was that maybe in the rough stuff at the beginning, the rudder had been hit hard enough to loosen it and actually stretched the fuses a little bit and then just as we were sailing along the stretched fuses, one bust then the other one bust. I couldn’t see any marks on the rudder and I replaced them – pain in the arse job!
On latitude of Finisterre and sailing into this depression now bit windier – all on – sea getting bigger now back into strong wind. The breeze didn’t go as light as we thought it would, average speed went down overnight quite a lot – 2 hrs at 17 knots, couple at 15 knots, bit rubbish – but now we appear to be off again.
Went through ridge of the high last night. Made a conscious decision not to put the gennaker up probably would have had it up for about six hours so decided not to go without it. You know in retrospect I could have managed but with 20 knots, gusting 23 knots and averaging 17 knots speed over ground its okay. I am in a different mindset…
Expecting wind to increase quite rapidly today and tonight.”
Joyon sent MacArthur a very sporting message, wishing her well and fair winds (but not too fair, I assume). Here are some pics of her departure…
Leaving Falmouth…
Hitting The Start Line…
Reaching Into The Bay Of Biscay…
(Photos: DPPI)
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