Ellen In Trouble…: It’s always the little things. Over the weekend Ellen, sailing beautifully and up to a day ahead of Joyon as she was closing on the Roaring Forties, reported major generator troubles. The gist of it was that her primary, water-cooled generator was burning way too much oil. So she had to shut it down and move to her smaller, air-cooled gen-set, which heated the engine compartment to Hades-like temps and filled the main cabin with noxious fumes. None of this has anything to do with the actual sailing of the boat. But no generator equals no power, equals no watermaker, auotpilot, communications, etc., etc. Game over.

In typical bulldog fashion, Ellen got down to work, and by today had rigged up a better cooling and vent system for the backup generator, as well as possibly sorting out the problem with the primary generator. She and her shore team are not sure the problems are well and truly fixed, are evaluating the situation, and seem fully prepared to pull the plug, if necessary, before sending Ellen deep into the Southern Ocean. Ellen’s reaction to her seeming Do-It-Yourself success was understandable: “Feel pretty trashed, and unsettled by all this. Its going to take a while for this pain to go away. I screamed out loud when I started the generator and it [the new ventilation system] worked… I have a load of diy to finish it properly, but the principle works…” It would be a real shame if this sort of technical problem ended it all. In the meantime, she has only slept 2 hours in the last 48, and her lead over Joyon is down to just over 5 hours.

Still, she’s held her own over a part of the course that Joyon sailed extremely fast, and she’s about to get into big westerly winds and hit the Southern Ocean proper. Click here for the latest 3D course animation. And keep your fingers crossed. This record bid is too close and too interesting to end now…



“Sigh. Back in my underwear again. Man, I hope my plumber’s crack is off camera…”