23.11.2008
Cheminées Poujoulat in the Doldrums
Bernard Stamm passed Norbert Sedlacek last night and is now less than 200
miles behind his next target, Great American III helmed by Rich Wilson. At
the 1600 hour ranking, Cheminées Poujoulat was continuing to make up miles
on the whole fleet and on his way south was still being slowed by the
Doldrums, a zone he entered last night.
Message from on board: “The fun and games began a little earlier and a bit
further north than forecast, but they have certainly started. The first
squall kicked in early on in the night and as there’s no moon anymore, I
didn’t really see it coming. I felt something strange in the air and when I
switched on the radar, the squall had already kicked in. I sailed into it
under full indexsail and large gennaker, but fortunately the wind didn’t
exceed 30 knots. It lasted a good half hour, with driving rain and
lightning. Then the wind shifted round 120° before gradually going back to
how it was before the squall, namely sailing downwind in 15 knots of breeze.
Soon after that another squall emerged but, in that instance, I was able to
take the time to set the solent and roll in the gennaker. This proved to be
a good move because since then I’ve been sailing close on the wind in 15-20
knots of breeze through the rain and I’m making the course I wanted. The new
day is about to dawn and I’ll finally be able to see what it looks like, try
to sort myself out and sleep a little if I can. On a positive note, the wind
is still blowing.” Bernard Stamm is afraid the Doldrums is fairly spread out
and whilst he’s having to tackle the calm section, he’s also dreading that
the zone will drop south with him. “For the time being I haven’t had any
calm spells, quite the contrary in fact: for three to four hours I’ve had
15-20 knots of S to SE’ly, with 30-35 knot squalls. If I’m lucky the
frontrunners may have complicated weather, but my priority right now is
escaping the Doldrums, which I began to suffer the effects of at 10° N!”.
Indeed, generally the Doldrums is situated at around 5 or 6° north. At 1600
hours Cheminées Poujoulat was still racking up a good average speed of 10
knots, as has been the case since the 1100 hour ranking.
Translated by Kate Jennings – Expression
|
