Brian Thompson's PlayStation diary - 6/1/01

The British PlayStation watch captain reflects on their setback

It's just turning dark and PlayStation is crashing along on starboard tack, 30 knots of wind, two reefs and the storm jib. The seas are 15 foot and the rain squalls are coming through every 15 minutes - it's great sailing, and it's only going to get better tonight as the wind moves aft with the cold front moving through. We have just passed Polpharma so we have eased into fourth place, about 360 nm behind the current leader Innovation Explorer.
There have been some interesting navigational choices made by the three leaders, Team Adventure having made a bold move to the west and Club Med playing the middle. We never expected to be this far back at this stage in the event, but considering we had to make a 48 hour pit-stop in Gibraltar and were slowed by damaged sails on our leg to there from Barcelona, we have gotten off lightly ... It won't be often on The Race that the cats will do such a short 48 hour run.

To get you up to date with us, let's recap the start - what an event for all of us, thousands on the docks, hundreds of spectator boats on the course with five huge cats and perfect weather. It was magic ... we had a conservative start protecting our new and untried battens with the first reef in place, and were not surprised to be off the pace on the round the cans course.

But once we got into the long tack through the Balearics we had good speed with the fleet, holding on to Team Adventure and gaining on the others. At ten that night we blew the head off our new solent jib, had to stop and take the sail down, and begin a lot of handsewing led by our sailmakers Nick Moloney and Stu Wilson.

So for the rest of the trip we were down to the staysail and were underpowered much of the time. We hung on to Club Med and Innovation Explorer for most of the next day, but Team Adventure sailed a great leg, tactically and with their hard driving style they got away from all of us.

Then 60 miles from Gibraltar, with one reef in the main and the usual staysail, the clew patch parted company from the rest of the main and we were down to the second reef. And that's the way we were to Gibraltar - fortunately our shore team did a great job getting our old sails down from Barcelona and we had a couple of busy days getting them transferred. We left exactly 48 hours later, doing a Le Mans start, full throttle out to the starting area, main being sneaked up whilst we were still on the dock.

Clearly our chances of winning this Race are reduced now, but it's a big planet and we can make these miles back, the entire crew are realistic about the challenge ahead but are full of enthusiasm for it, no one was despondent about the setback. We are all committed to sailing intelligently and making gains where we can. I really think we have a superb team, and that doesn't show more than when confronted by adversity.

So back to the deck now, on with the life harness and goggles, and let's hope we can start reaching tonight, for the first time since the start!