Boracay in the lead

An update from the China Sea Race

The Pink Paradise couldn't have done any better - the China Sea Race fleet have had a very frustrating 10 hours parked just south of Pratas Reef in light breeze, with Boracay holding on to a slender 17nm lead over Jelik. Jelik, in common with Mandrake and Siren seems to have gambled on taking a route north of the rhum line, however it has yet to pay off, with the IRC B Division hot on the heels of the front runners after 200nm of sailing.

Premier Cruising and HKPN Divisions have also stayed with the pack, however the breeze has filled in to the 11 knot northeasterly promised by Hong Kong Observatory and the competition should hot up overnight. Not expecting to reach Subic Bay before the rest of the fleet is Mikhailov Alexey's Farr 43 Carrera, which finally left Victoria Harbour this afternoon after some hasty repairs and re-provisioning.

For the first time, the entire fleet is carrying DMR 200 units supplied by SkyWave and powered by Purplefinder technology. Notwithstanding some minor glitches with auto-tracking, the system today proved how valuable it could be even in the case of a false alarm. When an EPIRB signal was received from yacht Soko, RHKYC had the facility to poll her DMR 200 remotely, thus confirming her location and also which boats were in close proximity, should assistance be required. Fortunately the signal in this case was due to equipment malfunction, however the incident showed that the safety of a racing fleet can benefit greatly from today's satellite technology.