2000 – 2001
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Pacific Cup Updates
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July 22, 2000 |
San Francisco, CA |
Rage update 7-22 10:14pdt
Position: 21 47N 153 28W
About one more day to go aboard the good ship Rage. After a frustrating night of lightening winds, Pegasus put another good 20 miles on us. It appears we can hang with them in real light, or windy conditions, but they are pretty invincible in moderate air. This would be the logical result of having a 6ft longer spin pole than ours, and 6-8ft more rig height. Their max spinnakers are probably nearly 1,000sq ft larger than even our “Whomper”! Speaking of our favorite sail, it is getting the tack ring rewebbed on by our resident sailmaker, Bill Colombo. In the last fire drill, the shackles hooked to tack were not quite right and wore through the webbing that holds the ring to the sail. So as you can imagine, at about 3am in the morning there was another loud bang and we had to rescue yet again. We are getting really good at this now, it didn’t even get wet.
Amazingly, this time Campbell slept through the entire procedure, dead to the world. Yesterday Steve found out he wasn’t drinking much water so he made him start guzzeling. After being rehydrated and the long nap, the kid is back in form.
Got to go, Bill has the kite ready to go! Down with old backup and up with our fav.
Fighting to the end!!!
The Warship Wocket,
Rage
PS: Whomper flies again! The pedal stays on the floor till the bar in Kanehoe!/font>
Rage report 7-12 4:38 pdt
Position: 22 21N 154 54W
Speed: Steady 13-17kts
170 miles to go to the finish in Kanehoe. Of course that is as the crow flies, we still have a jibe or three to go. The wind is back and we are hauling. Pegasus has a 50-60 mile lead as far as we know. We have the radio on to listen for their 100 mile to go check in.
Unless they break something they will get first to finish, but it turns out we have an unexpected reason to hurry in. According to projections, we have a shot at first overall on handicap for the race! This is something we never expected as usually Rage gets killed on handicap. But we have sailed a good race and have a chance.
Pegasus owes us about 10 hours, so we are really interested in when they hit 100 miles to go. Now that the wind is up, we hope to close in enough to make them nervous.
It is stinking hot. After a 1/2 hr of grinding away with my favorite Titan Carbon winch handle, I was completely drenched in sweat. We sort of have a grinding contest to see who never has to use low gear (on a 4,000 sq ft kite!). I will win. In the attached pic I was just warming up.
Ragin to the finish,
Bruce
Special thanks to our Pacific Cup Sponsors!:
Doyle Sails Alameda: Official Supplier of sails to Made in America
Titan winch handles: Makers of the superlight “Viper” carbon winch handles
Forespar Mfg: Makers of our badass 32ft “Turbo” spinnaker pole
Samson Cordage: Suppliers of “Amsteel Blue” running rigging, the strongest and most durable line
MAS Epoxies: Suppliers of Epoxy resin to Made in America
Nobeltec: Providing World-Wide charting software to Made in America
Complete Cruising Solutions:
Waypoint: Knowledgable dealers of Navigation and Weather software, charts, and books
HF Radio on Board: Experts in Marine Communication