GOLD COAST 120600ZFEB12 SKED

LAT 13 35.3N
LONG 116 40.9E
DTW 553nm
DTF 1355nm
ETA 0600z 21 Feb 12

WEATHER WIND 055@20kts, Sea Rough 1m, Swell NE 2m, Cloud Cl, Cs, Ci, Baro 1011.6

It has been a very challenging 24 hours for Gold Coast Australia filled with fishing vessels, nets, lines, changing wind
strengths, and shifting wind direction and the crew and me are starting to show the signs of fatigue. Boat speed for Gold
Coast Australia still remains a concern and the boat is not performing in her usual way increasing my suspicion that we may have a net caught on our underwater appendages.

Last night I was called on deck to find a line of strobe lights as far as the eye could see. Knowing that is was most likely
marking a drift net on the surface we were forced to tack and sail along the net. I spun back down below to call DLL on the
VHF who were by this stage sailing straight into the net then returned on deck to tack around the end of the net some 3nm
off our previous course. I presume DLL managed to sail around the other side of the net. Generally the presence of drift
nets and fishing lines are not incorporated into sailing races, and rather than see a fellow competitor get caught up.

GRIB files that show the predicted wind patterns are emailed to us daily and no other sources of information are allowed.
The GRIB seem to be constantly changing in this location and forever unreliable making tactics difficult. I always like to
look ahead to where I want the boat to be in three days time, however when the weather conditions are changing so fast with the monsoon it makes it very hard to predict.

This in the early hours of this morning I was predicting the wind to veer and allow us to tack to the north with the
assistance of a current eddie. The wind however had other ideas and as the morning went on we continued to lift higher and
higher on port tack taking us further and further east away from our rhumb line and away from the current system that we had
observed and wanted to be in. Finally the wind veered far enough to the NE for us to contemplate a tack, and we did so but
only making a course of 340T. DLL who were sailing to the south of us carried on to the east. At mid morning the wind
dropped out altogether and then backed around to the NW (despite the GRIB showing a predicted NE 20kts). We changed sails
to our Y1 and were just about to put the Y2 below when the wind picked back up and veered 70 degrees to the ENE and we
tacked back to the north. Finally the shift that we had been waiting for since midnight came which will hopefully put us in good stead for regaining our lead from Geraldton who are 20nm to the NW.

The ever changing conditions that consist of clouds, wind, sea, swell, current etc make it very hard for the crew who have
little racing or sailing experience to get a feel for the boat and to work out the best way to trim and steer. It is very
hard to explain to people who are relatively inexperienced for such conditions how to sail the boat by feel and the
different ways of trimming depending on the conditions and tactics. I will often wake up in my bunk because the boat does
not feel right, check the instruments then poke my head back up on deck for some instruction but there is so much
information to take in. The hardest job for a skipper is to transfer his skills to the crew and teach them as much as
possible but there is just so much to teach and learn and learning becomes a lot harder when levels of fatigue are increased
due to rough conditions. Imagine giving a physics, maths, geography, meteorology and PE lesson all in one to a class full
of sleepy students. The crew are doing a fantastic job and remain devoted to racing the boat hard and learning as much as
possible in these challenging conditions. I admire the level of knowledge the crew have built up in such a short amount of
time and their thirst for knowledge and just wish that I was a better teacher. Who would have thought teaching skills could be one of the most valuable asset in a race around the world!

We are now sailing north at 010T with a slight lead on DLL and hopefully with the wind we are currently sailing in we are
making some big ground on Geraldton though this will not be known until the next Sked (skeds with yachts positions are
received every 6 hours). As we sail north we sail away form the unpredictable monsoon weather and hopefully into some more
stable and predictable weather that will support our tactics further into the race as we head towards our next waypoint and the start of the speed gate adjacent to Taiwan.