Pacific Cup Update, Days 3 and 4: Spinnaker woes…

Our J World Team continues across the Pacific, bound for Hawaii, in the 2008 Pacific Cup. Good mileage was ticked off on Friday, and into the evening as solid broad reaching conditions in 18-24 knots continued. Unfortunately, spinnaker wows plagued us after dark, and we were forced to drop the chute near midnight.

In the morning radio check in, we found that reducing sail area at night had certainly cost us relative to some of our competition… but we got the kite up again in the morning, and had a brilliant day. It’s been nice broad reaching in 16-22 knots, with the wind starting to veer a bit and drive us more westward than southward. A fabulous Beef Stroganoff dinner (with sides of beef jerky and Pringles), and we were sailing into the night… but alas, the combination of darkness and spinnaker continues to be our nemesis, and about 1am we blew up our spinnaker. We got her down in a couple of big pieces, so we’ll take a look in the morning to see what can be done, but for now we are back to jib reaching. Time to let everyone get some much needed rest, and get charged for their next round!