For days now we’ve been stalked by a monster of a front that has been whirling through the GOR fleet as a ball of spiky red wind barbs. With the system on final approach, Sam and I decided to go for broke to consolidate our lead over the Fields. We ran deep through puffy 45+ knot squalls and positioned ourselves in the path of the beast. It might not be evident that sustained 35kts was an opportunity to attack, but we figured that if we could keep our foot on the loud pedal and stay ahead of the worst of it, then we could play the edge of the front and skim off as much wind as we wanted We still kept the door open to bail out to the north if things got too frisky.

As the wind built this morning we changed down from our A6 spinnaker made for VMG running in heavy conditions to the Code 5 fractional gennaker. Its also called a chicken chute, so what better for playing chicken with southern ocean front?! The sky stayed blue and the white caps sparkled, before being blown into the air as the wind built and stayed at 35 kts. We were fully pressed but still able to maintain control at 120-130 true wind angle and played the waves to surf for extra speed. Sam and I both saw 26kts of boat speed on the dial, and it always shows less than the GPS….

I found that the best way through the waves was not to surf down the face like normal but to carve down the troughs, at an angle to the waves so as to find the longest patch of smooth water as possible. I likened it to snowboarding down a half pipe, trying to get as lengthways as possible rather than criss crossing from lip to lip.

However, it was not all easy going. Halvard’s ruminations on the force presented by a mass of water brought home personally. We graduated up from the droplet- bricks of spray of previous days to walls of water rushing down the decks. After one altercation with a wave I was bodily picked up and deposited, spread eagled on my back on top of the life raft, two meters from where I had been helming. I was able to regain control but it was an eye opening experience and a warning taken to heart. As proof that sometimes the great lessons in life need to learned twice, Sam was later pushed off the helm and thrown into the sail stack on the back of the boat.

Given the water play I wasn’t too sad that we eventually out ran the stronger pressure and the wind dropped to a more sedate mid 20s. This wild ride will be just a memory in a couple of days as we are approaching a well established anticyclone in the Tasman Sea, and a tricky call as to which coast of the South Island to take to get to Wellington. Wish us well on the Cessna Citation flying boat.