A turn for the better
09:00, 09 July 2003
by Tim Hedges

Having virtually stopped for a couple of days, Jersey’s offering to Neptune yesterday obviously did the trick as they are currently making the highest average speed in the fleet, covering 106 miles in the last 12 hours, though their 24 hour run is a little behind rivals Bristol who managed 3 miles more with a run of 191. In fact the runs throughout the fleet indicate that the wind advantage held by the northern group has now faded. Roger Steven-Jennings and the Cape Town crew continue to do well, only marginally slower than Bristol with a run of 189 miles, but first placed New York have only managed 177. Meanwhile in the south Glasgow has achieved 183 miles and Hong Kong a respectable 176. Liverpool sailed 173 miles, but managed 101 of those in the last 12 hours, so sits just behind Bristol on current average speed. Only London have missed out with Rory and the crew managing a 24 hour run of only 163 miles, despite their position in the middle of the fleet. We should not feel too sorry for them however as that is still 100 miles more than that covered by some boats a few days ago.

Duty Skipper Adam Kyffin had been experiencing some technical problems with his SSB radio, so asked Hong Kong Skipper Justin Taylor to relay the 1500 positions for him yesterday. With advice from the race office he then passed the duty to Glasgow’s Rupert Parkhouse for this morning’s report. The ability of the Skippers to help each other out in the midst of tight competition is one of the great things about the culture of the Clipper Race. The only problem was that somehow the message did not get through to Rupert who was somewhat surprised to be woken in the early hours with the happy news by watch leader Mark Dence. Rupert coped admirably and had soon rattled off the positions to Race HQ, but not surprisingly he didn’t send much news from the fleet. This also probably indicates that life on board is progressing as normal and that the crews are going about their normal watch keeping race duties with little untoward to report.

With the fleet having all now sailed more than 360 degrees from the start line, it is easy to feel that they are on the homeward stretch, yet with around 10,000 miles still to sail this is far from the case. Apart from the miles left to reach the finish in Brazil, the fleet still have to face the frustrations of the Doldrums, the heat of the equator and another Atlantic crossing before returning to the delights of the English Channel and the Irish Sea in September. The race is far from over, and the crews on board will be acutely aware of this.

Source: Clipper 2002/2003 Round The World Race Official Site