8 days of training, plus days of work to get the boat ready, and put her away, are coming to an end. Most of the crew are now on their way home, and tired muscles are getting a well earned rest. This was a great training session – steady trade winds, warm blue seas, and a crew ready to learn. The data gathering all week, and number crunching every evening, is fine tuning the driving and sail selection so we can always have the optimum sail choice, and be driving in the most efficient manner. We just need a race now to test it all out! The shore team as always had a fabulous time and are looking forward to the next gathering.

Well after 4 days of training we’re still on the learning curve, very focussed on driving the boat to its theoretical speed (targets), and it’s not easy. The data collection team is analysing our performance for the evening debrief – not intimidating at all. Life jackets all tested last night, and the boat tuning each day is delivering results. We have such great knowledge and experience on the boat, we’re lucky as a team to learn from such great sailors. So ready for the evening feedback session now, hopefully no one noticed my screw ups today…

And what a race that was! A lighter than normal race – winds averaging 10 rather than 20 knots, made this a challenge of endurance as well as sailing – at the prize-giving event there were still 15 boats on the race course. For us losing electronics was a challenge to overcome – so we sailed with our heads focussed on wind and waves, not distracted by computer predictions nor readouts of all the data from the various sensors on the boat.

After 3 days and 11 hours of hiking, sail changes, trimming, tacking and gybing, we crossed the finish line in the dark and headed to the dock, to be met by the shore support team and cold refreshments. Quickly packing the boat away it was back to the house for a pasta supper and sleeping in a bed rather than on the floor or a pile of sails.

Today was spent cleaning the boat, packing racing sails, and generally starting to get the boat put away ready for the next adventure. The power problem was sorted out now we had access to spares, so we’re ready to go racing again.

We ended up 7th out of 17 in the IRC Zero division (the biggest and fastest boats), which considering our challenge, was a very positive result.

So time to relax as a crew with the prize-giving, then onto dinner and plenty of stories, and good times. Flying out has started, and now time to sign off this blog. Next up Les Voiles de St. Barths in April.