19.08.07 Here are my previous comments on Fastnet preparation

Event Date: 12th Aug 2007
Team Members: James Hope-Lang, Alisdair Pearson, David Scott, Katie Gibson, Daniel Roswell, John Kinchin, Terry Driscoll, Peter Brown, Melanie Cole, Catherine Strange, Andy Sharples, Keith Wall

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You may have only heard the title of the race. It is in August and lasts for up to five days over a 608 nautical mile course, including difficult tidal currents and changeable weather conditions. There will be over 200 yachts in the race, which goes west down the Solent (by the Isle of Wight and Southampton), then all the way to Lands End and the Scilly Isles, before finishing at Plymouth.This promises to be great fun. I've decided to treat it as a holiday, so it will be in my own time. It is a gamble, because it is expensive. The expenses of hiring the boat and entering the race are high, and we have to take part in two other races, on 13th to 15th July and 28th to 29th July, in order to prepare for the Fastnet, but I hope it will be worth the trouble. I have paid for the trip myself, so that any money raised will go directly to the Charity.
Monday 13.07.07 I just got back from the weekend's race and feel as though I have been 15 rounds with Mike Tyson! I am battered and blue and have a fair selection of cuts, together with worse sunburn than I have ever had.
We sailed to St Malo in France, but owing to bad weather (too much sunshine and not enough wind) we arrived late, probably in keeping with many other competitors. Ironically, we also had the other sort of bad weather, storms and rough seas, hence the battering that we all suffered. Unfortunately, bad seas slow you down almost as much as calm seas, because you have to keep climbing over waves.
The worst part, and I really can't remember what time of night or where we were, was one particular watch when everything seemed to go wrong. First of all, the rope operating the furling drum for the foresail (the triangular sale at the front of the boat) got jammed. Then another pulley got jammed under a hatch cover. Later, a rope became loose (very dangerous, as winds exert enormous pressure on loose ropes ; they flap about like 1-inch whips, and it's no joke); it wound itself round a winch. Efforts to fix these problems are really tricky manoeuvres in the dark in rough seas. All you can do is try to point the boat in the right direction, so that it doesn't pitch sideways as well as up and down. Then you have to remember which rope does which job (difficult anyway when one is colourblind). This really challenges you, when you're a novice sailor and the boat is quite new to you, as each boat is different. It's not surprising that you hear about people falling overboard. Do not worry; we tie ourselves on to the boat all the time at night or in rough weather.
Because of the time, we could not get into the harbour in St Malo, as the marina is protected in times of low tide. Therefore, we just turned round and headed for home via Alderney, which is lovely (and missed the Bastille Day party!!), but lost wind again. In the end we motored most of the way, which was a sad end to a lovely weekend sailing.
27.7.07 Well! We lost a captain, but gained a cook. Andy, do you yet realise how much we eat?! James has stepped in to replace Alan Morgan, who sadly had to step down. James is a good skipper, and our sense of loss is further mitigated by Andy's arrival.
Monday 30.07.07 Well, this is the second update of our testing for the Fastnet race. We did much better this week than in the previous race, but still did not finish in a good position. Unfortunately a block on the boat broke and left us without the use of our foresail for a long period of the night and Sunday morning. This meant that we were limping along on a staysail and mainsail, which do not give anything like the same amount of power to the boat.
Come daylight, we were able to assess the damage, but even then we had to wait for a heavy swell to subside before we were able to repair it. The amount of time lost was enormous, because we were swept along by a strong wind away from a buoy, which we had been about to pass, and when we recovered the situation, we had lost about eight miles. We had to go back against the wind and the heavy swell, to sail around the buoy, and this cost us four hours. The rest of the time lost was down to sailing at only half speed.
Would you believe it, just as we approached the finishing line, a small catamaran turned over in front of us ... 34 tons vs a couple of hundredweight, I suppose ... I don't know what he was planning, cutting in front of us, but our helmsman swerved, throwing us all off balance (we were ready to go past the marshall's boat in style). Not a dignified end to the race. Still, we have one more practice and then the big race on 12th August. Fingers crossed that all our problems are behind us!
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Fastnet race 2007
18.08.07 Here's my immediate impression of the race:

The start was hairy, as the previous races were gentlemanly by comparison. Here, it was every man or woman for himself. There were 12 on our boat (and then there were ...) ... we had injuries, but it's a good thing we did, or we might have carried on and got caught out. Four others at least were sick.

I had heard about the expected weather but was trying to be upbeat. Actually, we think we might have finished if they hadn't postponed the race, as we'd have been into the Irish Sea and well on the way before the worst weather, and then we'd have run before it coming back. So much for the plan! The postponement was to protect the smaller boats, which had the desired effect, so no complaints. The stat's speak for themselves: 300 in race, 29 didn't start, 46 finished and 5 still to finish, so 220 retired.

It was pretty scary at night when we did meet the storm, I must admit. Bigger and better boats than ours gave up, so we weren’t ashamed to live and sail another day. As for the couple of hospital cases, one has a damaged cruciate ligament, but it didn't stop him coming back to meet us as we returned to Gosport yesterday. The other sailed again with a sore head ("heads" in a boat are the toilets, but this one was his bonce!). We had another head injury, but not a hospital case. Most others were sick; even the captain caught a bug after the retirement (I was one of the lucky ones ... just a few bruises and tired), so pretty unpleasant and not a good basis for facing more storms. There were 60 boats already in Plymouth (great fireworks, by the way) as we arrived and more coming in every few minutes. You've never seen so many boats like sardines in a can. If you were first in, tough!! Could take days to escape.

We got shaken out of bed on Wednesday and thrown off our mooring to make way for the race leader. At least we weren't hung over like the crew of the adjacent yacht. Cheek! Because of the tight space, the harbour master said he would control our bow away from the pontoon, but he messed it up and then the bow caught the wind and nearly demolished three or four exposed sterns. Pretty bad. Skipper less than pleased, as the force pushed the back end to about 6 inches from a pricey racing boat!

We followed that up by getting a mooring line round wound the propeller as we left a buoy. Actually, I didn’t see what happened, but think the watch leader was careless with it … it was on the bow, for goodness sake, so shouldn't even have reached the propeller! It cost all Wednesday to find a diver to clear the line, so we sailed overnight, despite our previous decision not to.

We came back via Guernsey just for fun, and had a great run up until we countered strong tides off the IOW, our only mis-calculation of the week.

While writing, here is a web site for photos: There are some good photos: www.photoaction.com; this chap sails around the world to various regattas and takes photos from a tiny rib. The photos are searchable by yacht name (L'Isme), and the last one shows just how close the encounters were.

We got into the Plymouth Evening Herald: James Hope-Lang is our captain. I've reproduced the text at the end of this update.

In case you don't know, our team blog is http://www.benfastnet2007.com/blog/ and gives our impression as things happened.

All the best, Keith


FASTNET FIASCO
1 reader has commented on this story. Click here to read their views.
TRISTAN NICHOLS MARITIME REPORTER

06:50 - 15 August 2007

At least four people were taken to hospital within the first 24 hours of the Fastnet Race - with more than half of the fleet choosing to retire. 'Horrific' weather conditions including heavy rain and gale-force winds battered the 271 crews, with many sailing into Plymouth for shelter.

By yesterday evening 161 crews had retired from the biannual 608-mile race from the Isle of Wight to the Fastnet Rock off southern Ireland and back to Plymouth.

The boats arrived throughout yesterday in ports across the South of England including Plymouth, Brixham, Penzance and Torquay.

Both professional and amateur sailors suffered damage to their boats. At least three boats were dismasted, and some sailors were even taken to Derriford Hospital upon arrival.

Injuries included a broken leg, cracked ribs, a torn cruciate ligament and a head injury. Others suffered seasickness.

Brixham and Falmouth coastguards are continuing to monitor the remaining fleet's movements.

In a bid to prevent a repeat of the tragic 1979 race which cost the lives of 17 sailors, organisers delayed the race by 25 hours, sending the fleet off at 11am on Monday.

However, despite the delay, the fleet was still caught up in 38-knot winds and huge seas after leaving the start line off Cowes.

Many yachts were forced to seek shelter around the south coast.

Even the likes of sailing hero Pete Goss from St John in south-east Cornwall and record-breaking yachtswoman Dee Caffari - with Olympic rower Matthew Pinsent aboard her vessel - were forced to retire.

"Pride just isn't worth risking your life for," said 39-year-old Sussex skipper James Hope-Lang, who decided to retire his yacht L'Isme from the race.

"The boat was fine and we'd have continued had it not been for the injuries on board.

"One of our 12-man crew split his head open on the boom, while another tore his cruciate ligament, which was very painful for him.

"We felt both of them needed hospital treatment."

Mr Hope-Lang's shipmate David Scott added: "I did one of the watches overnight on Monday and it was pretty terrifying.

"The swell got up and we were going from one trough to another. You couldn't see the horizon.

"We just knew it wasn't as safe as it needed to be for a novice crew."

Mr Goss added: "I'm disappointed not to have finished the race, but it's a sport and we're ultimately doing it to enjoy it.

"Decisions are made by skippers based on their crews, their boats and the forecast.

"We knew the weather was getting bad and by midnight on Monday it was clear that the Irish Sea was no place for a 30-foot trimaran weighing less than a tonne.

"We had good fun surfing the waves on the way into Plymouth, but the decision was taken to end the race there," he said.

Another crew skipper, Mark Jephcott of the yacht Selene, said: "We retired because it just wasn't enjoyable any more.

"We didn't suffer any damage or injury; we just felt that it wasn't going to get any better for the coming days, and with little or no shelter we would have got battered.

"We only entered for pleasure and it was obvious early on that it wasn't going to be very pleasurable at all."

It is the 15th time he has entered the race, and the second time he has been forced to retire.

Race manager Janet Grosvenor said the boats did exactly what organisers expected, given the conditions, by heading into the nearest ports to find shelter and safety.

Chris Price, manager of the Queen Anne's Battery marina, added: "It's been a bit hectic down here because we weren't expecting so many boats at the same time.

"We've been able to accommodate them all and there's room for more if it's needed."

The race sees boats start from Cowes and pass through the Solent, westward down the English Channel to Land's End and then across the Celtic Sea, before rounding the famous Fastnet Rock off the south-west tip of Ireland and returning to the finish at Queen Anne's Battery at Coxside.

tnichols@eveningherald.co.uk

Your Views
About 30 years ago, the Fastnet race was hit by similarly bad weather. Then, lives were lost and boats smashed literally to pieces. I worked on the tugs in the Dockyard at the time and although I didn’t go, several larger vessels from our fleet were involved in the rescue operation. When they returned, I remember seeing the faces of many of the crews. They were tired and shocked, having had to pull bodies from the sea. That year’s race was regarded as a disaster. People sail for pleasure and sport and know they are competing with the elements. If they retire due to bad weather then they are very sensible. I think that, given the conditions that this year’s competitors endured, retirement from the race was the only option. Some people were injured, but at least no lives were lost.
Nick, Plymouth

The diagnosis
Hi, Q.

Glad you got the op early and it's all good so far. 1.4kg, eh? Sounds like a whopper to me. Touch wood it continues to go well and you get home as soon as anticipated.
Keith