Myth of Malam

One challenge before we got started was damage to the mainsail track and a sail carriage which lost its ball bearing, this meant we had to cancel our planned MOB drill and make for Cowes to decide how we hoist the sail in the morning

As expected the first half of the race was challenging into the wind and tide, but luckily we had 15knot of wind rather than the forecast 5 knots, so were able to reach the bottle net at Hurst Castle before the tidal flow was too strong.

We spent this part of the race cross tacking with another Swan, until we drew ahead across Christchurch bay. We stayed offshore looking for wind a nd concentrating on boat speed. At one time during the first night we were near the traffic separation zone. It was a bumpy ride. During this leg we broke one guardrail, to I went to to the lee rail attached to a jackstay to investigate a jury repair with water up to my ankles. A retaining ring had come out of a pin holding the rail in place. I decided to wait until we turned for home

Getting around the Eddystone light proved very tricky due to the tides and wind direction and it took two attempts, before we could ease our sails for the run home.

Once again the gremlins hit us, on checking the downwind sails what we thought was our largest spinnaker turned out to be a genniker which we had never used. Sails were not in the bags we thought.

We instead sailed directly downwind, goose-winged, with a boomed out jenny and the main sail on the opposite side held by a preventer. We were happy with our speed at this time managing to pass a couple of boats and keeping pace with others flying a spinnaker.

The second night was much more comfortable, but cold. And only a crash gybe disturbing the off watch crew. Morning dawned with lighter winds crossing Christchurch Bay to the finishing line, which was a buoy, this side of Hurst Castle.

We did have a few problems running out of drinking water and also our main watertank, together with leaks around the foredeck hatch.

A great race, challenging at times, but results are in 110 out of 136 overall and 33 out of 37 in Class. Just over 2days of racing 170 odd mile

Mission accomplished, No injuries, no major damage, race completed so now qualified for the Fastnet Race in August

David Ogden