Day 17 : 14.29N 57.29W
Elixir - Ovni
Richard Merrick
Wed 9 Dec 2009 11:09
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That's it, the race is on. Throughout last night's
watches yachts started to appear on the radar and it became apparent that the
spread of our competition is now tightening in our 250 mile sprint for the
finish line. We sailed hard throughout the night and with great winds Elixir is
now storming through the last stretch of the Atlantic. We have one boat fairly
close off our bow's which we are quickly gaining on and one on the horizon
directly behind us which we swear we are loosing with our 9ish knots
headway.
The sight of competition has encouraged us no end
and as we haven't seen any boats for several days, it seemed like we were on our
own. Today will be a long and very exciting days racing where we hope to claw
back as many positions as we can. Watch this space.
Naturally the competitive nature of the crew will
not stop when we get past the finish line as we all want to prove to our skipper
that we can beat him in a dinghy race. And so the gauntlet has been laid down,
with a Hobbie Cat race around a triangular course the winner literally takes all
(prize still undecided and very much depends on who wins).
Supplies onboard Elixir have lasted well and we
have used a fraction of the Diesel fuel we took as it was only required for the
generation of electricity. This has also meant that we have been able to run the
water maker constantly. Elixir's fridge is still half full as is her freezer and
larder so all our calculations when sat around a supper in Cornwall paid
off.
We think there is about 28 hours to go and one more
blog, maybe two and we are on target for our initial target of 18
days.
Elixir continues to look after us
excellently.
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