Congratulations to the Sailing Logic team on Quokka 8, a Grand Soleil 43, who won the recent RORC St Malo race by a huge margin!

The team have finally tasted the victory that they have been training so hard for. The season didn't start so well when boat damage forced them to retire from the Myth of Malham/Eddystone Race in May just on the final approach to the finish line. The next race was the Morgan Cup Race to Cherbourg, which was the really windy one in June, had its own set of challenges and whilst the team finished (which in itself was a hugh acheivement as only half of the fleet did finish) they were well down the leaderboard.

The recent St Malo race proved the ideal opportunity for Quokka to show the rest of the fleet just what they were capable of. Great team work, perfect sail choices and fantastic tactics by skipper Philippe meant saw the team cross the line over 40 mins ahead of the nearest yacht, and the team were moored up enjoying dinner whilst half of the fleet were floating just outside of St Malo in the wind hole!  A really fantastic result for the team and very much deserved after so many near-misses!

These races have all been part of the qualifiers to the prestigious Rolex Fastnet Race taking place in August - good luck to Philippe and the crew in the remaining qualifier, the Channel race and of course for the Fastnet finale! 

There will be prizes issued on Tuesday 2nd August 2011 at 7.30pm at the RORC Clubhouse (20 St James St, SW1A 1NN) - all are welcome to attend, if you'd like to pop by and say hi to some of our crew!

The Fastnet Campaign 2011 has seen our seven (yes, seven!) teams undergo two training weekends and compete in 3 offshore races. All 7 of our yachts are racing in Class IRC2 - a highly competitive fleet of about 50 yachts in most races. Through these events and the Sailing Logic socials, a friendly sense of rivalry has been developing and so far, consistently good results in each race has seen Visit Malta Puma take the lead of the Sailing Logic Seven! Well done team!

Each team is a mix of experience levels - some are hardened offshore racers with previous Fastnet experience, for others this is their first offshore experience. But the mix of conditions experienced so far has provided plenty of learning opportunities, especially about heavy weather sailing - as the first two races (Myth of Malham race to Eddystone Light and back and the Morgan Cup race to Cherbourg) saw winds speeds of over 30 knots!! 

The latest race to St Malo started with windy conditions, but the wind then died leaving many of the yachts struggling to reach boat speeds of even 2 knots - making the last few miles to the finish incredibly slow and frustrating!

Using the RORC scoring system, currently Visit Malta Puma leads the 'Sailing Logic Seven' on 239.2 points - a good 60 points ahead of Quokka, their nearest rival. (All race results are published on the RORC website). There is one more offshore qualifying race at the end of July (the Channel Race, around marks in the Channel) before the big event starting from Cowes on August 14th! Don't forget if you would like to come and watch the race start we have organised some spectator RIBs - just email Kate to book your place. 

As usual Allie will also be issuing a daily email blog to keep interested friends and families up to date on the progress of the yachts and crew - if you would like to receive or provide us with a list of recipients, please let Allie know.

Contacts details:

Katie: katie@sailinglogic.co.uk

Allie: allie@sailinglogic.co.uk

The 80th anniversary Round The Island Race saw a record number of entries - 1908! However, the race will probably be etched into most people's memory for other reasons! In stark contrast to the glorious blue skies and gentle breezes from last year, the 2011 race was marked by strong winds and rough seas, which put many competitors off before they even started. There were several dismastings, a few capsized catamarans and the odd man over-board - although fortunately none of these were Sailing Logic boats. 

Sailing Logic were thrilled to have had a record 9 yachts entered! - 4 corporate groups, 2 group bookings and 3 boats of individuals. 

Visit Malta Puma crewed by a team of individuals who had never raced together before did extremely well finishing 4th (out of 44) in Division 1B, which is a fantastic result as this is really competitive class! Well done to Becky and her crew.  And Quokka in class 1A, won the Schoolboat Trophy! - well done to the team, who were put together by Nick McLoughlin and skippered by Philippe!

Didn’t we have a lovely time the day we went to Dinard ?

Well, no, not exactly. The trip was sold as arriving in time for Saturday lunch and The Joker had booked a slap up Restaurant for dinner. We cursed the decision that the race would exit the Solent going east but as we passed St Catherines the rollicking breeze still seemed to promise a timely arrival.

Sadly, burnt out squalls stationery on the French coast snuffed out the breeze. The hint of wind in the spinnaker was mainly apparent wind generated by our movement on the tide. 

The sun sank, a molten ball, filling the gap between the solid black cloud and the sea. 

“Grind, grind, grind. The kites down.”

“I Know. Ease the pole forward, gently, under control.”

“Kites up.”

“Ease the pole back, that’s good there.”

“If we run out of food we could eat Jimbo, bowmen are expendable.”

“You will be disqualified if you finish without a full crew.”

“We will save the bones.”

“If we run out of water shall we drink our own urine ?”

“Grind, grind, grind, ease the pole forward…..kites down……”

The tide finally carried us over the finish line after midnight, several packs of ciggies and innumerable gybes. The last 22 miles took 12 hours and I slept an exhausted sleep.

Our lonely tour of geological land marks on the Dorset coast probably explains our relatively poor position in the race results. Relative, that is, to our potential and ambition.

At least we finished! No mean achievement when one heavy footstep or badly handled gybe would have left us completely stuffed. Jacko judged the tide perfectly and the rest of us did our part, sticking to the task without the frustration and rancour I recall on other yachts on wind hole days. 

Having initially doubted my ancient bones would stand another Fastnet my blood is now up. Shakespeare might well now write :

“We few, we happy few, we band of brothers and sisters ;

For those today, that shed their blood with me

Shall be my family; despite their origins

This day we shall all be famous

And gentlefolk in England now a-bed

Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,

And hold their manhood cheap while any speaks

That sailed with us, upon Lancelot, 2.”

Oh yes, and congratulations to Alex, who finally discovered the location of the light switch in the heads.

ST Malo Race Blog - Jaguar Logic.

The latest RORC race to St Malo was another exciting adventure!  The race started Friday afternoon with strong winds which resulted in RORC rerouting the fleet out of the Eastern Solent, adding 20 nM (and several hours) to the course! 

As we rounded St Catherine's point we were level pegging with Interceptor Logic, and super-slick reefing by Jaguar saw us creep ahead. We were enjoying our 1-on-1 battle and were puzzled by their disappearance. We later found out they had dismasted and were all glad to hear that everyone was ok, but knew that the crew must be bitterly disappointed.

The wind eased, the sun was shining and the sailing conditions were ideal, although the jerky sea action left several of us seeing our dinner a second time!  By Saturday afternoon we were passing the Channel Islands under spinnaker and could see both Addiction Logic and Lancelot Logic nearby. Then in contrast to the earlier strong winds, just 15 miles outside St Malo, the wind dropped to just 5 knots, and we inched along painfully slowly, and by sunset the wind had disappeared altogether. We were barely making way and were even overtaken by a jellyfish! So close, those last miles should have taken under three hours.

This leisurely calm was abruptly interrupted by the discovery we couldn't start our engine. With no wind, no steerage, no engine and the tide taking us towards the rocky entrance of St Malo - we were heading in the right direction but with hazards looming we started to consider back up plans. Yachts all around us were retiring, evidently frustrated by the lack of wind. But as we had retired from the Cherbourg race, we needed these miles to qualify for the Fastnet so we sat, bobbing, hoping and waiting for some wind.

After several hours we were getting more and more nervous about the rocks, and had given up hope of any breeze, and decided to retire and get a tow ashore. But no other boats were passing so we couldn't!! Very generously, Addiction Logic offered to retire and tow us in to safety - hugely unselfish of them as they also needed the miles. As luck would have it, they couldn't start their engine either so we were both stuck! Then Lancelot Logic who had just finished offered to come out and save us - again, a very kind offer as that would take several hours and it was already 2am, so everyone was exhausted. In the meantime, we had been investigating the battery set-up and after some clever re-wiring by engineer Eddie we actually managed to start the engine and miraculously the wind also picked up just enough to allow us to sail! 

Confidence bolstered by the knowledge we had an engine back-up in case the wind died again, we actually managed to sail the rest of the course, arriving some 10 hours later than expected, just behind Addiction who also completed the race.  A huge well done to Quokka and Visit Malta Puma who managed to finish before the wind died - especially Quokka who won the class. One thing about offshore racing - it's never the same twice!