Greetings all,

One week from now we will be starting our first WSSRC ratified record period. We have been spending the last couple of weeks preparing for it. This includes making all the preperations for the WSSRC official, the timing systems, the people to document it all... and the specific detailing of the boat itself. So far I think it's all working out OK.

We will be using a TRIMBLE GPS system to time all our runs. It has a number of advantages for our particular program the main one being that we can simply pluck out the best 500 meter section from each run. This means we will get the fastest averages of the day... and not just the best time between two fixed points. The system needs to be extremely accurate and it's not a simple handheld system that we will have in place. We will still have a simple hand held gps to give us a rough estimate between runs as it takes a bit longer to post-process the TRIMBLE data to get the exact times with the accuracy required by the WSSRC.

VESTAS SAILROCKET has been getting tidied up aerodynamically and we figure we can make some pretty serious gains here... more than any other boat except maybe Macquarrie Innovations who operate in similar apparent wind speeds/angles. We have fully faired the strut that supports the lower section of the wing, re-skinned the whole wing and made a moulded fairing to fair in the end of the beam to hull area. The cockpit windscreen may make a reappearance to break up the wind before it hits my body. All the rigging is getting cleaned up and we will trial some new MARLOW products which will reduce the diameters and hence drag by over 40% of all the standing rigging. The wind instruments and onboard camera will be removed to further clean up the transom and save weight. Yes... I'm losing weight too. I think I can get down to around 78 without too much suffering. Every aspect of the boat will be considered. It all counts as it will all affect the final outcome. The TRIMBLE system is accurate enough to count the milliseconds so all will be judged.

We tried to get out to speed-spot for two of the last three days and twice were denied... by a dodgy outboard engine on the support RIB. It is normallt very reliable but something has corrupted it. We reluctantly pushed VESTAS SAILROCKET back up the ramp and pulled the RIB out behind it. the next morning we had all the carbuerettors and fuel system stripped down. It appeared some water got in there so we flushed it all, changed the plugs and the gearbox oil and voila... she sounded fine. Today the wind came up again so we got all set to go. Helena drove over to speed spot in the RIB... and on the way back she began to play up again... so we repeated the process. We pushed VESTAS SAILROCKET back out of the water... and the Rib followed closely. BOOOOORING!!!!!!! If it's not one thing then it's another. I suppose it warns us to have a plan 'B' in preperation for similar events befalling us during the record attempt. So we will make provisions.

The wind has lost some of its 'oomph' as the seasons change. I know we will still get some banging days within the 28 day period. We have to make sure that we are totally ready for when they come because we are going to push harder than we ever have before. My prediction is that the days around the next full-moon will be the big ones. That will be around December the 12th. I don't know why the lunar cycle affects the winds... must be something to do with the tides. I thought it was a local myth but it seems to be consistent from our records.

We have been folllowing Hydroptere's progress with great interest. They are doing an amazing job with an incredible boat. Some of their peak speeds are spectacular. We will be interested to see if they are capable of ever hanging onto the big 5-0 for long enough to average it over 500 meters. I imagine that one of their problems is an unsteady response to gusts where they have to either bear away or sheet out. A bear away will give them a high peak... but put a 'kink' in their point-to-point course and sheeting out needs to be an incredibly precise process in order to maintain the knife edge balance neccesary to really 'max-out'. If VESTAS SAILROCKET gets hit by a gust... it just accelerates in a straight line. This strenght might really begin to feature in the upcoming weeks. Still they might get their magic gust and ride it just right. Good luck to them I say, nothing we can do but focus on our own issues.

Righto, that's enough for one blog.

Cheers, Paul.

Well that got a bit hairy. Old school 69 style!

The wind was building up to top end as we headed up the course. I felt good and was determined to put in a big one. I wanted to set either the new course record or even better... to break through Yellow Pages old 'boat' record of 46.52 knots. I feel we can do better than just trade blows with Hydroptere and if we are to do so... we need to push hard on days like this.

We got up the course and I knew it was strong. Good!

The rig went up without drama and the team headed off down the course to wait for events to unfold. The line popped when I dropped the tether. I quickly went through the checks and necessary procedures hoping to turn quickly onto the course. A solid black gust hit VESTAS SAILROCKET as I was still running downwind. It pushed the stalled wing hard and we began to plane. This had never happened before. Perhaps it was too much and I said so. But still... now is the time to find out. That last run (66) already justified our boat so now it was time to raise the bar. I reset the flap bungies to re-deploy the flap... no need for nitro today... we were sailing in it! As soon as he got a sniff of apparent wind she just launched down the course. The pod was instantly flying. I could feel the forces at work but felt like a passenger.

THE NOSE HAS SHAKEN OFF AND THE BOW HAS BEEN THROWN HIGH BY THE CHOP. JUST LIKE THE MODEL YEARS EARLIER, THE BOW WOULD COME AWAY AND THE FOIL WOULD REGAIN GRIP. GREAT PIC. SOME FOILING ACTION HYDROPTERE WOULD BE PROUD OF.

We were instantly in the forties as I felt the control. Damn... it was brilliant... almost gentle. The nose got picked up as the foil got hoisted off the surface, Vetsas Sailrocket yawed sideways and the foil dropped in again onto the front planing surface. It was just like the model. I still had positve control so despite the bumpy ride I held onto the course. Twice more the nose got hoisted skywards and on the second one I decided to abandon the run. In my peripheral vision I could see the pod was way high.

SOME MORE WILD POD FLYING ACTION... FUNNY THING IS... SHE FELT ALRIGHT!!!

It took ages, too long, to burn off the speed. When I finally turned for the beach... I had missed it. Instead of trying a risky salvage with the support RIB, I decided to sail a kilometer or so across the 'lagoon'. We took a few waves and the cockpit was filling up... but we made it.

In the end the 500 meter average was down around 43.66 but the new peak speed was 46.75 knots. These rugged runs don't really impress me too much. They are too messy. What did impress me was the way we managed to sail in full control in winds gusting to 27 knots. This bus is tough. The new control system is fantastic. It's a revolution for us.

VESTAS SAILROCKET behaved just like her 1/5th scale model did. The photo's look wild but in the end I have nothing but confidence. I would love to give her a rest and a full detailed service... but we have more sailing days ahead and we need to use all of them.

Hydroptere looks very flash and I admire them immensely... but I wouldn't swap rides for quids. It's going to be a great battle.

Enjoy the pics... we sure as hell did.

Cheers, Paul.

 New videos posted by the way, this next link is for a largish medium res file of around 18 mb. if you hit the link, you have to retype in the letter code at the top of the page and then follow the cues for the free download. We hope to improve on this. http://www.megaupload.com/?d=UKC8CTIN

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XSOJH8Gi_Y8 is the 'youtube' link

Righto... back to the update...

We hit the speed course again yesterday hungry to top our recent success on Run 66. We were only 0.2 knots behind Hydroptere's previous best 500 meter run and when I checked out their website to confirm this... it appears that they have gone and posted a faster run again!!! They are now around 1.8 knots faster at 46.1 knots! The king of the boats is still Good ol' Yellow Pages Endeavour with their amazing 46.52 knots posted way back in 1993.

HAPPY DAYS POST RUN 66.

45+ KNOTS PAST THE TIMING HUT ON RUN 66.

So with this in mind we crossed the lagoon on a day that was shaping up nicely. The buoys were placed out to give me a course to focus on and show me how close in I could potentially come in to the shore. After this we pull in to the timing hut where we have built a small roof top terrace to film the runs from. Out the back we mount the TACKTICK gear on a pole as an independent weather station to log the wind throughout the session. The remote display is up with the cameraman who has a VHF and can give me a quick wind update before I take over the channel for the run. I have no wind data display on the boat as the two PI RESEARCH displays are showing wing and rudder angles. Once this is set up we head to the top of the course where it takes five people to raise the rig... and about five to ten minutes.

A large anchor is dropped and a tether attached from this to the transom Of VESTAS SAILROCKET. It is left slack during the rigging process but acts as a safety in case the boat gets away on us... as it has once before. On a windy day, the boat would have the potential of locking onto a course at 40 + knots without me in it... and just sailing... until god knows what would happen (It would probably head to sea and a month later... take out HUGO BOSS in the middle of the night)! One person holds the wing angle whilst it is raised, one person eases the rigging, one person holds the bow, one person stands on the boat to help the rig get started in the raising process and one person hauls on the 6:1 HARKEN purchase to pull the strut in and hence raise the rig. The guy holding the bow stays with me whilst the other three head down the course. One of them takes up station on the video camera whilst the other two man the RIB (one of whom catches VESTAS SAILROCKET at the other end as she comes into the beach).

We have shown we can do back to back runs in around 20-25 minutes if we hop to it.

We had already raised the rig and done an electronics test in the still air of the morning... but as is always the case... problems began to arise the minute we got across to the windsweapt remoteness of Speed-spot. The displays for wing and rudder angle began to play up. At the top of the course we tried everything at our disposal all to no avail. Here we were plugging 9V batteries into a 30' speed sailing boat to try and make it work. It reminded me of Xmas day as a kid with a new remote control toy. There was a fault somewhere... obviously... and it was affecting both the PI RESEARCH logger and the displays. I considered aborting the day but decided to do a run flying blind anyway. You always learn something. The trouble is that from where I'm sitting, the wing angle is not that easy to judge, especially as we are constantly moving the beam and rake angles. The rudder angle is also pretty important as it shows me how well VESTAS SAILROCKET is balanced at speed and hence if I am in the 'safe' fine tune zone of the steering system as against the 'coarse' part. If the boat is not balanced and I'm doing over 40 knots in the coarse zone then small inputs by me have a large effect on the rudder. We are still talking fractions of a degree here but this can lead to the dreaded 'round-up' as we have seen recently... and many times before.

So I did a tentative run with a very nice and flat start up sequence. I didn't oversheet the wing but had it out at what I guessed was around 15-20 degrees. This limits the speed of the boat and I could feel it doing this like a rev limiter. VESTAS SAILROCKET would surge ahead... and the abruptly lose power as she would almost oversail the rig. We peaked at 41. something knots in not a moderate wind of around 19 knots. the water was flat and I had pulled the main flap on.

At the end of the course I decided to head back to the base to sort this problem out. If we are not logging the data then we are wasting our time. If we hit a high speed, have a crash or anything else in between... it's all a bit meaningless in the big picture if we don't understand why or how.

It was shaping up to be a brilliant day so it was pretty frustrating to walk away from it.

We have found the faulty connection and hopefully resolved the problem. The forecast looks great for today also so let's hope we can get out there and jump up another couple of rungs.

Well done to Hydroptere. I admire those guys immensely. It makes the whole endeavour much more interesting to have two teams going for it on the water at once. I'm pretty sure we can trade blows with them toe to toe. We each have our strengths and weaknesses and we are both at a stage in our projects lives where we are in good shape for the challenges to come. It's great stuff.

Cheers, Paul.

What a glamour day. Brought to us by sheer patience. This season down here in Walvis Bay hasn't been a good one. It's either been blowing like crazy... or nothing. Today was just right and we were ready to make the most of it.

The new steering slot, which alters the way the rudder moves to my inputs, arrived today and we didn't hang around in fitting it to the boat. Thanks once again to Uwe at JAZ MARINE in Cape Town for chasing this up for us. As the wind filled in we began to dress accordingly in preperation. The wind had built significantly by the time we got onto speed-spot and sure enough... we had another windy day on our hands. i tried a startup closer to the shore and then set VESTAS SAILROCKET off on a course. She wouldn't hold up to the beach over 40 knots so instead of trying to correct it with a totally new steering configuration... I abandoned the run. The wind dropped slightly so we headed back up. I was determined to get as many runs in as I could so that I myself could develop a solid routine for starting sequences. On the next run I just sheeted in to 20 degrees and watched what happened. She was reluctant to bear away at the start but as she accelerated she settled down onto a nice course running parallel to the beach. I could almost sail her hands free. We weren't going very fast as we were well sheeted out... but VSR was very well behaved. It showed that I don't necessarily have to oversheet and use large steering inputs to get her onto the course.

In the next two runs I focused on doing tighter 500 meter runs withe the final run involving a 500 meter run with the boat fully configured as she should be i.e. wing sheeted in to 10 degrees and the flap on. The wind had dropped to high teens but I was still able to feel the balance of the boat, effectiveness of the new steering system and just have a play with her.

We ahve never done four runs with the wing before so I think it was a great exercise for the whole team. The quality of the data is now much better than it ever has been so thanks to PI RESEARCH for helping us chase the 'gremlins'. We now sit surrounded by laptops digesting all this data so that it can be used to our advantage as early as tomorrow.

After the grounding on Run 61 we moved the beam back forward but it appears that it could now come back a few degrees as it seems that we have lee-helm where VESTAS SAILROCKET is trying to bear away from the beach a bit too hard.

I feel pretty happy with today. I think we have learnt a lot recently and I'm pretty sure that we are on the right path with this latest steering system. We need days like this. If we are going to ever max this boat out then we can't just go out on top end days and see what happens. We need to be well practiced and confident enough in our craft and level of development to be able to go out with a practiced approach and totally master a top-end day.

Tomorrow is set to be windy so we better be fast learners...

Cheers, Paul.