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lbrewer

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Amazing how most of us can show up on the line when it's 12,000 miles away, but put it practically in our own backyards, and we're in the "cruising" category...Still it looks like most of us have started to claw back into it...

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Whew!  I thought I had made a big mistake by committing to the more northerly route.  The timing of last wind update is the only thing that allowed it to work.  If the wind would have changed a couple hours earlier I would have had to beat back south to the mark, losing lots of positions.  A lot of luck was involved in that move.

Larry

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It looks like a lot of boats ran right over the first ice mark ! I was worried about hitting it dead on, so I dipped South, but then when I looked at the "tracks" of many boats they ran right THROUGH the flag!

Ken,

Did you "stop over" in Yarmouth, NS for more beer? Nice recovery.....

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I was away from the machine for a 1/2 a day, one boat missed the mark, the other cleared, but both now well south and in the back of the fleet. I'm going to try to broad reach across the top of the low and see if I can make up the ground. I'm not going to go back and round the last mark, so I'll just see where it ends up compared to other boats.

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I beat myself up at the start and finish but did a wonderful job in the middle.  Last night I had one more course change before calling it a night, then I fell asleep.  It cost me over 10,000 places once I finally dragged my battered hull off the coast of Ireland.  I'm lucky the crew even survived.  But at long last it's time to sit down and chew the fat over some of Murphy's finest.

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This leg was very educational for me. After rounding the first gate and setting course I advanced to 722th. After that I made a course change to the east about 2 hrs earlier than I really wanted to because I knew I would be away from the computer for a while and decided on a "safe" compromise. Wrong!!! I steady lost positions to nearly 20,000th. Finally in the last 12 hrs or so I had set up for the dash and gained back into the 11,000's. Kinda like real racing.....if you don't stay on the edge...you lose. Go figure!

Larry

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I figure the top boats in this thing are on line 24 hours a day.  They have desk jobs and keep the game minimized at work and check in constantly.  They set their alarms at home to get up  when entering wind cells that may require course changes.  Auto on the wind works great when going to weather and some times off the wind when the course changes are optimal for the conditions and leg.  A straight line can carry you through a couple wind cells some times, but not necessarily give you the best VMG (velocity made good).  The top boats also use 2 outside programs to assist in tactics.  They use VRtool and UGRIB.  There are some people who take this game very seriously.  I have been tracking numerous other boats, most from Europe.  I note them making course changes at all hours of their day and night.  They aim for wind lines or even the corners of cells and make course changes the second they enter the new cell regardless of the time of day. They use VRtool to calculate the exact course to do this and the exact time they need to get up.  They use UGRIB not only to get long term forecasts, but to learn the exact winds for the next 12 hours, 3 and a half hours before it happens.  It would seem they never sleep.

Unless you are willing to devote all of this and more, you can't keep up with them on a constant basis.

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This would be an entirely different game if you couldn't "see" any other boats...! Somewhere on their web page I was reading an interview where someone described how they just  "shadowed the usual leaders" such as " Power of Seven" etc., and let THEM do the navigation...

Of course we all do something similar when we're out on the water and we see how other boats are doing on their headings, etc. too...

If you REALLY want to make it a test, you'd change wind directions at all different times of the day, and avoid the " real world" forecasts. That would help to level the playing field, ( but of course no one would get any sleep at all then...).

It HAS been fun though. Surprising how they sell just about everything but a T shirt for the racers...

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You can't beat anyone you follow.  With delays seeing what they do, on long legs you will eventually fall behind enough that you aren't in the same winds and then it becomes counter productive to follow.

There were discussions in the forums about going to 4 wind changes a day.  It would be more realistic.  Wind changes every hour would be even more so.  But the 12 hour wind updates allow people to set a course and tactic that allows them to go to work or sleep a little  :)

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  • 2 weeks later...

Back in leg 5 I found myself sailing next to an Italian boat named Yosemite.  Some how he and I got to chatting.  Since that time Andrea and I have shared tactics, exchanged e-mails, chat constantly in game and become virtual friends.  Through a family friend of a friend type deal he got invited to go to Galway to sail in the pro-am race there this past week.  He sent me this picture of himself.

th.29b0618806.jpg

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This leg may be the toughest one yet! In spite of it's "shorter" run it has many more "obstacles"in the way that are forcing most of us to stay near the computer until we can get clear of these "distractions". I've already crossed course (not tacks, courses...) with Ken and Larry as we've been ramming a good portion of the Swedish coast in our attempt to get out of this corridor and back into open water...

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