Race 13 - Day 3
Skipper Report
20 July

It's been an interesting day out here with fickle winds, big tidal flow and lots of tacking!

We started the day well by being first out of the Pentland Firth, which was as impressive as I remember it, at one point we had nine knots of tide pushing us along, you could really see all the tidal eddies and swirls in the water.

Thankfully we got through unscathed. Just after exiting we put in a mini tack to get in a wind line and off we went, until a couple of hours later when the wind started to die.

From then on it's been up and down and we have been doing our best to keep with our group of boats all day.

We are currently sailing side by side with Derry~Londonderry~Doire as we make our way southwards to get a good position under the high pressure system forming, with a hope to bag the downwind sailing before the rest of the fleet to give us a real push to the finish line.

It looks like this little race will throw some curve balls yet as it looks like not only will we be battling foul tide at periods throughout the day, but the wind is set to ease significantly in the vicinity of the busy shipping lanes running up the coast of Holland.

Matt