After 24 hours on the water and as they enter the second night on the oars, all crews are starting to feel the scale of the challenge they have taken on. Initially blasting away from the start line and working hard through the night the crews produced impressive speeds in excess of 4kt. However during the day the wind had backed and started to blow more from the east and north east. Generally the wind blew between 10 -15kt but there were occasions where up to 18kt were experienced forcing the rowers to grip onto their oars and turn their boats into the breeze to avoid being pushed off course.
In order to somewhat counteract the easterly component of the wind a waypoint has been set to the east of the finish line. This forces the crews a little way off the shortest possible route between start and finish points but ensures that when the wind does fill in from the east that they are able to continue to make positive progress and avoid the need to call for assistance from our support yacht Rozamar.
After the relative cool of the night when the rowers are able to push themselves physically much harder, the heat of the day forces the rowers to be a little more sensible about the level of physical exertion they exhibit on the oars. Working too hard will result in dehydration and extreme heat stress on the body so there is a fine line that must be walked. Amongst all of this is the excitement of having another crew alongside. Team TP ICAP and Team Tradition have been trading places for the last 24 hours. It really is nip and tuck between them. Team Tradition currently has a slender advantage of 0.8nm but last night the ladies four of Team TP ICAP used the cooler conditions to work harder and press home an advantage that they retained throughout a significant portion of the morning. Team BA remain in the mix with a slender 2.5nm deficit to the leaders and Team GS Gives are less than 10nm behind the lead boat.
As the crews round the waypoint and start to point directly towards the finish mark, we expect that they will be able to take more advantage of those easterly winds speeding them home even faster.