The night watch during the race was probably my lowest point of the week. I was really tired after all the excitement of the previous day and I really did not feel like being there, all I could think of was of going back to sleep. But after almost 4 hours of deep sleep I woke up fully refreshed and ready for the new day.
That morning I felt full of energy, enjoying the sailing and the sunrise. I was able to helm for a while and everything looked wonderful. We then went down below for some breakfast and some rest and when we came back on deck we found that we had dropped from second to sixth place! Some of this could be explained by how the wind and tide had worked for some of the teams but Ineke and Josh thought that we must have been dragging something or had some kind of issue with the rudder because we could see that we were sailing in a very similar way as other boats yet they were able to be more than one knot faster than us. Josh tried to use my go-pro camera to check if we were dragging anything but he could not get a good view.
We approached our next mark near Weymouth and we did a quite complex evolution: round the mark, gybe, drop the yankee and hoist the kite. A lot of activity, I was in charge of the yankee active sheet and the new kite active sheet and all went really well, great teamwork from Team Nano.
We continued sailing with the spi up and we all had the opportunity to helm with it and we all did quite well. I really enjoyed the time that I was able to helm with the kite, I love how powerful these yachts feel under such power. I was also able to spend some time trimming the kite which is something that I also enjoy a lot.
After our watch we went down below and spent a great time laughing, dancing, having fun. The team was working wonderfully and you could feel that long lasting friendships were already being formed. All under the lead of Nano who is a wonderful person and an amazing skipper.
We started preparing dinner and while we were finishing it they asked for volunteers on deck because they wanted to do a gybe. I volunteered and went to help with the main sheet. The gybe was a bit of a disaster, the lazy sheet of the kite had been set up with too many turns so that when it became the active sheet it had a riding turn which was stuck. We ended up broaching but Ineke managed to control the boat beautifully until we were able to get rid of the riding turn and return the boat to a stable position.
I went down to finish my dinner and prepared to go on deck. But then I was told that we were going to drop the kite as we were reaching the end line for the race. So I stayed down below to help receive the kite. Once it was all down below I started working with David and Steve to wool it. We were able to find the head, clew and tack and put them in the right places and then follow the luff and leech but we found a big knot in the middle that for a while none of us was able to figure out how to untie. Finally Steve found the way and we were able to fully extend it ready for wooling. I was really hot and sweating because I had already put on my salopettes to go on deck and had not had the time to take them off before starting the task.
Josh came down and explained us how Team Ineke wools the kite. Instead of wooling starting from the tack, head and clew until they meet and then wooling the bag that is left in the middle, they work from the luff, starting at the tack and rolling the sail with the luff on the outside working all the way up to the head. I could see that the advantage of this method was that the sail was more evenly distributed, with no middle bag with a lot of sail. But I could also see that it was easy not to do this correctly and end up with a twisted sail, which is what I think happened the first day when we weren't able to open the kite after hoisting it.
By the time we had the sail wooled and in the bag we had already docked. Not too happy with our position (we were sixth in the end) but really happy after an amazing experience. It was past midnight, so too late to go to the pub but we bought some drinks in an off-licence and spent a great time in a nearby park with people from all the different yachts that were doing level 4, remembering all the good moments of the week.
Next day we did a deep clean of the boat under the lead of Maren who volunteered to lead the job. I worked on the galley with José and then helped with the bilges. All the other teams were also working and I was able to say hi to Mike and Hannah and they seemed really happy to see me, which was great.
Josh took our foulies to the Print & Sew shop to get our names and initials printed on them and they did a great job. It really looked like it was part of the original design of the clothing, very professional.
I had my briefing with Nano and I was really happy because he told me that he had enjoyed working with me a lot, that he thought I had done really well and that I had done a great job with the team. Music to my ears!
Once we finished with the deep clean we all got together for a group picture and some team building moments all together, forming a circle and doing a big group hug before some of the members of Team Nano had to leave. We had already formed deep bonds and it was sad to see some of this people go.
We then went to get some lunch at the Wetherspoons and enjoyed our last moments together. Then big hugs and sad goodbyes. It had been an extraordinary week, the best training so far. We left as a strongly bonded team, with lots of knowledge gained and all looking forward to see each other again during the race.
