Kirsten Percival
Arwen RTIR
Fundraising for The Ellen MacArthur Cancer Trust
Story
We got all the way round - eventually!
It took us a loooooooooooong time to finish, 12 Hours 19 Minutes and 17 Seconds to be precise. We lost a lot of spaces through taking the wrong line on the second leg, which meant that we had a lot more tide against us than those further inshore. The last leg felt like an eternity as we were stuck between Ryde Sands and the fleet. Olly turned green for the second and 3rd leg and decided to feed the fishes. Remarkably though he is up for the race again next year!
How did we do?
1779 boats started
1562 finished the race
123 retired (not us!)
13 were disqualified
We came 425th out of 1779 boats
The fastest boat was around in 6 Hours and 39 minutes - anyone can do THAT!
We were last out of our 21.7 fleet - that didn't quite go to plan - BEST OUT OF 3 GUYS! See you next year!
We were 44th out of 73 in the family trophy - so almost won it - what 's 43 places between friends hey ?
We beat our boat's 2008 position by 178 places (2008 result: 603rd) - BINGO!
The highlights undoubtedly were
- hitting 10 knots upwind on the way to the Needles
- rounding the Needless, missing Goose Rock and the wreck
- A brilliant go faster sail run on the second and third leg - who cares if we were too close to France - we now know for next year, but boy was that fun!
- catching up with the fleet again on the last leg only to loose it again ... (latter being very very disheartening!)
- finally getting over that (damned) finishing line!
- both boys taking a nap at the same time and Kirsten claiming she virtually single handedly sailed the entire race
- post race analysis which propelled us to first place on all counts:
a) second leg: wrong line worth 200 places
b) 1st spinnaker drop mess up: 100 places
c) not lifting the keel and going over the sands because we can : 100 places
d) psychological after effects of hurty thumb during training : 24 places
Result: Arwen takes first overall!
We feel very pleased with ourselves for getting both boat and crew around in one piece. We heard a couple of mayday's on the south side of the island and whizzing past a couple of life rings are a stark reminder that things can go very wrong.
We know where we went wrong and will do better next year!
Most of all we are very touched by your generosity. Thank you all for your support, for your humorous messages on our website and for making a very big difference in the lives of children recovering from life threatening illnesses!