Victory for Pirates!

Ok, it was only first amongst the Farr boats. But when as yesterday the wind is enough for Black Betty to lift up her skirts, that is becoming all that the fair weather Farrs can hope for. And for Paul Cayard and crew the real battle is with accident prone Movistar for second place.

This time it was Movistar's winch system - as Bouwe Bekking put it: “The second gybe in Annapolis the bevel box (which links the pedestal grinders to the drums) exploded so we were top handling (winding the winches with a single handle in the top of the winch) for the rest of the leg. Whatever you do, hoisting a sail or tacking, it was a nightmare”.

For a boat that has been as long on the water as Movistar the number of serious breakages is indeed surprising.

It must have felt good on the Pirates boat to get second place not only on this leg but on the overall standings - and in sight of of the Statue of Liberty. And that's not such an unlikely pairing, for in the goldern age of piracy, ships were managed very much as democracies, where captains were voted in and out of power, and people of all colours, races, and creeds were welcome. Liberty for all - as long, of course, as they had no quarms about slitting the odd throat and plundering the odd ship!

I wonder how a Volvo captain would fare under that form of leadership?


Picture from http://www.volvooceanrace.org