This race has been a real journey of personal development I think we're probably
all richer for the experience.
It has matured me as a sailor I think in a way.
There's moment where everything goes well and everyone's quite happy but there's
tough moments that you have to go through.
I find that fascinating to be
living for nine months in the world that is so competitive and this is what you
live and breathe for so great results you're happy bad results life's miserable.
You know that sometimes you have to invest a couple of days losing to
get the gain two days from now, but the toughness of this race is that all
these teams have the same ambitions but only one of them are gonna fulfil it.
You hear the guys talking about tenths of a knot. Throughout from the start at the
time we started testing a year ago right through to now having accurate sensors
and accurately calibrated sensors is critical to any decisions we make on
board and when you're racing side by side against another boat and you're
looking for tenths of a knot it's really important that you can tell and just get
those gains.
We rely heavily on the electronics of the boat mainly for
performance to see how we're going and how fast we're going we rely on it
especially at night and in the recent days with the foggy conditions where you
can't see anything you have no no bearing on where you are so you really
rely on the numbers to tell you how you're going and keep you in check and
keep you on course certainly is an important part of our sailing.
You know when you're when you're driving at 35, 40 knots of wind and it's the middle of the
night and you're in thick fog and you can't see past the bow of the boat you
know you've got to rely on the instruments they are your
lifeline that's what keeps you going fast, what keeps you going in the right direction.
We've had one of the most challenging, windiest, toughest conditions in
the Volvo throughout the whole race actually that certainly I've ever seen
in the five editions that I've sailed in the race. It's been incredible that we've
had zero issues with the B&G system on board it's always been rock steady reliable.
B&G takes care of all the data that is related to the boat.
So meaning the speed of the boat, the position of the boat, the temperature
around the boat, the heights of the waves, the heel angle of the boat, the pitch,
the roll, the wind speeds, the wind directions. All this information is collected with
B&G sensors through the B&G Network into a B&G processor and from there it's
streamed as telemetry data through the satellite system back to race control so
race control has B&G data from all these seven boats every ten seconds.
Data is critical unless all that stuff is calibrated perfectly you really can't
say what winds you're sailing in. And the kit is reliable we've got great new
displays on the boat with the H5000 displays
and we've had no problems at all with those this whole
lap of the planet that we've just done.
The B&G instruments have been very reliable throughout the race. WTP hasn't missed a
beat performance is superb but also for the
displays connected with it constantly being hosed with water, smashed by waves on deck.
Amazing how well this electronic equipment lasts in those conditions.
Where we've got to as a fleet and how competitive we are, it's been an incredibly challenging race.
It's been a real physical and mental test.
It's incredible to see how hard we managed to push these boats.
and it just goes to show you know how
competitive the racing is, how hard people are pushing and you know, and
the lengths you've gotta go to, to winning this race now.
After the race you go through this phase of happiness or disappointment at the finish line.
And then you get some distance to it and then you start to recognize and
appreciate more, regardless of the result, what you actually went through.
And you realize that you know, yes you have these amazing moments that you do love
you know midnight sailing, full moon, 40 knots of wind, big waves, stars.
I mean it's insane the experience.
And you start to recognize that when you have some distance to it.
and then you appreciate it
and then you want to do it again.
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