I mentioned this earlier, check out this video. Find the rest here.

I have been trying to keep politics out of this blog for a while, but I had to say something about this important visit.

I applaud Stephen Harper for making the decision to meet with the Dalai Lama publicly instead of the more common and cowardly option of meeting in private to avoid policital problems with China.

That said, I hope that some of His Holiness’s message gets through to our fearless leader. I think the government is simply responding to opinion polls in making this meeting happen, but there is almost no one on this earth who can not have a big smile on their face when listening His Holiness speak.

Stephen, I hope you end up with big smiles of compassion on your face this afternoon. Canada and the world needs your compassion.

The race reports on the Transat 650 site have been frustratingly slow and at times confusing because of that endearing “franglais” dialect. However, this morning’s report really conveys why this race is so special.

“Every day life on the Transat 6,50 Charente-Maritime/Bahia’s pontoons: tears, laughs, and long hugs… All the sailors have been through hell and paradise during the race. And all of them are proud and satisfied of what they have done.”

Just getting to the start line takes two years of commitment, every financial resource at your disposal, thousands of hours working on the boat just to keep up with the fleet and thousands more trying to make the boat faster.

Then there is the race. Leg two of this race would have been described as carnage on this side of the pond: five dismastings and numerous breakages forced competitors into port to make repairs. There were many heroics on the water, like Adrian Hardy’s amazing feat of repairing and raising his fallen mast at sea. Many of favorites to win, like Isabelle Joscke and Sam Manuard, had serious breakages that forced them to make repairs at sea, but in the end they fought to the finish.

This is what makes this race so special. Things that would make Joe Blow sailor radio for a rescue don’t faze mini sailors. They fight until the end, even if the victory is lost, they finish.

I can’t imagine the feelings that you must have coming into the dock in Brazil. At the end of two or three years, the project is done. The friends and family that have supported you are on the dock to welcome you in and you have crossed an ocean in a tiny, over canvassed boat. No matter where you place in the race, this is enough to make it all worth it.

All of this is ahead of me. Watching the sailors finish in Salvador is nothing short of totally inspiring. It makes me realize how hard it is going to be, how emotional it will be, and how totally worth it it will be in the end.

The French often talk about “making beautiful stories” and this is the happy ending for these sailors.

David Sineau, who was second across the line had this to say:

” The repair list is long. The most penalizing damage was the loss of my gennaker just before the doldrums. This is actually the sail we need the most to help us get out of the doldrums. This might have been for the better as I had to steer away from the rhumb line to sail better angles under spinnaker. I then lost all my wind instruments because of three birds who damaged them. So no more wind speed and wind angle….truly blind. Then the torn gennaker passsing under the boat damaged the keel foil, affecting greatly the hydrodynamic… Yves Le Blevec is a superb winner. He sailed really fast… I had a lot of fun sailing. I never pushed myself over the edge. My training on the water for the last 3 years paid off, I did not do any broach, which cost so much to my competitors.”

Yves Le Blevec, the former boat captain on the maxi catamaran Orange, crossed the finish line in Salvador this morning.

Because his radio was broken he had no idea he was in the lead for most of the second leg, so you can just imagine how he felt coming into the finish to find he had won the race!

Here’s an except from the Trasat website:

“It is an incredible, extraordinary feeling. I live for that project only since two years already, a project that my partner “Actual” and I built with a common aim… Winning only… As we did today in Salvador de Bahia! But that entire story is huge. Remember where I come from. I prepared both my boat and I these lasts months without knowing if I would leave. (- Yves knew that he could line up at start only a few days before the start as 4 other sailors -) After the first leg I really was under pressure because of my opponents level: Isa (Joschke), Sam (Manuard), but also Hardy, Deshayes and all the others… I have belt along as much as I could, without resting, and only at few moments I was worried for my boat and wondered if all that was reasonable.

When I passed the Equator where I dismasted in 2005, I had the feeling to be free. And, I had to concentrate again on my objectives by saying to myself “but you haven’t done anything yet, you still have half an Ocean to cross.” And at that moment, my boat fulfilled me… Easy, gliding in the trade winds, being incredibly well balanced. Yet I solicited it so much. Again I really doubt in the ‘Pot au Noir’. I have slow down a first time, and when I believed that the Pot was a bad memory; a monstrous cloud filled with storms and rain stuck me up and punished me by down pouring again and again… I, then, thought that the other competitors were cooler more east. I constantly was afraid to be overtaken under Brazilian Coasts. Without having any news since 6 days, I had to keep being aggressive. The boat did the rest…”

This Sunday from 1-3pm, the team will be hosting an Open Boat at the Kingston Yacht Club. We want to give the public a chance to look around the boat and to learn a little more about living aboard a mini and to tell people a little more about the race. Which is currently underway.

Everyone will be able to get aboard 680 to take a look around down below and to get a sense of what it’s like sleeping, eating and living aboard this tiny offshore weapon.

We’ll have a demonstration on how to cook freeze dried food with Chef Eric Baron (trust me you don’t generally need a chef for freeze dried…), we’ll have a slide show with some pictures and video of Minis sailing in the current Mini Transat and also give a little talk on how we interpret weather forecasts before heading out and while under way.

I think this will be a really fun opportunity to talk with folks about the project and to show people first hand how I manage sail this extreme little boat all by myself.

Hope to see you there!

Yesterday afternoon I got back from practice out in the lake and it was a pretty crazy 24 hours! I went out to the Ontario Buoy and back to practice, and as usual Lake Ontario served as a great training ground.

I had been watching the weather carefully for few days before I left, so I knew that I would be in for some intense weather. We started out on Friday night in a fairly sedate NW 10 knots that built to a pretty solid W 20 knots. I was barely able to make it close hauled on starboard tack once I was out in the open lake.

There is absolutely nothing that can describe how uncomfortable a mini can be bashing upwind in 20+ knots and 1-2 metre swell. The noise and jerky motion of the boat falling off of the tops of waves is so violent. I drove the boat for the first 8 hours and then let “Auto” do a lot of the work after Psyche Shoal so I could nap a little. Same schedule as before, trying to sleep for 20 min and then getting up to check the heading, speed and look for traffic. Did a lot of changing gears, reefing and un-reefing as the wind speed changed.

I met with two freighters on this leg, dealt with between naps. It’s always scary when you encounter freighters. You must determine their heading and speed and alter course accordingly, and both times we passed I had to alter course and we passed quite close. These things are huge, like floating cities on the water, and they are almost always coming straight at you.

I rounded around 0200 and then bore off for the ride home. I un-reefed the main and kept the jib as gusts were up to 25 knots and I didn’t want to blow out the kite. The breeze was up and down and shifting between W to NW. As I got to passed Point Petre and headed toward Psyche Shoal, I had a nice 12-15 knot breeze that let me get the kite up for a bit. The breeze built as I past the Ducks and I had to take the kite down for fear of it exploding.

Passing into the outer harbour, I had a beautiful rainbow on one side, and scary dark wet clouds on the other side with blue sky and 30-35 knots on the beam in between. What could be more perfect! It was fast and furious sailing, with the boat lifting up and surfing down the 1-2 m swell. I was averaging 9-10 knots (12 knots was the high speed, the fastest 680 has ever gone!) and I have to admit that I was a little nervous about this, as my pilot had finally given up because the batteries were on their way out. Without the pilot, I had to completely stop the boat to make any sail changes, and with the big breeze and waves, changing sails is a rough job.

I had to put in a couple of reefs on the final approach to the harbour so I could gybe safely down to the club. It built even further as I was approaching the club and I could have turned around and gone out again, but I was totally done and ready for a beer and some sleep.

When I got home, Alison had a hearty meal of spaghetti (sauce done on the slow cooker, so the house smelled awesome!) and we had a great dinner together. I fell asleep on the couch and Alison got me into bed around 2200.

(Aside: It’s Alison’s birthday today, Sunday, so be sure to wish her a happy belated.)

I think these training runs have tonnes of value and I am really enjoying the sailing. This practice was about heavy weather and I definitely learned a lot about handling in relatively heavy air. (I’m sure I will be sailing in a lot heavier than 35 sometimes…) I hope to keep the boat in the water for as long as I can, and continue testing both the boat and myself.

I know, I know: Pics or it didn’t happen. Well I was too busy to take any pictures, but here is a video of a figaro training in similar conditions with the same sail combination as I had. Like I said, fast and furious sailing!

I’m going sailing, but here is something to entertain you at work on a Friday…

The Chemical Brothers totally rock!!!