Day 14 Post By Jon
4 Over 10
Day 14 July 21 8:00 A.M. (154 Nautical Miles (NM) from Hawaii)
204 NM Made Good to Hawaii over the past 24 Hours. Another record for Avion!
Day 14 3:25 P.M. (911.8 NM from Hawaii)
GPS is indicating 14 hours to destination @ 3:00 A.M. Local Time
The wind has dropped considerable since I left the helm 1 hours ago; from 20 to 25 down o 15 to 16 Knots. It is hot, humid and the nav station bench broke so this post will be a relatively short one.
Juan woke for his morning watch at Noon. and felt totally miserable. He got very little sleep because the boat had been pitching from side to side navigation the 10 foot swells for the past two off watches. Every muscle in his body ached so he grabbed the vitamin I bottle (Ibeiprophin) and popped 4 pills and took a health gulp of water. Everything was wet, his shirt, his pants, his body and his sole; it is now crunch time. As he struggled to get on his wet gear he realized that he was bonking; a biking term when your body runs out of fuel and water. Before going up on deck he decided to scrounge around for some food, his portion of the small Mahi Mahi last night wasn’t cutting it. While filling his bottle from the second water bladder he discovered it too was empty, time to break into the backup water supply. They included an additional 22 gallons 1 gallon jugs strategically placed throughout the boat to create the most bodily harm as he discovered the previous morning. As a requirement of the race they have to make sure that there is 6 gallons remaining when Avion crosses the finish line or she will be disqualified. Now for food, all of the bagels are gone, he wasn’t up for making oatmeal, too hot, so he settled on fixing himself two salami burritos. After eating the burritos and downing a bottle of water, the Vitamin I was kicking in and he started to feel human again. As he came on deck he could see over cast skies, 3 fellow crew members huddled together on the high side of the cockpit and all still managing a smile, but all looking like Juan was feeling. As in any long distance race the last portion is always the hardest. There is the psychological aspect of getting closer to the finish line which tends to appear to not get any closer. There is the fatigue factor where the lack of sleep and constantly supporting yourself due to the perpetual listing. There is the emotional factor where any little task becomes a monumental challenge. For example last night the crew had a difficult sail change that resulted in a lively discussion about us all being sure to be even more safety conscious because now is the time accidents will happen. So far so good and the entire crew, especially Juan, is being very careful.
While on watch the crew were talking about last night’s Children’s Hour. While the crew was munching on the Dorado that sacrificed it’s life for their dinner nourishment, Skipper Tom, paid Juan a supreme compliment. He placed Juan’s name as Avion’s nomination into the Outstanding Crew competition. This should cause some consternation with the Pacific Cup’s Race Committee because there is not a Juan on Avion’s crew list. Tom explained the Juan was a stowaway and was being nominated for providing entertainment for the crew and his eloquent, verbose and embellished blog posts that had very little concerned for accuracy. Tom then made a shameless plug for his avionbianca.com web site.
After an hour on watch it was Juan’s turn at the helm. At this point Juan is a bit anxious. Could it have anything to do with 20 to 25 wind, 2 foot wind waves over 10 foot swells, 9 plus knots of boat speed, the fact that the display on the digital campus he has grown accustom to lost its display or that fact that he is totally exahausted? Juan gingerly scoots back behind the main sheet traveler and gets into helm position just in front of John as he is concentrating on the new conditions and displays while John explains the apparent wind angles for the course that is making Avion sound like a freight train. John hollers, “Do you have the tiller”, as he slowly releases his pressure on the helm. Juan yells “No”. Both Juan and Jon simultaneously pulled the teller as hard as possible as Avion started to round up. They managed to recover her before she went into a broach. By this time Juan had been acclimated to the conditions and was ready to take the helm. Over the course of his hour at the helm he reached a personal best in the Rocket Club to 11.20 Knots with 3 other entries into the club; 4 over 10 knots in an hour not bad. Nico commented that during that time Juan’s expression oscillated from deep concentration to big ass smiles. John is still the Chairman of the Rocket Club with 11.76 Knots, Nico Vice Chairman with 11.4 knots and Juan holding the Secretary slot with his 11.2 knots.
Day 14 5:00 P.M. (80 NM from Hawaii)
We just replaced the smaller spinnaker with our largest with wind speeds around 15 knots. Nicco now has 26 marks on his forearm, if any more he will need to go up to his biceps. Juan explained to him that Avion will not have enough headsail changes during this race for him to worry about the tattoo marks going across his face.
So much for the short post, the nomination must have gone to his head.
avionbianca 
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