The Black Pearl’s in Pretty Good Shape

I’m writing this week’s report from the Pirate’s base in Marina da Gloria, Rio de Janeiro. Following on from our strong finish into Rio, the team is upbeat and determined to continue our move up the leader board.

The crew have now taken a few days off, either to go and visit the sights and sounds of Brazil or fly home for some rest and relaxation. They’re due back tomorrow when they’ll get to work on the jobs at hand.

The Black Pearl’s in pretty good shape, the best of any of the stopovers so far. We’re tackling a huge job list but there’s been a major change in this stopover. During previous stopovers we’ve had major repairs to carry out, but in Rio we’re ticking jobs off which are purely maintenance based.

The Black Pearl was out of the water for a week and just went back in this afternoon. Every element of the boat has been thoroughly cleaned and checked to ensure she is in peak racing condition. With a new coat of paint on the deck, The Black Pearl will also be looking her best for the Disney and Pescanova VIPs, as well as a number of journalists, coming out sailing with us this week.

As I sit here in the beautiful city of Rio, it’s extremely difficult to do anything other than go to the beach (not that we’ve had the chance yet!). The heat is sweltering, so much so that we’ve had air conditioning installed on the boat for the guys working down below. The team have consumed in excess of 2,000 bottles/cans of fluids and we’ve only been here just over a week! The conditions for working have been virtually unbearable, but they’ve stuck at it and powered on.

This stopover we’ve beefed up the shore team which has proven invaluable. We’ve learned by experience that it’s crucial to have the right people in place.

I’d like to take this opportunity to introduce you to three valuable members of our shore team. First off is our most senior Pirate, Murray McDonnell who everyone knows as ‘Murph’. At 55, Murph brings the team a wealth of experience and boasts six America’s Cups to his credit. Murph also worked with Dennis Connor throughout the last Whitbread (97/98) aboard ‘Toshiba’.

Murph was a recruit of the ‘Pimp my Ride’ Academy, at the very beginning of the race in Vigo, when we enrolled the help of as many boat builders as we could, in order to get The Black Pearl ready for the start. Murph returned to help us when we had to divert to Portugal and then joined us again in Cape Town, where I asked him to join the team full time. Without a doubt, Murph has become indispensable to the team.

From the oldest to the youngest on the team, there’s Rikard Grunnan from San Francisco, who celebrated a milestone birthday this weekend. Rikard is a recent high school graduate and is taking a year off before heading to Arizona to study Mechanical Engineering.

Rikard’s day is as varied as you might imagine when it comes to maintaining a VO70. One day Rikard maybe doing carbon repairs and then he’ll hop over to maintain the boat’s many components. He also has his power boat license so he’s the official driver of the Captain’s Protector and in charge of getting some of the team from one side of the harbour in Niteroi to Rio.

I’d also like to introduce you to Craig Gurnell, a 30 year old sail maker from Whangarei, New Zealand. When it comes to sails, Craig’s your man – whether it’s repairs, shape changes or logos. Craig’s job is to make sure that the team sails as fast as possible – and that the sails stay in one piece. I say in one piece because the crew is only allowed 24 sails from start to finish. Craig started sailing when he was just ten and has worked in the industry for close to 13 years. This is Craig’s first round the world race and he hopes to crew on a VO70 in one of the upcoming VORs.

Last week the focus was on preparing The Black Pearl to go back in the water. This week we’ll be welcoming the sailing team back and looking forward to our events shoreside with Disney, Zegna and Pescanova.

We’ll keep you posted from Rio.

Kimo Worthington

General Manager

Pirates of the Caribbean

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From onboard The Black Pearl

Seahorse March 2006

Position: 47,48.88S , 50,11.62W

Speed: 21 knots, Course: 56 deg.

My third rounding of Cape Horn was the best. We got to within two miles of the Cape and having been there before, it was all about enjoying the moment this time. There was one other person onboard who had been there with me in 1998, Justin (Juggy) Clougher, and there were four of us rounding for the third time. That made it special and we decided to live it up. We took plenty of photos, video, laughed and reminisced, and after we completed the second of two gybes in 33 knots of wind, we broke out the cigars and sat on the stack and really enjoyed the moment. That’s a far cry from how we did it on EF, but hey, that was then and this is now and I am older and smarter. We coughed up a few miles but it was worth it. It certainly was a different Southern Ocean leg this time, with the ice waypoints keeping the fleet north. No ice, no snow, only got the gloves on for the last three days. It was probably very smart of the organizers to keep this event safe and under control. These are very new boats and not all of the bugs are worked out.

This Volvo Ocean Race has been very interesting for me. From the first meeting with the Disney executives in Burbank last May, which captivated my imagination and passion, to the difficulties of getting the boat built and launched in 5 months, to finding a great team in short order, to living the breakdowns, and now finally, getting some traction and being able to race. What a fantastic 10 months!

The VOR 70’s are amazing machines. Very light at 14 tons and very powerful with lots of sail area, they are quick in all conditions. In big breeze, they are extremely fun to sail…like a dinghy. They plane incessantly at speeds up to 35 knots. We have hit 39 knots as top speed on the paddle wheel, which at those speeds is out of the water 50% of the time. The inshore races are a blast…the boats change positions very easily and downwind crossing situations with two boats coming at each other at 20 knots of speed is not uncommon.

In the ocean, they take quite a pounding at those speeds. With flat sections and almost no rocker, they pound shudder, creak, and bang along. You never know what is making the sounds you here. They sound like things that are breaking, like broken glass or breaking carbon, but obviously it isn’t because if it were, we would not have made it around the Horn. The ride down below, in the nav station in particular, is much rougher than in the 60’s. Violent is a polite way to put it. The carbon also makes the boats very noisy. The water rushing by and easing of winches are very loud sounds inside this drum. The whole package adds to the fatigue.

As far as the boats go and the fleet, it appears that Jaun K has hit it closer to the mark than the others. ABN1 in particular is a very fast row of seats….very well thought out from many aspects. Beam gives you form stability, that is obvious. But it also gives you sheeting angle, a wider platform for stacking, and more room inside. There is a downside to beam and that is drag. But it appears that they overcome their drag penalty at around 10 knots upwind and reaching and 20 knots running, again because these boats have so much sail area and are so easily powered up. ABN’s inner forestay system is clever as well. They have their number 4 jib on a roller furler that sets on an inner forestay that is tensioned with a hydraulic ram. This allows for easy deployment of that sail and it is used when changing sails which set on the head stay as they have no foil. Hanks are safer in these boats as there is so much water coming down the foredeck that it is easy to loose a sail, and or a person, overboard in a change. They also have two smaller rudder which works well when heeled and a lot of other details which are working very well for them. The complete package is very, very fast. Having said that, they are very sticky in light air. So we have to hope we will find some light air races like the Sanxenxo inshore or possibly the finish up here in Brasil in a few days time, and pack some points on those ABN boats.

I have really learned a lot form this project. Sails are a whole other world when sailing at tight apparent wind angles all the time. Sizing and shape is extremely critical to speed. This is something catamaran sailors have no doubt known for years. The engineering, materials and mechanics behind the canting keels is also very interesting and important for the future of sailing, not just racing but cruising as well. I am enjoying being challenged by these new things, working with my team, and learning so much.

Pirates of the Caribbean is a great team onshore and at sea. We have been very fortunate to get such a strong group of people together and I have really enjoyed working with all of them. To see 30 individuals come together as a team through hard work is really beautiful. The common denominator is the project, and the more experiences the project has, the tighter the team is. Obviously being linked to such a popular brand as “Pirates of the Caribbean” has been a lot of fun too.

This campaign will be over before we know it. June 18th in Gothenburg is little more than 100 days away. The long legs are over and I hope the big repair jobs are too. No it is about racing and scoring points. It should be a lot of fun coming down the stretch.

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We are Happy to be in Brasil

Position: 23,19.8S , 43,16.50W

Speed: 15 knots, Course: 8 deg.

What an incredible afternoon and night. I have never been in so much rain. It has been one squall after another with huge down pours. Of course this reeked havoc on the wind. It was a 15 hour work out-changing sails one after another.

We got passed by Brasil yesterday afternoon but we some how managed a little better in all the crazy conditions to grab second place back. We broke the watch system off at the point when Brasil passed us. No one wanted to go to sleep until we had passed them back. To have to sprint like that right at the end of a 6700 mile-three week leg- was tough for everyone.Brasil and ABN2 also.

We are happy to be here in Brasil and happy with our result.

That is about it for now. Too tired for more. Tomorrow.

Paul Cayard

Pirates of the Caribbean

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The Pirates claim 2nd place after tough battle to the finish of Leg 4

PRESS RELEASE

It was a tough battle to the finish but the Pirates stayed strong, and finished in second place, just 30 minutes ahead of AMN ARMO TWO after the longest, toughest leg of the race. The Pirates of the Caribbean finished Leg 4 at 07.06 UTC, moving the team into third position overall in the Volvo Ocean Race.

With a winning start out of Wellington, the Pirates of the Caribbean team dominated centre stage the whole leg. It was a close race the entire leg and just a few hours before the finish Brasil 1 joined in the jostle for the finish, but were soon passed by ABN AMRO TWO. However, the Pirates refused to loosen their grip and captivated their awaiting audience by pulling out the stops to claim second place. The Pirates were welcomed into Rio in true Brazilian style.

“The weather at the end was phenomenal! There were horrid squalls out there and we were constantly changing sails to keep up with the changing conditions. With our hard earned second place in jeopardy, we stopped the watch system 20 hours before the finish to give it all we had. A great effort after 6,700 miles and 21 days! I am very proud of the way the guys responded to the challenge,” commented Skipper Paul Cayard.

Before leaving for Leg 4, and arguably the toughest leg of the race, Cayard felt that The Black Pearl was ready to challenge the opposition and give his team its well-deserved glory. Upon arriving in Rio de Janeiro, Cayard explained the hard and fast racing at the end: “We knew for a couple of days what would happen, that the weather would bring the trailing yachts up to us. It was pretty tight at the end with Brasil 1 and then with AMN AMRO TWO.”

“We’ve got a good boat and a fast team – we’re very solid. It’s satisfying from a management perspective to see the Pirates of the Caribbean team and project coming together so well. We were happy with our performance in the Melbourne inport race and 3rd into Wellington. We worked really hard as a crew and with the shore team; finding an answer to the keel ram problems and adopting different solutions than movistar and Ericsson,” continued Cayard. The Black Pearl sailed close to 8,000 nautical miles on Leg 4, including the notorious Cape Horn. For Cayard, this was his third time rounding Cape Horn and whilst nerve-wracking, it is ultimately the most exhilarating milestone to achieve. “To get the boat safely through the Southern Ocean weighed fairly heavily on me as we departed Wellington. The Southern Ocean, for me, is the reason for doing the Volvo Ocean Race; it

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Cayard, un pirata con i baffi – Intervista Esclusiva a Paul Cayard

Magro, elegante con la sua maglietta bianca da Pirate of the Caribbean, in grandisma, porta i 47 anni come i baffi, sempre neri come il carbone e i capelli. Come un ragazzino insomma, anche dopo 6.100 miglia in pieno oceano e oltre venti giorni della seconda durissima tappa dellavolvo Ocean Race, la Città del Capo Melbourne. Cayard arriva pedalando disinvolto in bicicletta sulla banchina di Port Phillip dove il traguardo è stato tagliato per primo, come già per la prima tappa, da Abn Amro One dello skipper neozelandese Mike Sanderson. La barca dei quei Pirati. The Black Pearl, è invece arrivata solo.

Full Article (Adobe Acrobat Required)

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Slow Progress to the Finish

Position: 26,7.36S , 44,19.28W

Speed: 7 knots, Course: 333 deg.

It has been very slow going for the past 24 hours. Added to that there seems to be no pattern to the weather. There is no trend. The wind is blowing basically directly from Rio so we are making very slow progress to the finish. If there were some pattern to recognize – it would be a lot less stressful. We could make a strategy and execute.

The GRIB told us that we would catch easterlies over the top of this high bubble and reach to the finish. ABN AMRO One appears to being doing that from the position reports. They have had to make some investing tacks on port (you can tell when they do this as their course is to the north east and they usually loose a bit of mileage) but it is working for them. However they are 80 miles more north than we. So seeing what they have we have invested a bit on port tack to try to get to the east and north. So far no luck.

Rather we seem to be blocked by the high bubble and if this is the case then there are a myriad of possibilities as to what will happen. So we have to try to stay between our opposition and the finish so that as they close in on us we at least have a chance of getting picked up by what ever it is they have. Knowing where they are or where they are going hour to hour is a bit hard to do when we only get a report every six hours-but at least we get that. So we are basically in a holding pattern.

It is hard not to think that this is a bit unfortunate.that the wind direction couldn’t be from any other direction so we could make steady progress and just finish off these 200 miles and get our second place. But this is the nature of sailing and especially when you get close to land and Rio is notoriously light and fickle.

It is very hot out here. Not much wind so it is hard to get cool enough below to sleep. We still have food and diesel so no urgencies there yet.

We are the best we can with what we have.

PC

Pirates of the Caribbean

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We Came to a Grinding Halt

Position: 25,30.60S , 44,13.59W

Speed: 11 knots, Course: 40 deg.

After the last sked we came to a grinding halt. It was depressing to see that Brasil1 and ABN AMRO Two had made big gains and were in the new wind while we were becalmed. Shortly thereafter we got hit with a squall. It was all hands for about 30 minutes as we had to shift from light air mode – all sails forward.to 25 knot mode – all sails aft. Not to mention that we had to get a spinnaker up and the jib down and bagged.

After we got under control we looked around and saw a boat about 6 miles behind. We are not sure who it is of the three that were behind. We have since put about 4 miles on them and can no longer see them. We are currently still being dictated to by this massive cloud line although it is only blowing 13 knots now.

It is going to be long night. The situation is very volatile with this front passing over the fleet and all the associated squalls. There can be 50 degree wind changes and 10 knots difference in wind speed. Big gains and losses!

PC

Pirates of the Caribbean

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Slogging Away

Position: 27,54.18S , 44,43.83W

Speed: 10 knots, Course: 342 deg.

Just slogging away upwind in 15 knots today. The good news is that there has been more wind than the forecast but still upwind which is slow going. Beautiful weather though – clear skies – sailing in our shorts and T-shirts. Fairly smooth sea. Nice moon at night now too – about three quarters.

The GRIB predicts that those behind will gain on us all the way to the finish. We have to negotiate one more high pressure cell tomorrow. Looks like ABN AMRO One might sneak through ahead of the high widening – but we may yet catch the worst which would allow those following to make big gains in a short period of time. However – that is just a forecast. It could all be different tomorrow and we might skate through as well. One thing it is not is straight forward and simple. We will just have to deal with it whatever it is.

In any case it appears that we will finish sometime on Saturday. I think we will be ready for that. It really is a long way from the Horn to a Rio.

Going to get some rest now if I can. It is really hot inside the boat. Sea temp is 27.

PC

Pirates of the Caribbean

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Eco-nomerics

Numbers games are what we play out here. It’s all about numbers!

Pressures, angles, days, grams, minutes, calories, codes, watches, deniers, millibars, legs, degrees….you name it we count it, graph it, record it, bag it, everything it.

Didn’t really see that much in the way of wild life closing into the Horn. The last few days were building and wild so can’t even remember if I even had me bloody eyes open!! It was wet and fast, grey and socked in most of the time. Normally the bird life hangs out around the wave tops, but we didn’t see much for those few day. Sea life=nil also. They must go deep or there’s free beer somewhere else or something!!

Situation changes around the corner of course. Temp goes up a few degrees and the Falkland Islands etc are huge breed grounds for tons of species especially cobbers the Alby gliders. It’s a PLEASURE to see the abundance of these all appear in blended company and plenty of them. Big ones, little ones, all shapes. Falklands current underneath our keel pushing us north-ish and obviously provides good pickings for the birdlife. Not much visible in the way of fish in fact not even a fishing boat.

Anyways as the water temp has shot way up now to 75f 30c (pool temp) these bird crowds have changed and diminished which is sad. Guess a bloke will have to plan another trip down to visit these wonderful comrade observers of our panic stricken furious noisy dramatic passages thru their latitudes.

Feel a bit empty now they have gone. Saw the last albatross yesterday around 35deg South latitude.

Looking for more company (not VOR70) but pretty quiet at the moment. Passed our first sea litter 2 1/2 days ago, looked like a shampoo bottle. We were going too fast to grab it unfortunately. Just a harsh reminder we are coming back out of the pure Southern Ocean into civilized waters!! Grrr Such a shame to have to endure these sights.

Every bit helps we can all try harder!! Pollution on board is reaching Geiger level as the warm conditions are igniting cultures and blending bouquets into gagging fumes. Our mid boat is every bit the dog pound and words CANNOT describe the ablution amenities. Decorum will stop us there.

No names will be mentioned as international sensitivities are important to protect and should remain intact. However I should urge any customs and frontier personnel coming aboard in a few days to at least “bring a hankie” !!

Yep that’s it if you got this far you are stoic beyond words or need to get a life…… A WILDLIFE !!!

Eco-watch out

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Slow going is the word.

Position: 32,34.83S , 47,11.37W

Speed: 11 knots, Course: 26 deg.

The fleet has had very light wind for the past 48 hours. We have gone through two transitions; one around a disintegrating low pressure cell and last night traversing a high pressure cell that moved across the course from west to east. The team onboard the Black Pearl have done a nice job of getting through both and maintained our second place position.

I thought we would have made bigger gains on ABN1 but they are doing a nice job up there.

Each of these transitions requires a huge amount of work for Jules and I.. Before the transition comes we work on all the possible realities. Is it coming earlier? If so, what will that mean to the optimal route we should take. Is it coming later? What if the whole wind field shifted east? Check the satellite pictures. Check the Chilean chart. Check the Brazilian chart. Verify the position of the feature on the GRIB. The uncertainty posed by any change requires thorough investigation.

So we work intensely for four hours together then give the crew guidelines and then we get some rest. It is now 11:56 UTC so I am up having my breakfast and getting ready to download the latest weather which comes at 1200. The weather comes every six hours at; 000, 0600, 1200 and 1800. The skeds come at 0400, 1000, 1600 and 2200. When the skeds come we get more

weather information by deducing what the other boats have from their performance over the past 6 hours as well as an instantaneous reading of what they had at the moment they were polled which is 5 minutes before each sked is issued. So there is basically always something to work on.

I went for the shower yesterday and new clothes. What a great feeling. The best part is to have clean hair. I can actually run my fingers through my hair now. Before it was as thick as one of those bristle door mats you have outside your front door. two weeks of salt water, etc.

The sailing has been intense but fairly easy for the last two days. The wind has never blown over 12 knots. The temperatures are beautiful.27 air and 25 sea temp. The nights have been spectacular. Clear skies with stars a bright as you can ever see. I love to just sit on deck in the middle of the night and take it all in. These are special days.very hard to come by.

It looks like it will be about three more days for us to do the last 600 miles.pretty slow given the speed of these boats. There will be at least one more transition and then possibly a park up in front of Rio depending on what time of day we get there. We will have to transition from whatever gradient wind we have to the local breeze (sea breeze or night breeze) in order to get into the Bay. You need a bit of luck there not to get caught out.

PC

Pirates of the Caribbean

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