Pirates receive warm welcome upon arrival in Melbourne 23 January 2006 (Melbourne, Australia) Paul Cayard and his Pirates of the Caribbean team crossed the finishing line off Williamstown, Melbourne at 2325 hrs (local time) to a warm reception from the awaiting flotilla. The team has overcome much adversity on Leg 2 of the Volvo Ocean […]

0730 UTC – 50 miles to Melbourne We are sailing down the coast to the southwest of Port Phillip Bay in 30 knots of wind. We are taking it easy as there is plenty of breeze for a boat without the ability to cant its keel and not much to gain. The sea is very […]

There are many aspects to this race. It’s a high level grand prix and associated with that,goes the stress and demand of competition. Due to the length and physical demands of the event, and each leg within it, human personalities cycle up and down , randomly and often. Being able to keep a grip on […]

Position: 35,1.90S , 117,53.16E Speed: 0 knots, Course: 152 deg. The repairs to the Black Pearl have been completed and she will leave the dock in Albany within the hour. It will then take her 1 more hour to reach the point at which she suspended racing yesterday. From that point in time, she will […]

Seahorse January 2006 We are close to completing our first leg of this Volvo Ocean Race. It hasn’t been without incident. We have broken the vang off the mast, hit an object in the water which damaged our rudder, and incurred some damage to our keel support structure. At this point, some 4000 miles into […]

Well, it is Saturday the 14th where we are and the crew are all talking about how the keel “made it”. Some of my guys are pretty concerned. I am starting to be more comfortable with the advice that we are receiving from our designers that our damage does not affect the critical elements of […]

2300 UTC Another 12 hours on, we have had another round of phone calls and information exchange with the designers of our boat. We have damage to secondary support structure in the area of the keel. That means that the main structure is integral but the bits that bond it to the boat have been […]

Position: 39,14.15S , 59,24.9E Speed: 7 knots, Course: 32 deg. We hit the wall. We have hit light air and are watching the others sail up to us. We are still being tormented by the old cold front that we fell off the back of about 48 hours ago. This is the same front that […]

Position: 42,30.94S , 46,56.79E Speed: 14 knots, Course: 59 deg. We have been battling with ABN 2 all day. They caught up to us and nearly passed us in 20 knots reaching conditions. They recorded the best runs of the four lead boats on the last two position reports. Their extra form stability was perfect […]

43 south 25 East / Boat speed: 25 knots, Course 100True We found the wind, finally. It has been a slow start to Leg 2 but now we are on the “highway” heading east and chewing up miles. We throttled back on the second night when things got rough and Ericsson and Brasil 1 broke. […]

That was a crazy start. I haven’t been on a boat without steerage for years. And it happened not just once but a few times in the first 2 hours of the race. Boat were backing down, gybing upwind, it was chaotic. The start itself wasn’t bad. We had about 5 knots of wind and […]

Tough day for the Pirates today. The day started off with some bad news in that our man Justin (Juggy) Clougher was not able to sail due to a violent case of the stomach flu. We were lucky to have a very good sailor working in our sail loft, Jeremy Smith, being able to fill […]

We are about 100 miles west of Cape Town, heading east. We will get back to the dock sometime early this afternoon. It has been good to get out here on the sea for a couple of days and run the boat and all its systems. Everything is working well. The first day we had […]

We have had a very good last couple of days here in Cape Town and The Black Pearl is all back together. As per the plan she went in the water today and the team is set to go sailing tomorrow. Paul Cayard The Black Pearl Skipper

Most of the Pirate crew arrived in Cape Town yesterday to join the shore team, some of whom have been here since the 25th of November. We have a great set up here again thanks to the help of Pescanova. Our boat is inside a purpose built shed with all of our containers around it […]

After properly inspecting the Black Pearl, we are now in a position to report on the damage. 1. Bulkhead C, midway from the bow to the mast, has broken. There was shearing of the frame along with compression of the – vertical beam. 2. The “bomber doors” which seal the Keel box at the hull, […]

The Black Pearl has safely arrived to Cascais, and we are fully committed to returning to the Volvo Ocean Race as soon as possible.The shore team has arrived with our tools, clothes, containers and has set up an infrastructure so we are functional. Engineers from Farr International as well as boat builders from Green Marine […]

I am onboard the Black Pearl right now sailing to Vigo for tomorrow’s start. Both Justins’ are with me, Clougher and Ferris and about 15 guests. Also a few of the great Pirates shore team are with us to make some final checks. I am in the nav station downloading some weather with Rosco and […]

Sanxenxo, 5 November 2005 Classification after In port Race 1 1. Ericsson Racing Team (SWE), Skipper Neal McDonald (GBR): pts 3.5 2. Brasil 1 (BRA), Skipper Torben Grael (BRA): pts 3.0 3. PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN (USA), Skipper Paul Cayard (USA): pts 2.5 4. movistar (SPA), Skipper Bouwe Bekking (NED): pts 2.0 5. ABN Amro […]