Range to mark 268 - 7/17 11:20 update from Andy

7/17
11:20 PST

We can basically see Hawaii. Range to mark 268, time to mark 1 day 16 hours. Only one more overnight and one more whole day. We are hoping the winds freshen or head to give us an advantage over our arch-rivals in the race. The 8 o'clock rollcall position reports have us arriving 1.5 hours behind them. If we continue to push hard and get some more luck we can totally close that gap. We are looking forward to a photo finish.

We tamed the Monster last night. Mostly light winds with a couple of squalls. Ever since we blew up Captain America (RIP) we've had to go big. That thing was a beast, unruly, ugly, loud, and really uncooperative. After riding her hard last yesterday I think we found her true soul- she's just a gentle beast that needs a firm hand and a rubber ball(Ed. note: The rest of the crew disavows these comments) (Andy’s note: bob is just jealous because we took his ball gag).

The rest of Brainwaves is doing great. She has a few more wrinkles and some new creaks and groans, but no broken arms. Nothing a few thousand more dollars wont fix. We are already figuring out how to win the PacCup in 2012.

The crew continues to be awesome. Everyone is making the spinnaker dance, which is most important, but the space on the boat down't seem too small. we have 5 guys on a 35 foot racer-cruiser and I haven't even wanted to kill anyone. I know for a fact that everyone LOVES my armpit smell and my near-constant Monty Python impressions (Ed. note: Andy's “odor-to-humor” ratio just barely within acceptable limits). I will look forward to some alone time, a shower, and some wife-squeezing when I get home.

Love Andy.

PS: BANG! th Port Spinnaker crane just broke! We had better get the spinnaker down and relaunched.
PPS: Well that could have been worse. We thought that might happen. The spinnaker douse and set went well (except for the hourglass that went up the first time, but we dropped it and flew it again without any difficulty) and I don't think we will do any active repair this time. I hope the other crane doesn't go, but we have a pretty good contingency plan if it does. I'm glad that happened in the day.
PPPS: Just got off the phone with the support crew. Those guys are the best. We heard that our rigger and friend was reading the blog and was concerned about the breakages. We have been pushing this baby hard.