Wilbur Hubbard wrote:


Tanya Abie of "Maiden Voyage" fame was twice the man poor Zac is. She had a
little help from her father on a couple occasions but nothing as ridiculous
as poor Zac. His parents are holding the baby bottle full of warm milk for
him, for Pete's sake.


Well, I have to agree. IMO, he has failed in his attempt. Two stoppages
and that's that. Here's a report:

"At midnight last Saturday the forestay of his 36-foot yacht Intrepid
separated from the chain plate at the bow while he was battling 20 knots
of wind and 10 foot seas. Luckily, the yacht has an inner forestay which
kept the mast up."

"Battling" 10 foot seas and 20 kt winds? Battling? Good grief. It makes
it sound like he was beset with a typhoon and 150 kt winds. If he were
to finish, he'd have accomplished nothing.

On Tue, 11 Nov 2008 17:19:54 -0700, slide
wrote:

"Battling" 10 foot seas and 20 kt winds? Battling? Good grief. It makes
it sound like he was beset with a typhoon and 150 kt winds. If he were
to finish, he'd have accomplished nothing.

Have you ever sailed a 36 ft boat in 10 ft seas and 20 knot winds for
any length of time ? It gets old pretty quickly.

On 2008-11-11 19:56:21 -0500, Wayne.B said:

On Tue, 11 Nov 2008 17:19:54 -0700, slide
wrote:

"Battling" 10 foot seas and 20 kt winds? Battling? Good grief. It makes
it sound like he was beset with a typhoon and 150 kt winds. If he were
to finish, he'd have accomplished nothing.

Have you ever sailed a 36 ft boat in 10 ft seas and 20 knot winds for
any length of time? It gets old pretty quickly.

I have. (actually was 31' through 50' at various times; winds and waves
exceeded those values) Piece of cake compared to a few hours of 15-20
and 3+ waves on the Chesapeake.

I've done 8 hours against 30+ and 6+ feet on the Bay with 28' and loved
it as a "done that" thing, but would much rather face what was reported
for Zac.

20 knots is a welcome occurrence to most of the world-travellers I've
followed. That such caused equipment failure points to other problems
in the equation of equipment and crew.

--
Jere Lull
Xan-à-Deux -- Tanzer 28 #4 out of Tolchester, MD
Xan's pages: http://web.mac.com/jerelull/iWeb/Xan/
Our BVI trips & tips: http://homepage.mac.com/jerelull/BVI/

"Jere Lull" wrote in message
news:2008111121584027544-jerelull@maccom...
On 2008-11-11 19:56:21 -0500, Wayne.B
said:

On Tue, 11 Nov 2008 17:19:54 -0700, slide
wrote:

"Battling" 10 foot seas and 20 kt winds? Battling? Good grief. It makes
it sound like he was beset with a typhoon and 150 kt winds. If he were
to finish, he'd have accomplished nothing.

Have you ever sailed a 36 ft boat in 10 ft seas and 20 knot winds for any
length of time? It gets old pretty quickly.

I have. (actually was 31' through 50' at various times; winds and waves
exceeded those values) Piece of cake compared to a few hours of 15-20 and
3+ waves on the Chesapeake.

I've done 8 hours against 30+ and 6+ feet on the Bay with 28' and loved it
as a "done that" thing, but would much rather face what was reported for
Zac.

20 knots is a welcome occurrence to most of the world-travellers I've
followed. That such caused equipment failure points to other problems in
the equation of equipment and crew.

--
Jere Lull
Xan-à-Deux -- Tanzer 28 #4 out of Tolchester, MD
Xan's pages: http://web.mac.com/jerelull/iWeb/Xan/
Our BVI trips & tips: http://homepage.mac.com/jerelull/BVI/



I sailed for two days (pretty much) into 30 kts. No idea of the wave
height.. at least 10'. I don't really want to ever do that again. That was
on a 48' CT, which is a damn heavy boat.


--
"j" ganz @@
www.sailnow.com

"Jere Lull" wrote in message
news:2008111121584027544-jerelull@maccom...
"Battling" 10 foot seas and 20 kt winds? Battling? Good grief. It makes
it sound like he was beset with a typhoon and 150 kt winds. If he were
to finish, he'd have accomplished nothing.
20 knots is a welcome occurrence to most of the world-travellers I've
followed. That such caused equipment failure points to other problems in
the equation of equipment and crew.

Don't blame Zac for the journos hype - they're the ones trying to make a
hero out of him.
Zac's own words when describing the conditions we "I was going between
6-7 knots in a nice 25 knot Indian Ocean trade on the aft quarter. ... I
switched on the spreader lights and found my gennie 15 feet from the boat
held by the furling line and the sheet. It looked like a spinnaker."
(quoted from his blog on www.zacsunderland.com)

He goes on to describe a bit of a battle getting the sail furled. I can
identify with that - furling a hanked on genny is quite a handful in 25 kt
and with a wrecked roller furler must have been quite a challenge.

I agree that he has had rather more outside support than is normal but I was
listening to the Volvo Ocean Race crew at the weekend and they have
considerably more external support. Their bosses know where they are every
15 minutes and virtually rebuild the boat in every port!

John.

On 2008-11-12 06:35:48 -0500, "John Seager" said:

"Jere Lull" wrote in message
news:2008111121584027544-jerelull@maccom...

20 knots is a welcome occurrence to most of the world-travellers I've
followed. That such caused equipment failure points to other problems in
the equation of equipment and crew.

Don't blame Zac for the journos hype - they're the ones trying to make a
hero out of him.
Zac's own words when describing the conditions we "I was going between
6-7 knots in a nice 25 knot Indian Ocean trade on the aft quarter. ... I
switched on the spreader lights and found my gennie 15 feet from the boat
held by the furling line and the sheet. It looked like a spinnaker."
(quoted from his blog on www.zacsunderland.com)

That confirms my contention this was likely caused by inadequacies in
the equipment or it's installation or maintenance.

The conditions were nice, thus not the major factor.

--
Jere Lull
Xan-à-Deux -- Tanzer 28 #4 out of Tolchester, MD
Xan's pages: http://web.mac.com/jerelull/iWeb/Xan/
Our BVI trips & tips: http://homepage.mac.com/jerelull/BVI/

Wayne.B wrote:
On Tue, 11 Nov 2008 17:19:54 -0700, slide
wrote:

"Battling" 10 foot seas and 20 kt winds? Battling? Good grief. It makes
it sound like he was beset with a typhoon and 150 kt winds. If he were
to finish, he'd have accomplished nothing.

Have you ever sailed a 36 ft boat in 10 ft seas and 20 knot winds for
any length of time ? It gets old pretty quickly.

32' boat. I found single handing a much larger boat (42') tougher due to
the larger rig. So what's your point? That a single hander RTW try
should be easy?