by Rich Wilson | Jan 2, 2017 | Ship's Logs
We are still standing. A very bad night. The violence that the sea can heap on a boat is not describable. Think Joseph Conrad’s ‘Typhoon’. It was bad when the front was approaching, we were heading east, going across the seas, with a north wind, and...
by Rich Wilson | Jan 2, 2017 | Q&A, Q&A - RichWilson, Q&A-RW-wk9
Dear Zhiyuan: Great American III was designed by Bernard Nivelt and built and raced by Thierry Dubois in 2000. She was a fiberglass boat, with 2 rudders, 1 canting keel, and 1 centerline daggerboard ( a fin that slides up and down and helps the boat to go straight in...
by Rich Wilson | Jan 2, 2017 | Q&A, Q&A - RichWilson, Q&A-RW-wk9
Dear Jiaxuan: The most important part of a good sailing vessel is a strong hull because the most important thing in sailing is to keep the water outside the boat! I think the next most important will be the rudders, to be able to steer the boat, and the keel, to keep...
by Rich Wilson | Jan 2, 2017 | Q&A, Q&A - RichWilson, Q&A-RW-wk9
Dear Jessica and Gabriella, Once when I was young and racing, I sailed in front of another boat that had the right of way, and we had a collision. I was clearly not paying enough attention to the boats around me. That was my fault. For Vendée Globe 2008, we had a...
by Rich Wilson | Jan 1, 2017 | Ship's Logs
We are in the gale. We have 35-40 knots of wind now and it looks as though this will last for another 18 hours. Then we get to the center of the storm, and then the same, about 24 hours of storm from the south. Depressions rotate clockwise here in the Southern...
