Bella Mente Version 7 goes to Cabo

I am sitting here still on east coast time waiting to get down to the boat which to sail to the start off Newport Beach.  Bella is to0 deep at almost 5 meters to get into Newport Harbor, so we a docked at Long Beach.  7 weeks ago, after Bella finished Key West Race Week, we added 5 feet to the Transom, modified the boom, added 20 sq meters to main and 70 to the spinnakers.  The boat also had to be trucked out from FL and a lot of other work to change it from a around the buoys boat to a CA ocean racer.  The shore group has done a fantastic job with all the changes and the boat is very ready and feels much faster.

Three new members have joined the crew.  Navigator Ian Moore, Volvo race winner Mike Sanderson and Kiwi Daniel Fong.  My job will be to do tactics and co navigate with Ian.  We have worked on many other projects before and won many races along the way.  It has been some time but nothing seems to be different other than he is a father of two now.

Looking at the weather it is not going to be too pleasant.  There is a front coming down and will cross the course over the next 36 hrs.  This puts us on the wind shortly after the start and I don’t expect to get spinnakers up for at least 36 hrs in a 70 hr race.  It won’t be too comfortable at all, not to mention the rain.

You can follow the race on the tracker at:http://cloud.iboattrack.com/r/start.php?r=2011_newportbeach_cabo

 

and the race info is at :http://www.nhyccaborace.com/nhyccaborace/Home.html

Just looked at the tracker and the smaller boats that started yesterday have had a good run in plenty of breeze.  It might be hard to catch them…  Well give a good go…