Bermuda 1-2: The Return...

...according to Mini sailor Clay Burkhaulter, is delayed. Here's his report from Bermuda:

Bermuda 1-2 Leg Two Start Delayed

The Bermuda 1-2 second leg start has been delayed do to a strong low pressure system that is moving off the coast on Sunday. The storm system has a pressure of 996 milibars and could produce storm force winds (50+ knots) in the area of the gulfstream and north to the coast, basically on the rhumb line for Newport. Winds are predicated to be from the North, so for the slower boats in the stream, conditions could be treacherous, and for the boats further up the course, heavy upwind conditions would prevail. It looks as though a delay of 24 hours might not help as the low stalls south of Nantucket and then starts to drift in a southerly direction, sitting directly on the rhumb line and producing consistent 30-40 knot winds.

Slightly more than half of the fleet wanted to get going despite the weather forecast... weather conditions until the low would have had us pushing along in reaching to downwind conditions, with 15-25 knot winds, for the next two days. When put out to the racers for a vote, I voted to get going... though in the end, it was Roy Guay, race director, who made the final decision to delay and it was proper that he made the decision as opposed to a vote by the racers.

Forecasts about the movement of this low will probably change again by this afternoon and tomorrow morning; yesterday at this time it was predicted to move off the coast of New Jersey and head out to the northeast; by this morning the forecast changed to the system stalling and then drifting south. Hopefully, computer models later today will show it again moving off to the northeast. Anyway, there could be worse places to sit and wait than Bermuda.

The race down was fine, depsite a broken spinnaker pole (1st night), broken rudder (2nd day) and an unhappy battery. The internet connections here in Bermuda amazingly seem to be stuck in some time-warp from 10 years ago... I will write a summary log of the whole race when I get back to Stonington and send it along. In the meantime, hunker down becuase it sounds like you are in for some more rain and lots of wind over the weekend, which you should be well use to by now. Here in Bermuda, the weather has been great.

Clay